White Sox 5, Royals 1: Long balls back the better López

White Sox win

Jorge Lopez’s second time facing the White Sox look an awful lot like his first.

Reynaldo López’s night looked like one he hadn’t enjoyed yet in 2019.

The White Sox’ Lopez overcame early wobbles to throw six strong innings, and an outburst of power in the middle innings was enough support for his first win of the season.

Just like back on March 31, Lopez got a lot of ugly swings over the first three innings. He racked up seven strikeouts through three, with Yoan Moncada’s opposite-field blast the only damage.

But his offspeed stuff drifted higher as he went through the order a second and third time …

… and the White Sox started pouncing.

In the fifth, Yolmer Sánchez drew a one-out walk on five pitches. Up came Leury García, who spun his entire frame into a hanging changeup and sent it 428 feet into the right-field seats for a 3-1 lead.

Two pitches later, Lopez threw Moncada a spinner on the outside corner, and Moncada ripped it into the Kansas City bullpen to make it back-to-back.

The Royals’ Lopez ended up striking out 10 Sox on the evening over six innings, but it once again ended without a quality start on a night KC needed one.

Reynaldo López also went six, but he limited the damage to a Lucas Duda solo shot on a hanging two-strike slider in the second. That was an ugly mistake, and coming after some shaky control in the first inning, López looked like he might have another difficult night in store.

Instead, he came back and retired the next seven. When he had to deal with traffic again, he found the double play ball. The Sox went around the horn on Chris Owings to end the fourth inning, and then turned a 6-5-3 double play in the shift to double up Ryan O’Hearn.

In terms of pitch mix, López had just about an ideal night. He did most of the setup work with a 95 mph fastball, then had both the slider and changeup at his disposal. He threw 20 of each and got nine swinging strikes between them. He only had half the strikeouts of the other Lopez, but he gave up a third of the homers.

Speaking of which, Yonder Alonso visited the Goose Island in the eighth inning to cap a four-hit game He raised his average from .152 to .220 in one night. The blast shoved the game out of a save situation for Alex Colomé, but Colomé was already warm and pitched around a one-out walk to close it out.

Bullet points:

*Moncada’s multi-homer night pushed his OPS back up over 1.000 (1.023).

*Tim Anderson didn’t back up my morning post, going 0-for-4 with two strikeouts and a double play. He did steal a base, at least.

*Jose Abreu also looked off, going 0-for-4 with a silver sombrero.

*García let a couple of flies drop in front of him, including a Jorge Soler “single” on which he broke the wrong way. A flare to right field in the ninth also fell in front of him, but he racked up the assist at second base.

*Engel entered in center and made a catch at the wall in left center look easy.

*Daniel Palka is now 0-for-32 after going 0-for-3 with two strikeouts.

Record: 7-9 | Box score | Highlights

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Yolmer

Lopez had a tick more on his fastball than earlier this year. I think he needs to work pretty consistently 95 mph plus to be effective. Also, like the rest of the White Sox pitching except Herrera and Colome, needs to limit walks.

Let’s hope Giolito can get the ball over the plate and show more of that fastball siting 94-95 mph. He’d be a very good pitcher this year if not for the crazy bad walk rate. Going for the sweep baby, get pumped.

karkovice squad

Have to wait for them to load the data for tonight but it looks like his fastball has picked up more run and is getting harder to square up. It also makes his secondary stuff play up.

It was trending in the right direction coming into tonight (2019 on the right):
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karkovice squad

A bit less movement than his previous start but that at least looks workable if he can command it.
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MrTopaz

That Leury home run was pretty as hell.

denbum

So much more enjoyable with a win or two. And having Herrera and Colome for the 8th and 9th makes it even more so. Trouble is, whenever the Sox win and these two seal the deal, you’ll inevitably hear the talk about flipping them in July. I hope that if the W Sox start turning it around and winning becomes a little more frequent, that they don’t flip these guys. Building a winning culture is vital, and if these guys go and leave guys like N Jones or Ruiz as closers, I feel like they’re going backwards. I want to see minimum of 75+ wins THIS year and Herrera and Colome are set in place. And this team has so few players that are set in place.

hitlesswonder

If either or both of Herrera or Colome could net a top 150 prospect, I’d flip them in a heartbeat. The sooner the better to improve the Sox draft position. I absolutely sympathize with the desire to win games, and I even agree that winning establishes something that is undervalued in terms of the impact on players like Anderson and Moncada that the Sox want to be the core of a competitive team.

But the Sox are going to be bad this season, and they really need more minor league talent since they clearly aren’t going to sign quality FAs.

jose robcada

i mean i dont wanna seem overly optimistic here but the whole division is bad, id say we have a chance to stack up with any other team in the division right now just by comparing lineups as long as the rotation isnt a total dumpsterfire

ya indians got starting pitching but that lineup/bullpen aint scaring noone, and ya twins are better than last year but they too arent intimidating

not too mention look at our schedule next month and a half… literally the only tough matchup is houston and red sox (if they get their act together)… not implying we are a super impressive team just that the whole division isnt very impressive, so far ive been having fun watching games which i couldnt say as much last year

roke1960

I agree completely, denbum. Why flip one of those guys for another AA prospect? We have enough of those already. Let’s create a winning culture here. Right now the 8th and 9th innings are in good hands, and it looks like maybe Fry and Jones are becoming the 7th inning guys. Our bullpen will very likely be a strength before too long- with the possibility of adding Fulmer, Burdi and Hamilton to the mix as the season goes on. It all depends on the starters. If our starters are good, we can contend in this weak division. If they aren’t and we are floundering, Hahn should still be looking to add at the deadline. The days of adding mid-tier prospects are over. It’s time to move forward.

tommytwonines

I say Palka goes to Charlotte after he gets a hit. 

Brett R. Bobysud

Swap him for Cordell or Tilson.

zerobs

Tilson would require a 40-man roster move. 

Brett R. Bobysud

Right. So swap him for Cordell then.

gooch

Leury’s defense leaves something to be desired. On that Soler blooper, he took two big steps backwards before breaking in on that ball. But he has been the best leadoff batter we’ve had since Eaton. Hoping we see more of him in RF rather than CF.

PauliePaulie

The Sox are better than the Royals.

tommytwonines

You said that out loud. 

Eagle Bones

How do I tell them that because of the rebuilding process I have no inner monologue? I hope I didn’t say that out loud just now.