LOS ANGELES — A walk followed by a home run. A single followed by another long ball.
Six batters into the first inning of an important West Coast road trip, Lance Lynn found himself and the White Sox trailing the Dodgers by four runs.
In the Dodgers’ 5-1 victory, Will Smith took Lynn deep to left field and David Peralta cleared the center field wall for the 17th and 18th home runs allowed by Lynn (4-7, 6.75 ERA) this season. Lynn settled into a better rhythm after that, stringing four scoreless innings and having an unearned run added to his line in the sixth, but with Dodgers right-hander Tony Gonsolin (4-1, 1.93 ERA) and three relievers holding the Sox to two hits, the first-inning damage was more than done.
“It’s kind of how it’s going right now,” Lynn said. “Two pitches cost you four runs in the first inning and then after that it’s just a battle. You put your team in a hole there early. All and all, my stuff feels pretty good. I have to figure out how to have productive outings because this isn’t going to work.”
A ground single through the infield by Jason Heyward and walk to J.D. Martinez to open the sixth ended Lynn’s night. In the dugout, Lynn slammed his glove and an ipad in frustration.
“It was an Ipad I didn’t think so I broke it,” Lynn said. “I’m probably going to have to pay for it, yeah.”
With Garrett Crochet pitching in relief, Yoan Moncada’s error on a potential double play — if not a triple play — preceded a sacrifice fly by Miguel Vargas making it 5-0.
The Sox (29-39) lost for the third time in a row and fell 51⁄2 games out of first place in the AL Central.
In first innings of his 14 starts this season, Lynn has allowed 19 earned runs on 25 hits including five homers, and eight walks.
“Today it was pitch selection,” Lynn said. “There’s been times where I wasn’t quite as sharp in the first inning but when it’s all said and done, the sinker in that Will hit was down and in. It’s kind of his spot but it’s also in the area after throwing him away a bunch of times you think he might have a chance to roll over it. But he’s ready for it. He’s been hot.”
Gonsolin got eight ground-ball outs, struck out six and gave up two hits — singles to Andrew Vaughn and Yoan Moncada — in six innings. Vaughn also doubled in the ninth against Tayler Scott and scored on Yasmani Grandal’s sacrifice fly against Brusdar Graterol.
“The contact we made was on the ground,” Grifol said. “We have to start getting the ball in the air.
“It’s pretty important for us to get the ball in the air. We got some guys that have the ability to drive the ball out of the ballpark and that’s something we’ve been talking about and we’ll continue to talk about. We’ve got to control the strike zone and put the ball in the air. Get away from those ground balls.”
“Every hitter across the board knows that driving the ball in the gaps is how you create damage and create runs,” Vaughn said.
