
The White Sox turned the tables on the A’s from the previous night.
After Kendall Graveman threw his first career shutout Friday, Chicago ace Chris Sale silenced the A’s bats in a 6-2 Sox victory Saturday at U.S. Cellular Field.
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The big lefty allowed just three hits over eight innings and struck out eight, his best start in a month. The White Sox knocked A’s starter Ross Detwiler from the game after just four innings, getting to him for runs in each frame that he was on the mound.
Detwiler (1-2) got touched for six runs and 10 hits, with the Sox doing most of their damage with two outs, which had to be most frustrating of all for the lefty.
The A’s biggest highlight came when Danny Valencia led off the ninth with a home run off Nate Jones to avoid a shutout for Oakland.
Starting pitching report
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After a sterling effort in his A’s debut on Aug. 10, Detwiler has found the going a bit rougher in his last two starts. On Saturday, he had trouble closing out innings. Four of the six runs off him were scored after he’d recorded two outs. Jose Abreu took him deep to the opposite field in the first. After retiring the first two batters in the second, Detwiler surrendered four singles in a row, though not all the balls were hit very hard. Back-to-back doubles in the third from Abreu and Melky Cabrera made it 4-0 and Todd Frazier followed with a run-scoring single. Cabrera delivered another RBI hit in the fourth when his single scored Adam Eaton for a 6-0 lead in the fourth.
Bullpen report
Daniel Coulombe, Chris Smith and John Axford held the Sox off the scoreboard over the final four innings.
At the plate
The A’s made a bit of noise in the ninth to make the final margin closer. Valencia homered to right for his 15th long ball of the season. Brett Eibner added an RBI single that scored Ryon Healy.
Sale, a five-time All-Star and one of the American League’s most dominant starters, had given up eight runs combined over his previous two starts. But he threw 120 pitches Saturday and powered his way through eight innings, beating the A’s for the second time in as many starts facing them this season. A’s second baseman Chad Pinder went 0-for-4 in his major league debut but drove the ball to the wall in center in the ninth, where Adam Eaton made a nice catch for the final out.
In the field
Eibner looked like he had a shot for a sensational catch on Abreu’s first-inning drive to right. The ball barely cleared the wall and Eibner leapt and got his glove on the ball but couldn’t haul it in. Neither team committed an error.
Up next
With Jesse Hahn getting scratched for Sunday, Zach Neal (2-2, 5.19) will take the ball for the 11:10 a.m. series finale. The A’s will face another lefty in Jose Quintana (9-9, 2.85).