Houston Astros baffled by Chris Sale, lose 10-1 to Chicago White Sox - Washington Post

CHICAGO â€" Houston’s Jordan Lyles matched White Sox left-hander Chris Sales for four innings before his defense let him down in the fifth.

And after the White Sox batted around while scoring five times, the Astros faced the daunting task of rallying against the 6-foot-6 Sale. It proved to be too difficult.

“Look at what he’s been doing. He was pretty outstanding,” Astros manager Brad Mills said after Sale pitched eight shutout innings in a 10-1 victory Saturday.

Gordon Beckham had three RBIs and Alejandro De Aza finished with four hits for the AL Central-leading White Sox, who bounced back from Friday night’s 8-3 loss in the series opener. Chicago finished with 17 hits â€" 16 singles and Adam Dunn’s 19th homer, a bases-loaded shot off Rhiner Cruz in the eighth for his 12th career grand slam.

“I just let the fifth inning blow up on me,” Lyles said, refusing to blame the poor fielding that jumped started the inning. “I didn’t make pitches. I put guys on base that I shouldn’t have.”

Chicago’s Alexei Ramirez reached on third baseman Matt Downs’ throwing error to start the fifth. Jordan Danks had an infield single and Ramirez reached third after a bad throw by second baseman Jose Altuve.

Eduardo Escobar worked a walk to load the bases, De Aza delivered an RBI single, and Beckham followed with a two-run single to right as Escobar made a nice slide around catcher Chris Snyder to score the third run. Dunn hit a sacrifice fly and, after a walk to Paul Konerko, Alex Rios had another RBI single to finish Lyles.

“You just can’t give a good hitting team like that extra outs,” Mills said.

Sale (8-2) gave up four singles, struck out seven and walked none while lowering his AL-leading ERA to 2.05 during his fifth straight victory.

“He did a good job of mixing it up with good movement on his pitches,” Houston’s Brian Bixler said. “He has great stuff.”

Jed Lowrie homered for the third straight game as the Astros averted the shutout in the ninth.

The 21-year-old Lyles allowed seven hits and five runs, four earned, with three walks in his season-low 4 1-3 innings. He is now 0-5 in 14 road games, including 12 starts.

NOTES: Houston placed OF Fernando Martinez on the seven-day disabled list Saturday for post-concussion like symptoms. Martinez was complaining of blurred vision. He was hit in the head by a pitch while playing for Oklahoma City on May 26. He was called up to the major league team June 2. Four days later, he may have hit his head diving for a ball against the Cardinals. “The thinking was that might have stirred something up a little bit. He went and saw the doctors on Friday and they wanted more tests done,” Mills said.

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