2020 OOTP sim: Late rally falls short for Sox

López drops his first of the season with a wild start

CHICAGO — Reynaldo López, heading into play with a spotless 6-0 record, 3.29 ERA and .206 opponent batting average, was due for a fall.

It's a tribute to how terrific the young righthander has been that even a first loss this season was only a mild setback. Chicago in fact was never out of the game, losing an early lead and leaving the tying run on third at the end of a 5-4 loss to Cleveland. 

López especially menaced presumptive AL MVP Francisco Lindor, who entered play hitting .384 but whiffed twice against the righty's wicked offerings. 

The Chicagos struck first, in the fourth, with Eloy Jiménez and José Abreu went back-to-back. In a sign that the season-long slump for El Pito is vanquished, he got the green light on 3-0 and punished the ball out to left. 

In the fifth, Cleveland began its comeback. Lindor fared better on his third pass against López, walking with the bases loaded, one of five free passes from the White Sox starter on the day. A sac fly knotted the game 2-2, and in the sixth, a Bobby Bradley leadoff dinger shook López out of the game.

Three straight singles off of Pat Venditte made it 4-2, Cleveland, and got the South Side relief ace his first fast hook of the season. The Wahoos finished out their scoring before the sixth was out, with another sac fly, pushing it to 5-2.

A Zack Collins double and Eloy safety tightened the game to 5-4 in the eighth, but the White Sox ran out of gas in the ninth after Yasiel Puig and Luis Robert singles were stifled with a game-ending K by Leury García.

The White Sox fall to 35-33, 7 ½ games back of first. Next up for the Good Guys is a weekend series against AL West-leading Houston.