CHICAGO -- Coming off his longest start of the season, Yoshinobu Yamamoto will look to keep rolling on the South Side.
Yamamoto takes the ball for his 13th start on Saturday afternoon against the White Sox at Rate Field. The Dodgers have won the past three starts from their right-hander, who holds a 0.89 ERA (two runs in 20 1/3 innings) in that span.
The last time Yamamoto took the mound, he dominated the Angels, holding them to two hits and one run across eight strong innings last Saturday at Dodger Stadium. He'll aim to build on that strong performance against a White Sox team that has seemingly turned the page on three straight seasons of more than 100 losses to emerge as potential contenders in the AL Central.
Yamamoto has pitched against the White Sox just once in his career, tossing seven innings of one-run ball last July in L.A. In that contest, he faced only three players currently on Chicago's active roster: Andrew Benintendi, Chase Meidroth and former teammate Miguel Vargas.
After Yamamoto hit a bit of a lull that lingered into mid-May -- posting a 5.18 ERA in four starts from April 21 to May 12 -- he has looked much more like the ace who should be in contention for the Cy Young Award of late. Yamamoto has allowed no more than one run in each of his past four starts.
Among qualified National League pitchers, Yamamoto's 2.68 ERA ranks seventh. His .202 opponent batting average is tied for fifth, and his 0.92 WHIP ranks second.
There is a staggering amount of pitching talent in the NL. The Phillies' Cristopher Sánchez and the Brewers' Jacob Misiorowski have established themselves as the favorites in NL Cy Young voting -- with more than three months to go -- and Yamamoto faces steep competition from his own rotation mate, Shohei Ohtani. But if Yamamoto can continue stacking strong starts, he can put himself right at the forefront of the conversation for the Majors' top pitching honor.