Lopez stays winless despite career-high 10 K's
Royals right-hander yields 3 costly HRs in loss to White Sox
Jeffrey Flanagan
@FlannyMLBCHICAGO -- Royals right-hander Jorge Lopez brought his “A” stuff to the mound on Tuesday night. But it still wasn’t enough.
Lopez struck out a career-high 10 batters, but he fell victim to the long ball, surrendering three home runs in the Royals’ 5-1 loss to the White Sox at Guaranteed Rate Field. The Royals are 0-5 on the road this season.
“Just a couple of mistakes they didn’t miss,” manager Ned Yost said. “There were probably three balls they did damage on, but other than that, I thought he threw extremely well. We just couldn’t get anything going against their [Reynaldo] Lopez -- he kept us off-balance.”
Jorge Lopez struck out the side in the first and he had seven strikeouts through three innings. But he left a two-seamer up in the zone to Yoan Moncada in the third inning and Moncada drove it over the left-center-field wall.
Then in a 1-1 game in the fifth, Lopez was betrayed by his breaking stuff which had been so effective early on.
Lopez walked Yolmer Sanchez with one out in the fifth. Then, Leury Garcia, who had struck out his first two times up and looked bad chasing curveballs, jumped on a 1-1 changeup for a two-run home run to right.
Afterward, Lopez seemed to second-guess the pitch selection.
“He had been swinging and missing on my curveball,” Lopez said. “That’s something we’re still thinking about. I’m still thinking why we threw a changeup there. I didn’t have that conviction to it. I left it up and it wasn’t good. I couldn’t execute it.”
Moncada was next up and he got Lopez again, this time on a 1-0 curve that he rifled over the fence in right for a 4-1 lead.
“He was probably looking for [a curveball] because I was throwing a lot of curveballs to lefties,” Lopez said. “But I couldn’t get him to swing and miss on anything else. He was really locked in.
“Moncada can do damage. You have to be careful to him. I was impressed.”
For the night, Lopez gave up eight hits and four runs while walking two. The 10 strikeouts were nice, he said, but, “It’s a lot nicer if you get the win. It’s my only my fifth start this season. I know I will get better.”