SEATTLE — The White Sox needed Lance Lynn to go deep with a taxed bullpen needing some rest on the last day of a six-game West Coast road trip.
Lynn gave them seven-plus innings and a season-high 114 pitches.
While he was at it, the 36-year-old right-hander struck out 16 batters over seven innings, tying a franchise record held by Jack Harshman, who struck out 16 at Boston on July 25, 1954. It was the most strikeouts by a Sox since Chris Sale had 15 on Aug. 16, 2015, against the Cubs.
It also came in a 5-1 loss, and as Lynn knows, the Sox need to start hitting and stop losing. This defeat resulted in a lost series and a 2-4 trip that started in Los Angeles and dropped their record to 31-42. That was no way for a team that believes it’s still a postseason contender to begin carving away at an eyesore record.
“All in all, my stuff was good today but we lost,” said Lynn, who will take a 4-8 record and 6.51 ERA into his next start. “It doesn’t matter how many you strike out, you have to win the game. It was a series loss for us and we need to win as many series as we can, and today we weren’t able to do that.”
For his part, Lynn was magnificent. Using his full arsenal of pitches, he got 33 swings and misses. Only Jacob deGrom in 2020, Danny Duffy in 2016 and Clayton Kershaw in 2015 (35 each) have had more in the pitch-tracking era since 2008.
“Only one of the best pitching performances I’ve ever seen,” Sox right-hander Lucas Giolito said. “He was painting [corners], like an artist.”
Lynn was the oldest pitcher to strike out 16 or more since Randy Johnson had 17 for the Diamondbacks on Sept. 14, 2002. When everyone at T-Mobile Park thought he was done after seven innings and 113 pitches, Lynn went back to the mound in the eighth trailing 2-1.
“My goal was to make sure nobody was used. Came a little short of that,” Lynn said.
Kolten Wong bunted for a single on the first pitch, and manager Pedro Grifol went to Reynaldo Lopez, who didn’t belong on the same mound on this day. Lopez walked two and gave up a three-run triple to Jarred Kelenic, making it 5-1. Lynn was charged with three runs. He walked two batters and gave up four hits, including a two-run double to Julio Rodriguez in the third inning.
“He knew we needed him and that’s what makes him great,” Grifol said. “It doesn’t -matter what he’s done or his ERA or -anything like that, it’s what he’s done in his career and who he is.”
Lynn’s sweeper was sharp and he got swings and misses with his changeup. He pitched in, away and up in the zone. It was an unexpected performance, even for a former All-Star with Lynn’s pedigree. He had two games of 10 strikeouts this season but had struck out a total of 14 while allowing 22 hits (including six home runs) and seven walks in his previous three starts.
“He really mixed the pitches well, got them to good locations and did a good job reading hitters,” pitching coach Ethan Katz said. “The only mistake he made was the Julio fastball for a double. The shape of his pitches were fantastic and location was really good, just [not] the one pitch that he missed and they capitalized on it.”
“On the offensive side, we didn’t get anything going,” Grifol said. “We’ve got to score runs for him and we didn’t.”
Elvis Andrus doubled in the sixth and scored on Andrew Benintendi’s single, -cutting the lead to 2-1.
“To see Lance give it his all, he has their hitters off balance all day. It’s disappointing we couldn’t get more runs for him,” said Jake Burger, who had one of the Sox’ four hits against Mariners starter Bryce Miller (5-3, 3.68).
