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Closeout Sale: White Sox ace much more efficient
- Updated: July 23, 2016
9:50 AM ET
Chicago White Sox starter Chris Sale shares the major league lead in wins with 14 this season, but he’s gotten there with a completely revamped game plan compared with past seasons. He’s gone from a strikeout pitcher to a contact one, which allows him to go deeper into games.
Case in point was Monday night, when he threw eight highly efficient, scoreless, one-hit innings in a no-decision against the Mariners. He had an apparently sure win snatched away when the Mariners rallied for four runs in the ninth against David Robertson.
It was the second time in Sale’s career that he allowed one or no hits in eight innings or more. He threw a one-hit shutout against the Angels in 2013.
On Saturday, he faces a Tigers team that hits ground balls on 43 percent of balls in play, the second-lowest total in the American League, which should challenge Sale’s new road map.
Early-career strikeout king
Sale’s 900 strikeouts from 2012 to 2015 were the most in the AL. In that span, his 28 percent strikeout rate trailed only that of Max Scherzer and Clayton Kershaw (29 percent each), among those who made at least 100 starts in …
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