The Chicago White Sox signed Lance Lynn to a contract extension during the 2021 season and right now that deal isn’t looking promising. The veteran starting pitcher suffered his third loss of the season Monday night, as the White Sox lost their fifth game in a row. Lynn is getting dangerously close to Dallas Keuchel levels of bad.

In the 5-2 series opening loss to the Toronto Blue Jays, Lynn walked 3+ batters for the fourth time in his first five starts, increasing his walk rate to 10.5 percent this season. That needs to be fixed as soon as possible or the White Sox are going to continue watching more bad results from Lynn.

Comparing Lance Lynn to Dallas Keuchel

Left-handed starting pitcher Dallas Keuchel only pitched in eight games before the White Sox DFA’d the former Cy Young Award winner last year. There were already warning signs that the lefty was going to regress quickly going back to 2021 and although Lynn ended 2022 strong, both pitchers are having eerily similar results through five starts.

So, here’s Keuchel’s first five starts of 2022 compared to Lynn’s first five starts of 2023.

The biggest difference at the moment is that Lynn is a much more lovable player than Keuchel, who was later revealed to be the player spreading rumors to media about the White Sox clubhouse last year. Keuchel was also the easy scapegoat for White Sox fans through the first month of the 2022 season, as they didn’t expect the year to end up being one of the most miserable in recent memory.

Keuchel threw a total of 32 innings for the White Sox last year, recording a 7.88 ERA and 2.16 WHIP before he was designated for assignment on May 28, 2022.

Meanwhile, Lynn isn’t the only problem for the White Sox and as a group, Chicago’s starting rotation has been annoyingly bad through the first three weeks of the 2023 season.

White Sox Pitching Rankings

Here are where the White Sox pitching staff ranks among all 30 MLB teams in various categories.

ERA: 3rd Worst
WHIP: 2nd Worst
HR/9: 6th Worst
BB%: 3rd Worst
FIP: 5th Worst
xFIP: 5th Worst

Now, as far as Lynn goes, I wouldn’t say he’s destined to be DFA’d like Keuchel. Not even close. For starters, Lynn at least still does have the ability to work out of jams with an above average strikeout rate, which Keuchel simply could not do. Lynn also showed in 2022 that after a bad start to his season, he got stronger and rebounded after July, posting a 2.43 ERA in his last 12 starts.

However, just like 2022, Keuchel isn’t the only problem for the White Sox, who currently have the fourth worst record in baseball at 7-16, only ahead of the Colorado Rockies, Oakland A’s and Kansas City Royals.