White Sox’s Liam Hendriks gets first win since cancer battle

Jake Burger‘s game-ending grand slam handed Liam Hendriks his first win since returning from cancer, and the Chicago White Sox beat the Detroit Tigers 6-2 on Sunday for a three-game series sweep.

Hendriks (1-0) worked a 1-2-3 ninth, striking out two. It was the third big league appearance for the All-Star closer since he missed the start of the season after he was diagnosed with stage 4 non-Hodgkin lymphoma.

Hendriks’ win coincided with National Cancer Survivors Day in the United States.

“Hopefully I can continue moving forward and continue somewhat of at least doing the right thing on the field, and give people some hope to continue fighting,” Hendriks said.

Yoán Moncada and Tim Anderson walked with one out to load the bases for Burger, who hit a drive to left-center off Alex Lange (3-1) for his 12th homer of the season. It was his first career slam and game-ending homer.

“We’d faced (Lange) a couple times and he’s a great pitcher,” Burger said. “Today, we got the better of him, but he’s gotten the better of us in the last couple of outings. That’s baseball.”

Spencer Torkelson hit a two-run homer for Detroit, which has dropped five of six. Matthew Boyd struck out nine while pitching five innings of one-run ball.

Tigers manager A.J. Hinch said Lange had been on “such a good roll,” but was a “little erratic” in the ninth.

“(The grand slam) makes it sting even more when you can’t finish the game,” Hinch said. “Frustrating day.”