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It’s not often that a team comes back from seven runs. The largest comeback in Royals history is nine runs. But that’s exactly what this young, undefeated team did.
After going down 8-1 after 2.5 innings, Kansas City made a frantic comeback, scoring eight unanswered runs to eventually take a 9-8 lead in the 7th after scoring runs in the 3rd, 4th, 5th and 7th innings.
Everything was in vain.
Aroldis Chapman blew the save, giving up the game and winning runs in the 8th inning. Baltimore added three more in the ninth against Amir Garrett in place of Chapman. This time the Royals were unable to put together a comeback and eventually fell to the Orioles 13-10. To make matters worse, the game ended at the plate representing the tying run by Hunter Dozier. He was hitting in place of Vinny Pasquantino, who took over as a defensive replacement in the 8th.
The loss pushes the Royals to 8-24 on the season and drops another series. Kansas City has just one win streak on the season and has dropped seven straight. Home record drops to 2-14.
In the 2nd inning, it looked like this game was over. Lyles appeared to be on his way to a clean 1st inning after two hits when MJ Melendez threw the third out of the game. Anthony Santander followed with a two-run homer to give Baltimore a 2-0 lead. It’s not ideal, but both run without fail.
However, Cedric Mullins doubled all of them to put the Orioles up 5-0, giving up a single, a walk and a hit batter, and a overwhelmed Lyles couldn’t corral himself. Kansas City got one back in the bottom of the 2nd before Lyles struck again for a quick inning. However, after getting the first two outs of the 3rd, Lyles would give up a walk, a wild pitch, an RBI single to George Matteo, another wild pitch and finally a two-run homer to Gunnar Henderson.
When the dust settled, it was 8-1 Baltimore. In fairness to Lyles, he did what he always does. He continued to throw. Matt Quatraro put him in there and was able to rally through five innings, including a big shutout in the 5th inning.
However, it was the latest in a string of bad starts from Lyles, which included giving up seven runs in his last start to the Twins. The Royals overpaid him, and with Chris Bubick injured, Daniel Lynch appears to have a stable spot in the rotation even when he returns. And with that, Kansas City got what they paid for: an innings eater that wasn’t good at defending the run. And they paid more than they could.
Meanwhile, the Royals offense took off. Freddie Fermin hit his 3rd home run in his career debut.
Bobby Witt Jr. followed with a walk and scored on Salvador Perez’s 6th homer of the season to cut the Orioles’ lead to 8-4. For all the Royals’ struggles this season, Perez has been quietly buzzing, even before his latest onslaught of homers. Since April 18th, Salvi is slashing .341/.340/.636, good for a 181 wRC+ while walking 6% (!!) of the season. And that doesn’t count today’s Homer.
Melendez followed with his second double of the day, but Orioles starter Grayson Rodriguez was able to escape a one-out jam. The rookie and former first rounder battled back despite giving them a big lead, cutting the lead to 8-5 in the fourth on Kyle Isbell’s solo shot. It was Isbell’s first homer of the season and 3rd of the game for Kansas City.
Fermin immediately followed with another first, this time his first career triple, which he did immediately on cycle time. Witt Jr. singled to 2nd, but Vinny Pasquintino came up with an RBI single to bring the Royals within two runs.
A leadoff single from Melendez led to a critical sequence when Nick Prato grounded into a double play. Kansas City successfully challenged the call, leaving Pratt on 1st. That allowed Michael Massey to line an RBI double into the right-center gap, trimming the lead to 8-7. Isabelle Massey left at 2nd but the damage was done.
Kansas City responded with six unearned runs to lead 8-1 after 2.5 innings. But their best chance to win the game so far came in the bottom of the 6th. After Austin Cox’s scoreless first inning, the Royals loaded the bases with a walk from Fermin, a double from Witt Jr., and an intentional walk to Salvi. This red-hot Melendez brought to the plate in front of left Danny Coulombe, who came Brian Baker.
Columbe chased down Melendez with a 2-1 fastball and a 2-2 sweeper before striking out Prato. It will be a missed opportunity that looms large.
The offense came right back in the 7th with a double by Michael Garcia. Garcia then stole 3rd and scored on a single by Isbell Bunn, tying the game 8-8 with runners on 1st and 2nd. A walk after Garcia’s double drove in Witt Jr.’s single in Massey, and before you knew it, the Kansas City Royals were up 9-8 in this baseball game.
It won’t be long.
Arldis Chapman immediately ran into trouble with runners on 2nd and 3rd with nobody out. A Ramon Uria single scored two, putting the Orioles up 10-9. More recently, catcher Dozier came in as a defensive replacement, taking Pasquintino’s spot in the lineup. They added three more runs off Garrett in the 9th to make it 13-9.
Chapman and Garrett combined to give up five runs and walk five batters in 1.1 innings of work.
Somehow, the potent Royals offense rallied once in the 9th to add a 10th run and bring the tying run to the plate by Witt Jr. That’s not Vinnie Pasquantino, the Royals’ best hitter by a country mile. Dozier struck out to end the game.
Hindsight is 20/20, of course. However, for a defender who already had a career-high -51.6 earned run average in 17 RPA games, getting rid of the best hitter in the lineup? Not Matt Quatraro’s best moment.
Not much else to say. This is like loss back loss 8-23 It can have 24 teams.
to athletics.
Next: Royals v. Athletics, Friday, May 5, 7:10 pm CDT, Kauffman Stadium. RHP Brad Keller (2-2, 3.56 ERA) v. LHP Kyle Muller (0-2, 6.28 ERA)
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