So close

The Royals rally in the ninth, but it's not enough to catch the Twins.

Two months ago when these teams met to kick off the 2024 season, it kind of felt to me as if the Twins were the class of the AL Central. They were certainly a difficult match-up for the Royals. It turns out that was a projection of my preseason bias (and predictions as I predicted the Twins to once again win the division). The reality was much closer to what we saw over those three games. The Royals played the Twins close in the first two games before Minnesota pushed through late. Then there was the third game of the season where the Royals crushed the Twins by an 11-0 score. Ultimately, they lost two of three yet outscored Minnesota by a 13-9 tally.

Everything we’ve seen from the 2024 Royals was on display in that opening series. A dormant offense that could spark to life. Great starting pitching. An at times wobbly bullpen.

The Twins and the Royals haven’t mixed it up since that meeting in March and plenty has transpired in the ensuing two months. Kansas City rolled into Minnesota five and a half games ahead of the third-place Twins in the Central. These are going to be key games this summer. On Monday, they were down early, rallied late and ultimately fell short by a final of 6-5.

Starter Alec Marsh went deep, completing seven innings for the second time this season and throwing a career-high 103 pitches. He also struck out seven for the third time in his last four starts. That sounds good, and maybe reading that, you think he did just fine. Except his location just wasn’t as sharp as one would like. Marsh was living dangerously for most of the afternoon, spotting his fastball way too centered in the zone for my taste. It was a center-cut 1-0 fastball that Trevor Larnash crushed for a three-run home run in the fifth inning.

Before that, the Twins were leading 2-0 after Jose Miranda clubbed a first-pitch sinker that caught far too much of the center of the zone for his fifth home run of the season.

It’s not really fair to highlight a couple of mistakes, but as I said, Marsh was making those kinds of pitches all afternoon.

The Twins were really laying off the pitches in the lower part of the zone. That cluster in the bottom third or so contains plenty of called strikes and few, if any, balls put in play. It was the elevated fastball that was going to cause issues and it popped up at just the wrong time for Marsh, meaning he made a couple of bad pitches with runners on base.

The Twins plated their final run of the afternoon in the eighth inning, an uncharacteristic one for the usual solid Royals defense. It unraveled, as these things often do, with two outs and nobody on base. The first misqueue was a popup in shallow right-center field. Four Royals converged and Bobby Witt Jr. took charge and made the call.

As we’ve seen throughout his time at shortstop, if there’s one thing Witt excels at (and there are many things Witt excels at) it’s going back on a pop up. There’s no such thing as no man’s land when he’s on the field. Indeed, he go there with room to spare, only to have the ball hit the heel of his glove and drop for an error. There’s certainly a high degree of difficulty in making that play, but we’ve seen Witt make those. The way he stretched, it looked as though second baseman Adam Frazier was a bit too close for comfort. Fortunately, he had peeled off at the last second because the two middle infielders were most definitely on a collision course. Unfortunately, I think Witt heard those footsteps and that prevented him from getting in an optimal position to make the play.

It’s one of those plays that in the moment you wonder if it will find a way to bite the Royals. It was going to be an easy inning for them and reliever Nick Anderson would’ve gotten out of the frame throwing only nine pitches. Instead, after a Ryan Jeffers single, Alex Kirilloff lifed a fly ball to shallow left.

I understand if the temptation is there to roast MJ Melendez and his defense, but he made a helluva run to get there. He actually had the ball in his glove. He made the catch. And then when his glove hit the ground, the ball popped out and the Twins had their final run of the afternoon and a five run lead. They would need every bit of that margin.

The Twins would need that margin because the Royals are simply never out of a ballgame. Even when down to their final three outs, there’s high potential they’re going to find a way to make things uncomfortable for their opponents. In this case, it started with a one-out Salvador Perez single. Because of course it does. After Nelson Velázquez popped to second, the fun really started.

Frazier singled and was followed by a Hunter Renfroe double to left that brought home Perez and moved Frazier to third. That double was highly important for a couple of reasons. One, and this is more trivial I suppose than important, it was the 55th consecutive game with an extra base hit for the team. Yes, they waited until two outs in the ninth to extend their streak. The fact that I’m mentioning it means I find it to be truly impressive. I didn’t think, at the start of this season, this team had a lineup that could pull off something like that where they’ve had at least one extra base hit in every game this season. They continue to find ways to surprise and amaze.

Second, it knocked reliever Cole Sands from the game and forced the Twins to go to their closer, Jhoan Durán.

And Durán didn’t have an easy go of it, either. He jumped ahead of Melendez 0-2 and then spiked a curve than caught him on the front foot. That loaded the bases. Then, the Royals engaged in some sort of dink-fest, soft contact rally. Dairon Blanco hit a dribbler to third that Willi Castro rightfully put in his pocket. That brought home a run to push the score to 6-3 and kept the bases loaded. The next batter, Maikel Garcia, basically replicated the Blanco hit and probably thinking, “What? Not again!” Castro instead of just holding onto the ball, chucked an off-balance throw to first. That effort got away and brought home not one, but two runs.

This had the potential to be the best rally in the history of rallies.

This unbelievable, yet delightful, string of events cut the score to 6-5 and brought Witt to the plate for another showdown with Durán.

You know what I mean when I write “another showdown.” Durán was the pitcher in that game from late July of last year that Witt hit the walk-off grand slam against that kickstarted this whole Royals renaissance. It’s exactly what you want in this situation. The best the Twins have to offer against the best of the Royals. It’s the AL Central version of Ohtani versus Trout in the World Baseball Classic.

This time the advantage went to Durán, who retired Witt on one pitch.

Man, you really want Witt to take at least one offering, don’t you? Get an opportunity to take a measure of what Durán is bringing to the confrontation. Swinging at an offering at that location just kind of feels like Witt was geared up to take a rip at the first pitch he saw if it was close. Durán gets some credit here. After back-to-back infield grounders for hits, he kept his cool and made a great pitch in that situation.

Advantage on this day goes to Durán. You can’t win ‘em all.

With a loss like this, it’s easy to engage in revisionist history. What if Witt had made that catch in the eighth? What if Melendez had made his? What if Witt had made Durán work in that final at bat? It’s also easy to describe this loss as a “moral victory” of sorts in that the team battled back. I’ll resist both temptations.

In the case of the eighth inning defense, yeah, it’s amazing this came to be the deciding run when they were already down by a large margin. But these things will happen from time to time I suppose. I mean, I’ll take Witt’s glove out there all day, everyday. That’s a play he’s going to make 99 times out of 100. I have less confidence in Melendez’s glove (naturally), but he was right there. Can’t fault the effort, or the route taken to the ball.

As for the “moral victory” aspect, I think this team has moved passed that. We can be heartened by the fact the team didn’t fold in the ninth—they put the ball in play and put pressure on the Twins to make a play. That’s a hallmark of these 2024 Royals that they’re competitive in every single game. But moral victories are for last year’s Royals. They’re something for bad teams to feel good about. The Royals are no longer a bad team. They need real victories.

Don’t get me wrong. Monday’s ninth inning was still a net positive. As long as these Royals are grinding and making their opponents uncomfortable, you have to take that. And do not lose sight of the fact that the Twins had to go to their closer to get one out and he ended up throwing 15 pitches. That could have implications as we move through this series.

The Royals just happened to come up short on Monday. The next time, the Twins may not be so fortunate.

Central Issues

Blue Jays 5, White Sox 1

The Jays hit three home runs, accounting for all their runs while Chris Bassett threw five shutout innings, striking out seven. The Hapless White Sox have now lost 10 of their last 11.

Guardians 6, Rockies 8

Charlie Blackmon drove in four as the Rockies overcame an early 4-1 deficit with six runs in the fourth snapping the Guardians’ winning streak at 10 games. Finally!