Three innings that defined the sweep

Pivotal moments in each win over the Twins as the Royals rediscover their nerve and focus on the finish line. The postseason is near.

I’m not going to jump out and write that the Royals needed that three-game sweep against AL Central rivals, the Minnesota Twins. I will say that it was very much welcome.

Quite the turnaround from the depths that accompany a seven-game losing streak. We’ve seen the ups and downs—or as our friends from England would say, the swings and roundabouts—in bursts this season, usually on a game by game basis. To see almost two solid weeks where the first half was spent screaming, with our hands helplessly in the air while the rollercoaster was plummeting only to go to the weightless euphoria of rising back to the peak…It’s exhausting, man.

Back in the early days of the blog, the word cloud was kind of a cool gimmick. Not sure it’s a thing anymore, but if it was I expect the word resiliency would be well represented. It seems as if I’ve been writing about that as a core characteristic of this team almost from the opening pitch of the season. Generally, I write about it as it pertains within a game. These last two weeks have shown that this is a Royals team that not only gets off the mat when all looks lost in a ballgame, but they can do the same thing over the course of a series.

When I recharge the batteries over the weekend, I usually don’t do a full recap of all the games. Generally, there’s not really a point to do that. Friday is a distant memory by the time Monday rolls around. Yet there was something in this series against the Twins that deserves mention. The resiliency runs deep in this ballclub. So I’ve chosen to focus on one inning from each game where the Royals showed the fortitude to stand their ground.

This series, just three games in their journey to October, says so much about this 2024 Royals team.

Keeping momentum on their side
Friday - The top of the 4th

The game before, back on Wednesday, the Royals finally pulled out of their tailspin that saw them lose a season-high seven consecutive games. The victory provided a moment to collectively exhale. The Royals were still in position for a postseason spot and were still lurking around what has been a semi-competitive AL Central.

Friday presented a new challenge. The Twins stumbled into Kansas City with a 22-22 record since the All-Star break, yet had mostly handled the Royals in 2024, winning seven of 10. Minnesota has stared down injuries and underperformance yet somehow provides a formidable opponent for these Royals. It’s been that way since the opening game of the season. As recently a month ago, I favored these Twins to put it together to jump the Guardians for the lead in the Central. While expectations have been recalibrated, the Twins would be dangerous. Nothing could be taken for granted.

While Wednesday’s game was provided some relief from the stress of a postseason race, Friday’s affair started off a bit nervy. There was a touch of apprehension in the air. Would the Royals be able to build off their lone win in over a week? Or would the Twins roll in to Kansas City and once again push the Royals around? The Royals had Cole Ragans on the mound who is exactly what you want in a large game. The lefty gave the Twins a glimmer of hope in the first, allowing a pair of two-out singles, but quickly settled in. He fanned Royce Lewis in the third for his 200th strikeout of the season.

The Royals opened the scoring in the bottom of the third. With one out, number nine hitter Kyle Isbel worked a walk and scored one pitch later when Tommy Pham ripped a double to left. Pham was left at second, but the Royals had the 1-0 lead.

If we’ve learned anything following these Royals, it’s how important it is to get a shutdown inning on the back of putting some runs (or a single run) on the board. The broadcast seems to place great emphasis on this, but I would tend to agree. The last thing any competitor wants to do once they find an advantage is to cough it back up. In this situation, it was probably even more important than usual. I don’t have any data to back that up, obviously. It’s just a feel. Given that this team had recently snapped an extended losing streak, they certainly didn’t want to surrender any ground. They didn’t want to give up that ground to their kryptonite, these Minnesota Twins. Especially in the early going. Once they seized control—even just an early one run advantage—they needed to find a way to keep it.

The top of the fourth started out smoothly enough. Ragans jumped ahead 0-2 to José Miranda and got him to fly out to right. He fell behind 2-0 to Matt Wallner, fought back to get the count full, and then induced a tapper back to the mound. Things were looking good to get out of the inning with the narrow lead secure.

Yet danger was near. Kyle Farmer singled. Fine. A two-out single. Not a lot of threat there. That brought up Austin Martin. Ragans started him with a cutter up and well out of the zone. That followed with an elevated changeup on the inner half that Martin watched for a strike. For the third pitch, Ragans delivered a carbon copy of the second—an elevated change on the inner half. Martin was ready. He ripped a line drive to left. It bounced up against the wall. Left fielder Tommy Pham was quick to the ball and delivered a perfect strike to Bobby Witt Jr. who ventured out to shallow left. While that was happening, Farmer had turned the corner at third and chugged home. Not a great decision.

The order of events in this GIF always surprises me. Farmer hits third. We see him get, what…at least 15 feet beyond third on his way to the plate? And then Witt collects the throw from Pham. Witt turns and guns a throw to Salvador Perez at the plate that nails Farmer by a couple of steps. What? How is this even possible?

Shades of Alex Gordon to Alcides Escobar to Perez. (I simply love that the one constant in all of this is Salvy. There’s going to be a lot more discussion of this in the coming weeks. A lot.)

The relay extinguished the threat, ended the inning and, more importantly, kept the Twins off the board. Had the Twins scored in that situation, they would’ve tied the score, had a runner on second and likely killed any early game momentum. Sometimes the intangibles matter. If you go back and visit the game log from Friday, you’ll see the top plays by Win Expectancy. It’s what you would expect to find in a 5-0 ballgame. You’ll see the Pham double that opened the scoring. The Michael Massey home run an inning later. And the Hunter Renfroe two-run single. Yeah…the run-scoring plays are important, obviously. But we cannot discount the importance of that relay throw in the third. It squelched a potential rally and served notice the Royals would not be the usual pushovers for the Twins.

Quick-Strike Offense strikes again
Saturday - The bottom of the 8th

Saturday’s starter for the Twins, Bailey Ober, has had a terrific season. Except when he’s pitching against the Royals. Overall, Ober came into his latest start with a 3.95 ERA in 26 starts. Yet two of his worst starts this year have been against the Royals. It’s always been this way for Ober. Entering Saturday, he had a 7.71 ERA against Kansas City in nine career starts.

The past didn’t seem to matter. Ober hit Perez with a pitch in the first and allowed a leadoff single to Robbie Grossman in the third. That was it. Complete cruise control from the Minnesota starter. As we know, this Royals offense can certainly struggle at times, but this was just some sort of dominating performance. Ober was getting whiffs. He was getting weak contact. After Grossman’s single, he retired the next 15 batters in a row.

After seven innings, Ober had thrown 83 pitches. That’s on the low end of his range. In fact, he’s thrown 82 or more pitches in 24 of his 27 starts. In those 24 starts, he averages 90 pitches. He’s topped 95 pitches in eight starts this year. His manager Rocco Baldelli doesn’t push him, but those 82 pitches Ober had thrown on Saturday were of the extremely low stress variety. Ober had more in the tank.

From Day Hayes at The Athletic:

“After the seventh, I’m thinking maybe I can finish this thing out just because of the low pitch count, and I was on a roll,” Ober said. “I felt like I was locating stuff in and out. Even when I fell behind to Pham 3-0, I was able to strike him out. I felt like I was in control the whole day. Obviously, the competitor in me wants to keep pitching the whole game. I always want to be out there and throw.

I think Ober perfectly encapsulated his outing. He was in control.

The Twins have a nifty one-two combo in the bullpen in Griffin Jax and Jhoan Durán. Jax closed games early in the season while Durán was out with an injury. Since returning, Durán has notched a save in 22 of 24 opportunities, including in each of the last four Twins victories. The order seems set. Except Baldelli brought in Durán to face the Royals in the eighth. He opened with a strikeout against the sixth place hitter, Michael Massey. Then, the Royals quick-strike offense assembled.

It started—how else?—with a first-pitch single from Freddy Fermin. Quick-strike, indeed. Then, after Robbie Grossman fell behind 1-2 on a couple of borderline strike calls, Durán clipped his foot with a spiked curve. That brought up Kyle Isbel. It feels like every time I’m writing about a Royals win, he’s low key a part of it. The overall numbers may not back this up—his 76 OPS+ for the season is the definition of underwhelming. Yet in high leverage situations (as defined by Baseball Reference), Isbel is hitting .368/.379/.491, good for a 143 OPS+. That means when confronted with a high leverage moment, Kyle Isbel turns into Bryce Harper. I kid you not.

Wanna call Kyle Isbel clutch? I’ll most definitely allow it.

So of course Isbel comes through, lining a single back up the middle. A run was far from assured, though. Fermin, at second base, didn’t get a good break on the hit because the ball was in front of him. He had to pause for the ball to skip into the outfield before heading to third. Watching the play unfold in real time, the expectation was the hesitation meant that Fermin would pull into third.

That didn’t happen.

The real hero of this moment? How about Vance Wilson. Wilson saw that the cutoff man was lining up for a throw going to third base. I’m thinking that had the Twins even thought about attempting a play at the plate, Wilson holds Fermin. I’m not sure what the Twins defense was doing in that moment, other than conceding a run. I do not think it’s smart baseball to give the Royals even a glimmer of hope.

It took the Royals seven-plus innings and the departure of Ober, but they finally broke through. And, as you are well familiar with, once they get started in the later innings, they are difficult to stop. It’s a team as ruthless as they are resiliant.

So now exit Durán, and enter Jax. Baldelli is managing this game like it’s October. Given how the Twins have been playing, I don’t blame him. Like the Royals, they are in a favorable position. Unlike the Royals, the vibes are not even moderately positive.

The first batter Jax faces is Pham, who chops a slow roller to short. All hell breaks loose.

Third baseman Royce Lewis pulls up to avoid a collision with Dairon Blanco, who was in the game as a pinch runner. That forces shortstop Brooks Lee to have to charge in and rush a throw across his body. Blanco comes around to score the tying run. The Twins and Baldelli thought Blanco interfered with Lewis as the third baseman is allowed to have a free path to the ball. That’s all well and good, expect Lewis is the one who broke off his route. Had he continued and collided with Blanco, then yes…that would be an out. Knowing the Twins and their injury issues though, had Lewis run into Blanco, I’m fairly certain he would’ve been just been vaporized.

At the same time, the baserunner is being forced to advance. He doesn’t have a choice with a runner behind him at first. He’s in the baseline and probably should have an expectation that, given that’s where Blanco is required to be, he’s in the right. From the camera angle on the third base side, the umpire at third immediately throws out his arms in a “safe” call, signaling that there was no interference.

With the errant throw, Blanco is able to scoot home with the tying run. Witt, who isn’t too shabby in high leverage situations himself, bloops a single to center with the go-ahead run. MJ Melendez caps the scoring with a single to the right of second. After being held with one hit through the first seven innings, the Royals explode for five singles in the eighth, leading to four runs.

Quick-strike, indeed.

The 85 foot single
Sunday - The bottom of the 5th

Pitching was the theme of the weekend as Sunday’s game was almost a mirror image of Saturday’s contest. Almost. The two teams were scoreless through four and a half innings. When the Royals came up in the fifth, they had just one hit and one walk to show for their troubles. Sound familiar?

Rather than waiting until the eighth, the Royals went to work against starter Simeon Woods Richardson in the fifth. Melendez led off the frame and worked an eight pitch walk. A fine plate appearance where he laid off outside fastballs and ultimately resisted a tempting changeup that just missed nicking the corner low and away. Fermin hit a first-pitch slider to right for a single to put runners on first and second and nobody out.

Maikel Garcia was up next and, you’ll be shocked…attempted to sacrifice. He failed twice. On the third pitch, he chopped a grounder to second that Edouard Julien could only stop from going into the outfield. That loaded the bases for Garrett Hampson.

Hampson is not what you would call a power hitter. (Aren’t you glad this newsletter is free?) He has yet to hit a home run this year and has hit only six baseballs that have traveled further than 375 feet. Yet there he was on Sunday afternoon, muscling up on a fat slider from Woods Richardson. The ball got up in the cool September air and it just kind of rode some sort of wave. It kept going and going. It wouldn’t leave the yard. That would be ridiculous. Instead, it carried 379 feet, his fifth longest ball put in play this year. That allowed everyone to tag up and advance.

Pham walked to load the bases again, chasing Woods Richardson from the game. After reliever Cole Sands got Witt to strike out, Salvador Perez did this.

That’s what…an 85 foot single from Salvador Perez? To plate a run with the bases loaded? Now I’ve seen everything.

I’m fairly certain that the Twins were doomed before this happened. That just sealed the deal. Minnesota managed just two hits from this point forward. Two runs for the Royals? We know better than to expect smooth sailing but to the Twins, that felt like a 20 run deficit.

What a inning. What a game. What a weekend.

What a sweep.

While I focused on particular innings in each game, there was so much more that happened over this three game sweep of the Twins. The starting pitchers (Ragans, March and Wacha) combined to throw 18 innings with only Marsh allowing runs. They combined for 19 strikeouts and just two walks. The bullpen was even better, going nine innings over the series with 11 strikeouts and no walks. They allowed just two hits. Lucas Erceg picked up saves on Saturday and Sunday. Daniel Lynch IV was rock solid on Saturday, going three innings.

• The defense, which has been a little lax at times recently, showed up. After that play at the plate on Friday, the Royals gunned down a runner at home in the first on Sunday to continue to set the tone. Hunter Renfroe to Maikel Garcia to Freddy Fermin this time. Garcia later shifted over to third made a great play on a ground ball to get a key out in the ninth inning.

• It was nice that this series got some national attention. First as an Apple TV game on Friday and then on Fox on Saturday. The country needs more Bobby Witt Jr. and Cole Ragans. Also, Apple TV’s broadcast resolution is fantastic. I’ll watch any game on that platform.

• The fans turned out. The K was rollicking, especially on Saturday during that late come from behind win. When the Royals started winning in 2014, there wasn’t really a baseline to talk about a winning team in Kansas City. Thirty-odd years is an eternity. These guys on the current squad all remember those teams and probably those times. They’re familiar with what Kansas City brought and they’ve been waiting for this moment. On Saturday, Lynch said he had goosebumps in the dugout during the eighth inning.

• As a full-fledged “uniform guy” I don’t think there’s a better trio than what the Royals wear on a weekend series with two night games followed by the Sunday matinee. The City Connects, followed by the traditional home whites and then the powder blues for the afternoon…Unbeatable.

Meanwhile the Twins…man, I don’t know. I felt certain they would cruise into a Wild Card spot but it doesn’t feel so certain anymore. We experienced something similar when the Royals dropped seven in a row last week, but even then it never felt like they were smashing the snooze button like the Twins were at Kauffman this weekend. They just looked deflated and defeated. I think Baldelli agrees with this assessment as he held a team meeting after the game to try to light a fire. They could probably use a Raul Ibanez over there at the moment.

It’s not going great in Minnesota these days.

The Royals have just three games remaining in this latest stretch of brutal scheduling. Remember when it started how I wrote these would be the 20 games that defined their season? Well, with that seven-game losing streak thrown in for a little angst, the Royals are now 8-9 over this stretch. That’s not bad, especially considering how the rest of the contenders have played.

They’re just a half game worse than Cleveland and three and a half games better than the Twins. They’ve jumped ahead of Minnesota in both the AL Central and the Wild Card. I mean look at the Twins…and the Red Sox. I remain intrigued by the Tigers.

The Royals’ magic number to clinch a spot in October is now down to 13. They have a 95 percent chance of advancing according to FanGraphs.

Just in case you had any doubt, this is very much happening.