R’s – Slipping Away

I didn’t mean to jinx the Royals a week ago when I wrote that the series against Boston would likely be the high point of the season. And while it remains to be seen if their glorious month of baseball has come to an end and they will scuffle through the remainder of the season, things certainly don’t look promising.

Losing three of five in Detroit was perfectly acceptable, although blowing Saturday’s game was galling. Especially with the bases loaded and one out in the eighth and a runner on third in the ninth. But and you just have to tip your cap sometimes.

They held their own in Motown and then came home for a stretch of games against bad teams.

And proceeded to get shut out by the Chicago White Sox. Sure, John Danks has owned the Royals in his career, but he’s not been a good pitcher this year. Didn’t matter last night, as they had no answers for him.

The big concern is that, through a combination of injuries and slumps, the team is looking pathetic on offense again. And they’re making mistakes teams that struggle to score can’t afford to make.¹

That’s five losses in a week, after losing that many games over the previous month. Last night was only one game, but it sure felt like more than that. Perhaps all will be well tonight and the Royals will rip through the rest of this 18-game stretch against (mostly) teams that are not in a pennant race and be within shouting distance of the Wild Card lead when they play Detroit again on Sept. 6. But at 8.5 and 6.5 games out of the division and Wild Card races, they can’t afford to waste another night like last night.

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