All too familiar

The Royals lost to the Yankees on Wednesday, 7-0. An unsurprising result. It felt the most likely outcome.

Noah Cameron was good. Garrett Cole was better. Cameron was perfect the first time through the Yankee order. Cole's only blemish his first time around the Royals lineup was a one-out double to Michael Massey in the third. Maikel Garcia, seeing Cole for the second time, laced a two-out single to the opposite field. Massey motored around third. Aaron Judge came up throwing. The throw was great. The play at the plate was not close.

You just knew that the Royals running into an out at home had to be an omen. And just two batters later, the Yankees had broken through against Cameron and seized the lead when Ben Rice tripled home Paul Goldschmidt who led off the inning with a single. Aaron Judge tacked on another run with a sacrifice fly. Just like that...Just like that, in the span of four batters, the Royals went from potentially edging out in front to falling behind. With Cole looking fresh, healthy and vintage for New York, even an early two-run deficit felt a bridge too far.

I cannot decide if the Yankees are generally unsparing in their attack or if the Royals are quick in their surrender.

If you're looking for analysis, other than telling you that the Royals are not a good baseball team, I don't have much for you. No need to go in-depth on that topic. Watching these three games were like watching the varsity team scrimmage against the freshman "C" team. The Royals put up a good fight on Monday, still took the loss and then were thoroughly outclassed the rest of the way.

In some ways, I admire the Royals commitment to the bit. They found three different ways to lose. First up was the cruelest.

That was followed by a bullpen game where the Royals started Bailey Falter. This game was lost before a single Royals batter stepped up to the plate. Falter was designated for assignment on Wednesday afternoon.

Then, there was Wednesday's game where it took the Yankees four innings to solve Cameron before they then took advantage of an overmatched bullpen.

The Royals were outscored in this series 26-4. In their earlier series in the Bronx, the Royals were outscored 24-6. Yes, they allowed 50 runs to the Yankees this year...in six games! That's 19 percent of all their runs they've allowed this year! In just about 10 percent of their schedule to this point.

The only drama in this game centered around Cole, the Yankee starter. It was just his second major league start since his return from Tommy John surgery and, perhaps inspired by his time under the knife, carved up the Royals batters with surgical precision. He was at 70 pitches through six innings, with 54 of them strikes. He was in Maddux territory.

For those unfamiliar, a Maddux is a start where a pitcher throws a complete game shutout in under 100 pitches. Named after Greg Maddux, naturally. The way Cole was slicing and dicing, it was most certainly in play. But he is working his way back from major surgery. He was cruising in his first start back and was lifted after six innings. The Yankees are being cautious with their ace.

Once Cole was lifted, the drama exited the stadium.

Central Issues

We haven't done this for awhile because it's generally depressing. So let's pile on!

Twins 2
White Sox 15

Chase Meidroth hit a grand slam and Munetaka Murakami clubbed his 20th home run of the season to lead the Sox in a rout. Remember when front offices across baseball questioned whether or not Murakami could handle major league pitching? David Sandlin threw six innings of one-run ball in his major league debut. If you recognize the name it's because he was drafted by the Royals in the 11th round of the 2022 draft and subsequently dealt to the Boston Red Sox for John Schreiber. He ended up in Chicago when the Red Sox found a willing partner in their Jordan Hicks salary dump last February.

Angels 0
Tigers 4

Tigers starter Casey Mize allowed just two hits through four innings and four Detroit relievers combined to keep the Angels off the scoreboard. Spencer Torkelson had three hits, including a solo home run as the Tigers got to starter José Soriano, touching him for three runs over five innings.

Nationals 2
Guardians 3

Cleveland had traffic on the bases all night, but saved their run-scoring exploits for the fifth inning when an error, a double, a sac fly and three singles yielded all three runs. Guardian stater Gavin Williams allowed just three hits and a run through seven innings.

The standings paint an increasingly grim picture for the Royals.

Gross.

Up Next

The Royals are off on Thursday. They are undefeated when they do not play.

The club embarks on a 10-game road trip starting on Friday with stops in Texas, Cincinnati and Minnesota. The Royals have not played particularly well on the road this season, winners of just seven of the 24 games they've played away from Kauffman.

The Royals will roll out in their series against the Rangers with Steven Kolek, Seth Lugo and Michael Wacha. Texas has not announced their probable starters.