Capital crumble

In the Royals 7-3 loss to the Nationals, emergency starter Mitch Spence made it through the Washington order the first time with barely a scratch. The second time through was a different story.

The Nats tagged Spence for two runs in the third when number nine hitter Nasim Nuñez went inside out to flare a single to left. With the lineup flipping over for that second time, James Woods, a strikeout victim his first time up, hit a soft line drive for a double. Curtis Mead brought them both home on a liner that just flicked off the top of Nick Loftin’s glove at second. A lot of weak contact in that frame but the damage wasn’t beyond what could be recovered.

That changed in the fifth. After the Royals did chip back and take the lead on a Maikel Garcia two-run single, Spence couldn’t record an out in the bottom half of the frame, facing the eight and nine hitters for the second time before the lineup flipped over again. The Royals had hope that he could get through five innings. He faced four batters in the bottom of that fifth and allowed three singles and a walk.

Mason Black was in for relief, tasked with stranding two runners to maintain a new one-run deficit. He recorded the first two outs before allowing a three-run home run to Dylan Crews on a 3-2 hanging slider. Crews was ahead on the pitch, but not ahead enough. The margins, they are thin, and the Royals one-run lead turned into a four-run deficit. Ballgame.

I don’t know…You want to point a finger somewhere but damned if I know where to aim. Spence did a credible job getting through the first four innings. The fifth was just a bridge—or and inning—too far. Maybe Matt Quatraro should’ve been quicker with the hook, but…waves hands at the bullpen what would you expect from that move? Quatraro said postgame that they hoped Spence could give the team five. Reasonable. And smart. When you’re talking about needing the Royals bullpen in 2026, four innings of work sounds a helluva lot better than five. More innings, more problems. There was the shoddy defense in left where Collins deflected a bases-loaded single from Luis García Jr. in that fateful fifth. Had he played it cleanly maybe a solitary run scores instead of two. Collins has left me largely unimpressed this season, but tough to get worked up over a gift run when some guy up a few batters later clears the bases.

You want to get ticked off, but it’s kind of tough to give a damn. That's kind of the whole vibe around this bunch in 2026. It's tough to give a damn. The thing is, I don’t think I can say anything worse about a baseball team. They’re just wholly uninteresting, uninspiring and uncompetitive.

In that spirit, it should be noted that the Royals offense went down with barely a peep. Swingman starter Andrew Alvarez is a lefty, so you pretty much know how the first half of the game went. They put two runners on in the four innings after the Nationals took that lead in the fifth: A two-out John Rave walk in the eighth and a leadoff double from Loftin in the ninth. A leadoff double sounds promising. A pop out, a strikeout and a ground ball out rips that promise to shreds.

Quick ABS aside…It seems like every time I see Isaac Collins make a challenge, it fails. It did again in the ninth as he was punched out on an 0-2 four-seamer at the bottom of the zone. All in all, not a poor challenge given the situation. No reason to pocket challenges at that point in the game. Still, Collins is now 4-11 on ABS challenges this season. Baseball Savant says Collins has been worth -0.2 runs when he challenges, the only negative batter on the Royals.

Quick at bat aside...Look at this from Salvador Perez in the eighth inning after the Rave two-out walk:

Sure, this is Salvy being Salvy, but in a season where we've seen far too many plate appearances that resemble the above, these things are slowly driving me insane. The Royals are running short of outs in the moment and this is completely uncompetitive. Why come up to the plate with a bat when you can just carry a white flag?

All in all, a thoroughly unremarkable ballgame. Just another night from a team playing out the string in mid-June.

In a season short on laughs, this gave me a bit of a chuckle.

I didn't check what other teams were doing, but I have to assume this is an MLB initiative with all other clubs that are partnered with the league doing their broadcasts are offering the same deals. But, yeah...good luck with that.

While the pitching churn continues, the Royals made a minor deal on Monday with the Toronto Blue Jays, acquiring right-handed reliever Connor Seabold for minor leaguer Denis Samudio and cash. Seabold had been designated for assignment last week. In a corresponding move to get Seabold on the 40-man roster, the Royals transferred Carlos Estévez to the 60-day IL.

Seabold has been a swingman or a starter for most of his career. He spent the 2024 season pitching in Korea. He’s appeared for the Rays, Atlanta, Tigers and Jays since returning stateside. He signed a minor league deal with Toronto last winter and exercised an opt-out in spring training. The Tigers picked him up and he appeared in 11 games for Detroit, posting a 3.45 ERA with five walks and 14 strikeouts in 15.2 innings. When he was DFA’d by Detroit, the Jays re-acquired him. He made just five appearances for Toronto, allowing 3 runs in 3.1 innings with two walks and a strikeout.

So now Seabold lands in Kansas City. He’s out of options—which is why he’s been DFA’d twice this season—so the Royals will need some further manuevering to get him on the big league roster. They have a couple of days to figure that out.

While the big league team is in the pits, some good things are afoot in the minors. Top pitching prospect Kendry Chourio earned a promotion to High-A where he will slot into the rotation for the Quad Cities River Bandits.

Chourio, who turns 19 in October, ripped through the Carolina League at Columbia. He will be the youngest pitcher in High-A. The international signing from Venezuela made 11 starts for the Fireflies, throwing 48 innings with a 1.88 ERA while striking out 44 and walking just nine. Chourio’s strikeout rate of 8.3 SO/9 is down a bit from last year’s 9.5 SO/9 in limited action at the same level. That’s not 100 percent great, but his walk rate of 1.7 BB/9 remains exquisite.

Chourio will join another teenager, 19-year-old lefty David Shields, in the Quad Cities rotation. Shields, the Royals number three ranked prospect according to BA, has thrown 53 innings over 12 starts with a 4.92 ERA and a 9.7 SO/9 and 3.1 BB/9 for the River Bandits. That’s quite a one-two prospect punch for that rotation.

As a TINSTAPP (There Is No Such Thing As a Pitching Prospect) guy, I’m allowing myself some cautious optimism. It could be a fun couple of years watching these two progress through the system. I’m setting myself up for some extreme prospect pain.

The first round of All-Star balloting dropped on Monday. Bobby Witt Jr. leads the AL shortstops by a comfortable margin. With 890,000+ votes, he’s about 536,000 in front of Andrés Giménez who is in second. That’s a World Series hangover effect for Giménez. If I was voting for second (because there’s no one better at the position than Witt), I’d throw my ballot to Detroit’s Kevin McGonigle who’s having a very fine rookie season.

The only Royals who are in the top 10 in voting are Salvador Perez and Maikel Garcia who are both in seventh place in their respective positions. Kind of a solid snapshot of where this team is through the first two and a half months of the season.