Keeping score as the Royals are swept by the Dodgers

I had an idea to try something different with Wednesday's Royals game, another loss to the Dodgers. The final score: 4-2. Why not? The season is lost, the bullpen is in flames and sometimes you have to find some motivation just to watch.

So I decided to keep a scorecard while watching and writing about it.

If you know me, you know I'm a massive advocate of keeping score at the ballpark. I take my scorebook everywhere. It's always in my car on the off chance I divert to a game on the spur of the moment. I take it on trips if I know I'll be going to a game. My current book, that holds 81 games, has seen Coors Field, Fenway Park and Citi Field in addition to The K.

My scorecard of choice when I'm at the ballpark is the Eephus League Halfliner. I use a Blackwing 602 pencil. I told you...I'm deadly serious about keeping score. I never use a pen. My penmanship is terrible, so I'm often dissatisfied with how something goes on the paper so I use the eraser for a re-do quite often. I also make plenty of mistakes.

For tonight's exercise, I'm scoring on an iPad using a file from Lou Spirito's THIRTY81 Project. I'm enough of a sicko that I'll keep score at home sometimes and I use his printed PDFs when I do. This is my first time scoring on an iPad, so we'll see how it goes! There is a high level of confidence that it will not replace my pencil and paper.

Top of the first

It's bad enough that the Royals are forced, by the schedule, to play three games against the Los Angeles Dodgers. It's completely unfair that the Dodgers will start a lefty in all three games. Wednesday's starter is Eric Lauer, who opened the year in Toronto and then was designated for assignment back in May when he had a 6.69 ERA in 36.1 innings. Since the Dodgers picked him up for "cash," he's thrown 56 innings with a 3.70 ERA. Of course.

Bobby Witt Jr. taking a low and away changeup to the opposite field and one-hopping over the wall makes me immediately realize I don't have a special notation for an automatic double. So I just mark it as a 2B on the scorecard.

Starling Marte is rung up on strikes to end the inning. If you're not going to challenge that (pitch eight), why even bother?

He would've won the challenge, walked to load the bases and prolonged the inning for Carter Jensen. Just a horrible no-challenge on Marte's part.

Bottom of the first

How about the opening frame from Royals starter Daniel Lynch IV? He throws three straight pitches in the zone to Shohei Ohtani. He then rings up Andy Pages on a pitch he actually challenges on 3-2 and was not just a strike, but it was totally inside the zone. A Reverse Marte, if you will. Lynch then gets Freddie Freeman to chase a slider down and away after setting him up with an elevated slider that he fouled off.

I love the backwards K for a strikeout looking. It's so uniquely baseball. I don't think other sports have anything quite like it.

Top of the second

Two innings and every ball put in play against Lauer has been in the air to this point. I know a lot of people who keep score will put the "F" in front of the position for a fly ball out, but I was taught to draw a circle around the number. Another of the great things about keeping score...it's your scorecard. You can do it however makes sense to you.

An important steal from Tyler Tolbert with two outs, going on first movement. That allows him to score when Josh Rojas flips a single to right. Nice little two out rally. It also flips the lineup over for the second time. Meanwhile, Rojas has taken up residence not just at first, but in Lauer's head. Rojas has attempted just one steal this year and has a sprint speed that is in the lower quarter of the range. He's not going anywhere, but Lauer throws over twice and falls behind Loftin 2-0. He finds his footing once he cannot throw over again (or risk a balk) and gets Loftin to pop out to second.

Bottom of the second

Mookie Betts is like Kody Clemens or Ty France—Official Royal Killer. At least Betts is in the National League.

In the 30 games before the Royals came to town, Betts hit .200/.261/.282. He had just five extra base hits in 119 plate appearances. After his home run to right, he had four extra base hits (two doubles and two homers) in this series. Unreal.

Top of the third

Cags bounces one up the middle that Lauer deflects and is fielded by Betts at short. I'm getting ready to drop a 1-6-3 in the scorebook, but Betts throws it wide of first and Cags gets to take second. I've missed some plays by jumping the gun and starting to mark the routine. On the next pitch, Perez throws his bat out at a changeup down and away that goes for a single. Caglianone doesn't think it's going through and takes it easy getting to second and then has to flip the hustle switch to get home. He scores as Tucker's throw is up the third base line and the Royals reclaim the lead.

You can probably tell, but the little marks in the top left corner on my scorecard are for RBIs. I feel as though I should mention that now because who knows if there will be an opportunity later.

Bottom of the third

Did you think the Royals could keep Shohei Ohtani quiet all series? Lynch's last pitch of the night was a meaty sinker that Ohtani parked into the seats in left. He looked so good in that first inning and then served a couple of meatballs to two very dangerous hitters. Welcome to the rotation.

Jose Cuas is the new pitcher. He gives up a single to Pages. Gulp. We're only in the third and I'm questioning the sanity of keeping score for what amounts to a Royals bullpen game. I'm going to run out of digital ink. Cuas is momentarily bailed out when Perez cuts Pages down stealing. Pages got a great jump, going on first movement of Cuas who takes a little bit of time getting the ball to the plate with that lower arm slot. It took a fantastic throw and great tag by Witt, along with a bit of an assist from Pages, whose front foot went above the bag at second.

Top of the fourth

I don't remember when I started scoring ballgames. I also couldn't tell you when the last time was I was at a ballgame and didn't keep score. My grandfather started taking me to games when I was about six or seven. He wasn't an especially patient man and I know he was worried that I'd be up and down, paying attention to everything but the game. He would not stand for that. I suspect he taught me how to keep score as a diversion. He's lucky I took to it. I'm lucky he taught me.

One of the things that I love about keeping score is you have the entire story of the game right in front of you. Sure, you could consult an app now, but how great is it that I immediately know that Loftin's ground ball to short to end the inning was Lauer's first ground ball out of the night?

Bottom of the fourth

At 73 mph off the bat of Max Muncy, the double play was slow to develop. Loftin did a nice job getting the ball quickly to Witt. Witt then had to hustle his throw and ended up bouncing it to Caglianone who made a nifty pick to get the second out. Twice, Cuas has put on the first batter he's faced and twice the Royals have gotten that runner out on the bases.

Top of the fifth

Lauer has now retired eight in a row. Figures. The Royals looked like they could make some things happen early. Instead, the lefty has settled into a middle inning groove.

Bottom of the fifth

Hunter Feduccia greets new reliever Mason Black by launching an elevated four-seamer 402 feet. At this point, it just feels obligatory. It's the third home run of the game for the Dodgers with all four of their runs scoring via the long ball.

One modification I've made to my scorebook over the years is that I'll draw a box around a line drive. The Ohtani liner to Caglianone was a screamer at 109 mph. Sometimes, I'll denote it on a ball hit to the outfield on a line, but I decided not to do that for this game since it's not always easy to follow the arc of the ball through the television.

Top of the sixth

Lauer retired 10 Royals in a row before he walked Isaac Collins. He then got Tolbert swinging to close out another scoreless frame.

I haven't figured out a way to denote challenges in the scorecard, but is that something I really need to do? On a pitch that came a bit inside, Tolbert motioned to the Royals dugout that he was clipped on the elbow bad. The Royals thought they had something there and challenged. I did enjoy home plate umpire Bill Miller's disdain for the challenge. The call was confirmed...no hit by a pitch.

I will hang a star on a defensive play of quality. Lauer gets one after making an almost no-look behind the back stab of a Marte ground ball to open the inning.

Bottom of the sixth

My grandfather had season tickets to both the Royals and the Chiefs. After I was able to handle the Royals games, he decided I could accompany him to Arrowhead. I remember that I got the Gameday Program, flipped to the middle and...there wasn't a scorecard. How could that be? You didn't keep score at a football game? Nobody told me this. Annoying. No wonder I never really cared for the NFL.

Mason Black gets through a full turn of the Dodgers order in two innings with the only damage coming from that Feduccia home run, the first batter he faced. And That counts as a good outing. Even if the leadoff man reached again.

Top of the seventh

For some reason, manager Dave Roberts sends Lauer back out for the start of the inning after he had thrown 107 pitches. No big deal I suppose. He wanted the lefty Lauer to get the left-handed hitting Rojas. It worked as Rojas went down swinging.

Landon Knack is the first arm out of the LA bullpen. He gets Loftin, but Witt lines a single to right. It's the Royals first hit since the third inning. Caglianone follows that with a 105 mph liner up the middle that almost brains the second base umpire. That pushes his hitting streak to 11 games. Nothing comes of the mini-rally as Luke Maile, who entered the game as a defensive replacement for Perez who exited in the bottom of the sixth with right elbow aggravation, grounded out to first.

Like refusing to note a fly ball with an "F," I also avoid putting a "U" in front of an unassisted play. I guess at some point I decided the only letter in the book should be a "K." For simplicity.

Bottom of the seventh

Black is back out for a third inning of work and gets immediate revenge on Feduccia by striking him out on three pitches with the last offering a nasty curve. For awhile I used a scorebook with boxes for a pitch count, but I decided that wasn't for me. It gets to be a bit much. If there's something interesting about a PA, I'll make a note in the margins. A three-pitch strikeout is cool, but probably not noteworthy enough. Although I might reconsider for Royals relievers.

Black gets into a spot after a walk to Rojas and an Ohtani single. Pages lofts a fly to shallow right. It's not deep enough for Rojas to score, but Ohtani wanders off first. When Caglianone cuts off the ball, the Royals execute a perfect rundown that has Rojas rooted to third. Nothing like a cool 9-3-6-3 double play. I enjoy it when the other team TOOTBLANs.

God, my penmanship is bad.

Top of the eighth

The error on the pitcher, Knack, on the Jensen at bat was an infield popup. The third baseman and shortstop converged on the mound. Knack acted like he was going to call for it...and then everyone just kind of stopped and the ball landed on the first base side of the mound. Chaos all around.

More chaos as, with Collins up, he lofted a foul pop on the first base side. Freeman tracked the ball, moved to the railing...and then went flying down the stairs in the Royals dugout. It looked like Freeman thought he was by a barrier. I don't think I've ever seen anyone fly down the dugout stairs like that. Scary moment. The only time all night I sports yelled. Oh, and Collins challenged a called third strike. And lost. He's still bad at this whole ABS thing, worth -3.4 expected runs. It's pitch number five.

I get that it's late and the Royals had their challenges, but sometimes you gotta take the L. Or in this case, the backwards K.

Bottom of the eighth

Craig Kimbrel makes his Royals debut! He doesn't face Freeman, who is lifted for pinch-hitter Tommy Edman. I'm still a bit shook with all of the replays of Freeman flying down those stairs. I hope he's ok.

The Kimbrel Era officially gets underway when he walks Tucker on four pitches.

Danger averted as Betts grounds one back up the middle, through Kimbrel's legs and right to Massey behind the bag at second. He grabs the force and then fires to first to get the double play. After the Ohtani home run in the third, the Dodgers put eight runners on base. Four of them were erased. This game could've been a lot worse.

May all of Craig Kimbrel's innings with the Royals be this tidy.

Top of the ninth

And the Royals go quietly in the ninth. Knack gets three soft fly balls to close out the game and record his first save since he picked up a 3.2 inning save last September. The Royals mounted a quiet two-out threat in the seventh, but that was that. A 4-2 loss and a sweep in LA.

I enjoyed keeping score on my iPad. It's something I can see myself doing again. It's just nice having that record of a game right in front of me without having to open the MLB app. I hope you enjoyed following along. Maybe I'll do it again sometime.