The Royals cruise to victory

The Royals closed out the week with a victory, a 5-2 win over the Philadelphia Phillies. The win was the team's first in a week, snapping a four-game losing streak. It was only the second time in 10 games the Royals emerged as victors.

Luinder Avila made one of his best starts of the season, going five inning and allowing just three hits. There were a couple of things that were impressive that I’d like to touch on. First, his four-seamer gained life during his start. He opened the game throwing around 96 mph. He finished averaging close to 97 mph over his last two innings.

Second, his curveball was stright filth.

He only threw the pitch 13 times, but got a chase on 50 percent of the swings. He also threw it for a first pitch eight out of 18 times, making it his most frequently thrown first pitch on the afternoon. He also got a couple of called strikes on it.

Third, he was all over the zone. That’s complimentary. If I were to paraphrase pitching coach Brian Sweeney, Avila "raided the zone." He threw a strike 59 percent of the time and of those, 25 percent were chases out of the zone. He leaned on his fastball pairing, but his secondaries—the curve, the slider and the change—were all lethal in their own way.

These were the called and swinging strikes for Avila on the afternoon:

That's a healthy mix of all his offerings, located where you would expect. Overall, this outing was another positive step in his development as a starter. He limited hard contact and was largely efficient in his work. He threw just 69 mostly low stress pitches, rolling through the Phillies lineup twice. The next step would be to go deeper into ballgames. Let the guy work a lineup through for a third time.

He finished with a Game Score of 59, making it the fifth time out of eight starts that he's landed with a Game Score between 63 and 59. When a pitcher is in that range throwing only five innings, you'll take it.

It was a largely comfortable afternoon for Avila as the Royals jumped first, getting to Phillies starter Aaron Nola for a pair of runs in the opening inning. Bobby Witt Jr. lined a pitch at 111 mph back up the middle for a one-out single and, after Jac Caglianone flied out for the second out of the inning, it’s understandable if you figured the frame was a wash. Yet Lane Thomas went down to get a perfectly placed 1-2 fastball to flick the ball the opposite way for a double. Of course Witt motored around from first to score the opening run.

I remain torn on Thomas and what he provides to this team. Entering the game hitting .214/.319/.338 with an 86 wRC+, it’s not like he’s a solid contributor, but he does have his moments where he stays within himself, battles and turns in a productive plate appearance. He fouled off a couple of strikes before he went with that four-seamer for the double. He gets all the credit because, at 1-2, it really was a killer pitch.

Not content with just a solitary run, Michael Massey likewise battled after falling behind 1-2 to pull a single into right to score Thomas from second. A good inning out of next to nothing! Too bad this offense could do things like that on a bit of a consistent basis.

The Royals added a run in the fifth on a Jac Caglianone sac fly before they salted the game away courtesy a Salvador Perez two-run double. Goodness, did he need that. Goodness, did we need that.

The Captain had missed the last two games with right elbow soreness. Since the beginning of June, Perez has hit .190/.204/.260, alarming numbers across the board. Over that time, he’s hit just one home run and four doubles.

A rough month? How about a rough season. On the FanGraphs leaderboards, there are 151 qualified hitters over the first half of the season. Of those 151, 10 have posted a negative fWAR. Of those 10, nine are between -0.1 fWAR and -0.5 fWAR. Perez, prior to Sunday’s game, has a -1.6 fWAR in 2026. This isn’t just some extended cold streak. He’s been a poor hitter for the entire season. It’s too late for the Royals, so I wouldn’t be surprised if they just let him play out the string, but we’re now at a point where difficult conversations are going to need to be had. If they haven’t already started. While Sunday’s double was nice—it’s good to see he can get around on a 77 mph sweeper—those moments are now far too infrequent.

Here’s a fun exercise…I’ll break out players with an fWAR of 1.5 or greater by month. The March/April list is lengthy due to the number of games since the season starts early.

March/April
Yordan Alvarez - 2.1
JJ Wetherholt - 1.8
Kevin McGonigle - 1.7
Mike Trout - 1.7
Ben Rice - 1.6
Bobby Witt Jr. -1.6
Elly De La Cruz - 1.5
Brice Turang - 1.5
Aaron Judge - 1.5
Corbin Carroll - 1.5
Max Muncy - 1.5
Shea Langeliers - 1.5

May
Cody Bellinger - 1.6
Bobby Witt Jr. - 1.6
Nick Kurtz - 1.5

June
Pete Crow-Armstrong - 3.1
Dillon Dingler - 1.8
Jackson Chourio - 1.6
Bobby Witt Jr. - 1.5

While Yordan Alavarz’s hot start was fun and Pete Crow-Armstrong played absolutely unconscious baseball in June, the consistency of Bobby Witt Jr. is simply amazing. No other player in baseball has had two months of an fWAR over 1.5. The usual Shohei Ohtani caveat applies, but Witt the best player in baseball. Full stop.

I want to make sure you saw this story from Anne Rogers: On Tuesday night last week, the Royals usual 50/50 raffle had the proceed earmarked for Venezuelan earthquake relief efforts. The winner of the drawing was Jorge Guevara, a Venezuelan native who is a massive Royals fan who now lives in Sedalia. He promptly donated his half—$13,679—to the relief efforts.

If you weren’t in attendance on Sunday, did you even watch the game? I ask because every single MLB game on Sunday was locked out of the MLB app and was available only via NBC and it’s associated platforms. It was called…Star-Spangled Sunday. In other words, if you bought the Royals TV package to view games through the MLB app or if you were out of the Kansas City market and viewing likewise through the MLB app, you were out of luck.

You needed to ante up for Peacock. Yet another streaming service to view yet another game. Enough.

I just don’t understand this. Sure, the powers that be in baseball would like—occasionally—for their product to be available to the masses. In this case though, they were doing so in a way that penalized their hardcore base. Why not open the games to NBC while keeping them available through the app? The casuals may have had greater access to the slate of games on Sunday, which is good. The diehards probably saw their access cut. That’s far from ideal. Why can’t they just keep their broadcasts consistent and then add access from time to time? If you pay $100 a year to watch your team, you should be able to watch your team. Revolutionary, I know.

Once again, I tilt at windmills. This is life in the 21st century. I just wish that someone would stand up for the regular consumer.

OK…one more rant about this Star-Spangled Sunday mess. On the MLB website there was a FAQ of sorts about how the day would work. One of the questions was “Will I be able to hear my team’s usual announcers?” The answer was: “Yes, in most cases.” For the Royals game, that was not the case as regular Phillies play-by-play man Tom McCarthy was joined in the booth by Phillies field reporter Ben Davis.

I guess it was because NBC Sports has the local rights to Phillies games. It was basically a Phillies production from what I could tell. That’s great for the fans in Philadelphia. Not so great for those of us in Kansas City.

All I’m going to say is someone dropped the ball in failing to get us a Rex Hudler and John Kruk pairing.

While we’re on the topic of things that frustrate, why did MLB decide to announce their All-Star starting teams on Independence Day? I knew what was going on because I’m a sicko. Again, the rank and file fan probably had no clue this was happening. Or if they did, it was secondary to a backyard party and gunpowder.

Anyway, all that to say that Witt was elected the AL’s starting shortstop for the first time in his career. Michael Wacha will be joining him.

Well-deserved honors for both. I didn’t figure Wacha had much of a chance because of the rule that every team needs representation and since the Royals are now the worst team in baseball, giving them two spots seemed a bit of a stretch. But Wacha has been a beast for this team this year.

I’ll add the disclaimer that the All-Star Game doesn’t captivate the way it did when I was much younger. Maybe I’ll tune in early to watch Bob’s at bats. I doubt the game can hold my attention for the whole nine innings.

Central Issues

White Sox 7
Guardians 6

The Sox charged out to an early lead on the back of three home runs—A Colson Montgomery two-run shot and solo blasts from Kyle Teel and Tristan Peters. With the game 6-3 in the fifth, Cleveland’s Gabriel Arias tied it up with a three-run homer of his own. The winning run scored an inning later on a Sam Antonacci ground out. The White Sox and Guardians split their four-game set, keeping the status quo at the top of the AL Central.

After the game, the White Sox announced that first baseman Munetaka Murakami will start a rehab assignment on Monday. He’s been out since the end of May with a hamstring strain.

Twins 6
Yankees 1

This is how things are going for the Yankees: They lost a home series to the Twins for the first time since 2014. Joe Ryan held New York to just three hits over seven innings while striking out nine. To make sure that things aren’t totally bizarro-world, Byron Buxton left the game in the first inning after re-aggrivating a hip injury.

Tigers 6
Rangers 3

It was the Riley Greene show as the freshly-minted All-Star homered, tripled and singled while driving in four. Casey Mize allowed two runs over 6.2 innings and Kenley Jansen locked down his 10th save as the Tigers won the series, 2-1.

Over the weekend, the Royals were, momentarily, the worst team in the majors. They are currently a few percentage points ahead of the Angels, who have lost six in a row, for that ignominy. I cannot believe we are doing this.

Up Next

A World Cup match at Arrowhead last Friday means the Royals and Phillies wrap their three-game series with an afternoon tilt on Monday.

Mon - LHP Cristopher Sánchez (10-3, 2.00) vs. LHP Noah Cameron (4-6, 4.95) at 1:10 p.m.

After Monday, the Royals continue their games against the NL East as travel to New York to meet the Mets. I’m sure it will be a compelling battle between two teams that have underachieved this year.