Finishing kick

The inevitable became official on Monday as the Royals were eliminated from the Wild Card race before they took the field in Anaheim.

I suppose, for the first time since 2023, that renders a regular season game as pointless. Except there are no pointless games. There are milestones to achieve, punchout to be had and exceptional defensive plays to marvel at. It’s still baseball, after all.

Ultimately, the Royals won on Tuesday, by a scoreline of 8-4. Even a meaningless ballgame can be entertaining.

Perhaps the goal of reaching the postseason, now out of reach, should be recalibrated to something more modest, like finishing above .500. It’s something. Tuesday’s win moved the Royals to 79-78 on the season with five games remaining.

Cole Ragans made his second start since his return from that rotator cuff strain and, once again, he pitched like a complete stud.

5 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 10 SO

Yeah, that’s two-thirds of the outs Ragans recorded coming via the strikeout. He punched out seven of the first eight batters he faced. He let his fielders do some work in the fourth inning (more on that in a moment) and then hit a bit of a speedbump in the fifth, allowing a single and a two-out home run to Bryce Teodosio. Yet in that fifth inning, Ragans still struck out three, including Mike Trout for the second time on the night.

Ragans finished with 17 swings and misses, which is just amazing.

He would get a tad wild with the four-seamer from time to time, but he really raided the zone with that pitch, keeping it elevated for the most part. As you can see from the chart above, he got some chase on the changeup.

Ragans finished at 72 pitches. It remains a disappointment that Ragans missed so much time this year, but he’s looking good and healthy and finishing 2025 on a high note. That’s something.

How about this defensive gem from Maikel Garcia?

There’s a bit to unpack here. For starters, the ball left the bat of Logan O’Hoppe at 99.5 mph. For Garcia to cover the line like that is sort of bonkers. Also…the ball hit the third base bag. Ok, so the ball didn’t really take a weird deflection when it hit the bag, it looks like it hit is square on the back half, but still…this is an amazing defensive play from Garcia.

Garcia has tallied 12 Defensive Runs Saved this year, tied with Toronto’s Ernie Clement for the most in the AL. Garcia has also been good for 14 Fielding Runs, the best total in the AL by far. Basically, he’s the best fielding third baseman not named Ke’Bryan Hayes.

The eye tests—and the selected GIFs—only confirm the defensive metrics. Garcia absolutely has to be the favorite for the AL Gold Glove.

The lineup banged out 15 hits in scoring those eight runs. They brought the vibe of “offensive juggernaut” with them to the West Coast. Not Friday night in Kansas City where they scored 20 runs offensive juggernaut…that was insane. This lineup, against an overmatched Angels ballclub, was simply too much.

The Royals made another of their patented first inning showings where they went for two runs on three hits when four of the first five batters reached base. A Maikel Garcia double, a Bobby Witt Jr. single and a wild pitch plated the first run. The second run came off the bat of Salvador Perez.

That was RBI number 1,013 for Perez in his Royals career, which gives him second place on the all-time franchise list.

George Brett - 1,596
Salvador Perez - 1,013
Hal McRae - 1,012
Amos Otis - 992

A few weeks ago, I doubted that Perez could reach this milesone this season. He’s gone on an absolute run producing binge of late, collecting 16 RBIs over his last nine games. In that time, he’s bashed five home runs and hit .382/.642/.824 over 39 plate appearances. This coincides with Carter Jensen getting some more time behind the plate as in this stretch of nine games, Perez has started at catcher five times and as the designated hitter on four occasions.

The Royals tacked on a run in the fifth, courtesy back-to-back doubles from Garcia and Vinnie Pasquantino. They exploded for five runs over the seventh and eighth innings to salt this one away. The big hit in the seventh was a two-out, two-run double from professional hitter Adam Frazier. The big hit in the eighth was a two-run double from superstar Bobby Witt Jr.

The Frazier double was capped by what looked to be a TOOTBLAN from Frazier, who was hung up between second and third on his double that went to right-center field. He gets a free TOOTBLAN pass here, as there was a method to his baserunning madness. There were runners on the corner when Frazier laced his double to the gap. Mike Yastrzemski, on third, scored easily. Randall Grichuk, on first, started motoring when the bat met the ball. There probably would’ve been a play at the plate on Grichuk, but Frazier was halfway between second and third when the ball was returned to the infield, which meant the cutoff man for the Angels had to make the catch. The result was an out on the bases, but Grichuk crossed the plate unbothered.

I do not know if Frazier did this on purpose, but I’d like to think so. TOOTBLANS are often called out in this space. So a positive one (?) should be noted as well. Although I’m not sure what to call a positive TOOTBLAN since “nincompoop” is part of the acronym. Something we can workshop over the winter.

Major League Baseball announced on Tuesday that the ABS balls and strikes system will be implemented for the 2026 season. This wasn’t unexpected and it’s a welcome bit of change. We can get deeper into the rules and implementation and strategy that will go along with this later. As you are aware, I absolutely loathe the current replay review system. It takes too long, it’s incredibly flawed and generally results in frustration.

This feels different. It’s fast and correct. Tap your helmet, see the result immediately and move forward.

Here’s a perfect example of when the system could’ve been used.

I’m looking forward to a guy like Jensen, who has outstanding awareness of that zone, to tap his helmet and get a call overturned.

I can’t wrap up today’s edition without mentioning the bonkers race in the AL Central. The Guardians and Tigers are going head-to-head in a three-game set this week, and boy, oh boy, do the Tigers look like a team operating on vapors. On September 1, Detroit led the division by nine games over the Royals and 10.5 games over the Guardians. That lead is now completely gone as both Cleveland and Detroit have identical 85-72 records.

On Tuesday, the Tigers, behind Tarik Skubal, took an early 2-0 lead. Cleveland then turned on some sort of baseball voodoo to take the lead in the sixth. They did this on a bunt, a sacrifice bunt plus an error from Skubal, an infield single, a wild pitch, a balk and a ground out. “Guards-ball” their broadcast called it. That’s three runs on one hit and zero baseball that left the infield. When things aren’t going your way…

Once Cleveland took the lead, the Tigers looked like they’d rather be anywhere but the ballpark. At this point, even if the Tigers somehow get right over the last week and make the postseason, this is a damaged ballclub.

It was the Guardians win over the Tigers that officially eliminated the Royals, collateral damage in the Detroit collapse.