Game 9: Missed opportunity

Riding a five-game winning streak, the Royals saw it come crashing to an end with a late-inning collapse. Wednesday’s game ended in a frustrating 6-3 defeat to the Texas Rangers. Even with a pair of brutal losses on this most important homestand, it has been a successful stretch of baseball in Kansas City. The Royals are 7-2 with one game remaining, and, most importantly, they have solidified their position in the Wild Card race.

Still, a frustrating loss is a frustrating loss.

This game had the familiar hallmarks of the early-season Royals that frustrated so often: An offense that shows early promise but then goes cold and pitching that holds it together just long enough but can’t ultimately overcome the lack of offense.

The game started promisingly enough. Mike Yastrzemski and Bobby Witt Jr. singled. And Vinnie Pasquantino did his thing.

This has been some kind of heater from Pasquantino. He’s locked in and leading the charge when the Royals needed someone…anyone…to push this offense forward. So fun to witness.

Three batters in and the Royals had a 3-0 lead. This was a bullpen game for the Rangers, having scratched scheduled starter Jacob DeGrom with shoulder fatigue. Caleb Boushley was making the start and things were looking up for the Royals.

They would not score another run all game.

The Royals were not without opportunity, however. Both teams had the bases loaded with two outs in a tie game in the later innings. For the Royals, their opportunity came in the seventh, just after Daniel Lynch IV and Lucas Erceg teamed up to allow the tying run to score. With one out, Bobby Witt Jr. singled. He advanced to third on a Vinnie Pasquantino single. Forget about loading the bases. This was a golden opportunity. Maikel Garcia, though, expanded his zone and fell behind 0-2. He went down swinging on a pitcher’s pitch: Too close to take yet impossible to make contact with.

Then, Salvador Perez looked a four consecutive pitches out of the zone for a walk to load the bases. And Nick Loftin was sawed off on an inside fastball and tapped weakly back to the pitcher for the third out.

Meanwhile, the Rangers had their bases loaded chance in the ninth inning. All the runners came with two outs. Wyatt Langford started with a walk against Sam Long. Langford was a thorn in the side of the Royals all night. He hit a leadoff home run and added a single. He also accepted three free passes. None of Long’s offerings to Langford, save the 3-0 pitch, was even close to the zone; all of them away. I wondered if he was pitching around Langford so he could face the right-handed hitting Corey Seager.

It almost worked. Seager offered at a low curve and grounded it to Pasquantino at first. It was hit in an awkward spot between first and second. Pasquantino, holding Langford on first, was in a good position to field it, but had to play it on a short hop and couldn’t glove it. It kicked to Long who couldn’t pick it up, either. There was no play at first.

In an ideal world, Pasquantino fields it cleanly and flips to Long covering first for the final out.

The next batter, Marcus Semien, was fooled on a first-pitch slider and hit a check swing roller to third. Calling it a “roller” may be too kind of an adjective. The ball had an exit velocity of 39 mph. He could not have bunted that ball better. Garcia fielded it but had no play; the bases were loaded.

This felt incredibly ominous. The Royals, up to this point, had been living right all homestand. They had been one out away from setting themselves up for a potential walkoff in the ninth. A walk, an error and an infield single followed. This was set up for disaster.

Disaster came in the form of Kyle Higashioka, who laced a double down the third base line. All three runners scored. And that was your ballgame.

I get it if you want to criticize the bullpen management of Matt Quatraro. Two innings from Long out of the bullpen is a bit of a roll of the dice. But at that point in the game, the options were limited. The Royals had just two relievers available: Carlos Estévez and Bailey Falter. Estévez could’ve pitched the ninth, but then if you have extra innings, it’s all going to fall on Falter. I’m not sure that’s ideal. The Royals burned Lucas Erceg in the seventh. He entered needing just one out, but didn’t record an out on his own. He allowed two singles and a walk, the first single tied the game.

Erceg was bailed out from further disaster thanks to another amazing defensive play from Witt and some boneheaded baserunning from Langford.

This play is all down to effort from Witt. He lays out for the ball to keep it basically on the infield so Langford can’t score the go-ahead run. Langford, figures the ball got through the infield, so he blows through a Vance Wilson-type stop sign (remember that?) and heads for home. Except…surprise! Witt throws from his knees, a neat little one-hopper to Perez and the rundown commences. At the time, a huge defensive play from Witt and a massive baserunning blunder from Langford.

Erceg needed 12 pitches to get through his three batters in the seventh, so Quatraro opted for Long in the eighth. He came back out in the ninth with the game still tied. The Royals bullpen has been through it of late. Starter Noah Cameron could only go 4.2 innings on Wednesday. The Royals starters just have not been pitching deep into ballgames in the second half of the season and the bullpen has been taxed. Usually, we would see some movement shuttling players between Omaha and Kansas City, but the key guys are the only ones who have options, which ties their hands on the transaction front when it comes to restocking the bullpen. It’s going to be ride or die with this group of relievers, at least until the rosters expand in a week and a half.

On the Wild Card front, two days after setting fire to the Mariners pitching with 21 hits and 12 runs scored, the Phillies lit the match again with 11 runs and 20 hits on Wednesday. It was the first time in Phillies franchise history that they collected 20 hits two times in a single series. Perfect time to make a little history. Seattle has lost five in a row.

Meanwhile, in Arizona, the Guardians threw a game away against the Diamondbacks. A Lourdes Gurriel Jr. home run in the ninth tied the game and Arizona scored their Manfred Man in the bottom of the tenth to walk it off, 3-2.

The Yankees remain hot, winning 6-4 in extras against Tampa. That is their fifth consecutive victory which has allowed them to solidify their current standing as the best team of the Wild Card bunch. That’s a shame. I thought New York was fading. Just goes to show the volatility of the Wild Card.

One game left in this homestand. The Royals are on seven wins out of nine. Eight out of ten would be amazing. Patrick Corbin will start for Texas and the Royals will counter with Michael Lorenzen. First pitch is at 1:10 p.m.