Clank!

The schedule makers were kind to the Royals, giving them a pair of extended homestands toward the end of the season. They capitalized on the first one, going 8-2 against two weak teams and a contender. The second one isn’t going as well.

The Royals, coming off a series against the Tigers where they dropped two of three, lost another home series last night, falling 4-3 to the Los Angeles Angels. They are now 1-4 on this homestand with four games remaining: One more against these Angels and then three with the Minnesota Twins.

There is no more margin for error. The Royals need to capitalize on these upcoming games. In a big series against a lesser team, the Royals have simply not been good enough.

As they did in the series lid-lifter on Tuesday, the Royals drew first blood on Wednesday against the Angels. It began with a Michael Massey single to lead off the bottom of the third, followed by a Jac Caglianone walk in his first plate appearance since his activation off the injured list.

In yesterday’s edition, perhaps I was a bit too harsh on Kyle Isbel and his propensity to TOOTBLAN. He is also a chaos agent when it comes to the bunt. The Royals plated their first run of the night when, with runners on first and second and no outs, Isbel laid down one of his patented bunts down the first base line. Angels first baseman Oswald Peraza fielded the ball, but threw a little too far to the left of the bag and the ball deflected off Isbel’s helmet. Good times.

Again, I’ll stress that I’m not a fan of the bunt coming in the third inning, especially with nobody out. But it is worth noting that Isbel has nine bunt hits this season, second only to Cincinnati’s TJ Friedl’s 10. In this situation, I think he was more going for the sacrifice than a hit, but it’s something that cannot be discounted. If I’m going to be lenient on my anti-bunt bent, it will be with a guy like Isbel, who can use it as a weapon and not as a free out. Isbel was credited with a sacrifice on the play and now leads the majors with 13 sac bunts on the season.

With the ball bouncing off Isbel’s dome and down the right field line, Massey was able to score from second with Caglianone advancing to third. A Mike Yastrzemski sacrifice fly plated Caglianone and the Royals had an early 2-0 lead.

One night after getting shut down by Mitch Farris, who was making his major league debut, the Royals faced off against Caden Dana. Dana wasn’t making his debut—he made three starts for the Angels last season, posting a 9.58 ERA in 10.1 innings. He had pitched twice in relief this season, tallying six innings where he gave up five runs and five walks. Dana had spent most of the season in Triple-A, where he posted a 5.93 ERA with a 9.3 SO/9 and 5.0 BB/9.

And guess what? Dana held the Royals to two hits (both Massey singles leading off an inning) and just one walk. The only runs they scored against Dana came in the aforementioned third inning.

Again…not good enough.

Earlier in the day, the Royals announced the winners of their player and pitcher of the month awards. Vinnie Pasquantino won player of the month, because of course. The dude was on a fantastic heater for pretty much all of August. The pitcher of the month was Ryan Bergert, who led all Royals starters last month with a 2.54 ERA. He held opponents to just 2 runs or fewer in each of his 1st 5 starts as a Royal. The only other Royals starters in history to do that are Steve Busby and Noah Cameron.

Bergert was just as sharp to open September, allowing just a single hit over five innings. He did walk three, but struck out six. It was the base on balls that was his undoing leading off the sixth. After walking Zach Neto on five pitches that weren’t close to the zone (Neto offered at a sweeper outside the plate and missed early in the count) Matt Quatraro had seen enough and brought back John Schreiber for another turn against the Angels. Schreiber, as you will recall, had a streak of 11 consecutive scoreless outings broken when he served up a pair of doubles and a wild pitch in the seventh inning in Tuesday’s loss.

He did not begin another scoreless streak.

That man, Jo Adell, sank the Royals again. After his two-run home run to give the Angels a lead they would not relinquish on Tuesday, he clubbed a three-run bomb against Schreiber.

Schreiber has been good this season coming out of the Royals bullpen. Like any reliever, he will hit a rough patch here or there. His struggles this season have generally been brief. The Royals need him to get back on track because more important innings are ahead.

Anyway, back to Bergert. He recorded a swing and a miss on 11 of 41 swings on the night. Seven came against the sweeper with three more on the slider. That can be a devastating combo working along with a solid four-seam offering. The sweeper was especially outstanding. Angels hitters chased it 44 percent of the time and put the pitch in play only twice.

The location of the sweeper in the GIF above is in the neighborhood of where you think that offering belongs. Yet on Wednesday, Bergert will let a couple glide up in the zone, which really gave poor Neto fits.

That’s a location where Bergert hadn’t located his sweeper against a right-handed batter this season. If he’s leaving that pitch up, it’s usually a little flatter on the horizontal plane.

These were the locations of the sweepers Bergert threw on Wednesday, along with the outcome of the pitch.

I believe the Bergert sweeper is what the scouts and prospect hounds call a plus pitch.

What a tremendous piece of business for JJ Picollo to grab this kid from the Padres at the trade deadline. No matter how this season ends up, Bergert just adds to the Royals starting pitching depth going forward.

After falling behind 3-2 on the Adell home run, the Royals scratched one back in the seventh on back-to-back doubles from Salvador Perez and Adam Frazier. The Perez double was on a slider he had absolutely no business swinging at, never mind putting in play. Yet he yanked it down the left field line. Perez probably had no business trying for two, but the way the offense is operating these days, a spark of some sort was required. It seemed as though he hit first, right as Angels left fielder Chris Taylor fielded the ball. The play was close at second, but Perez executed a perfect swim move to evade the tag on his right side, while his left hand grabbed the edge of the bag.

Frazier followed with his double, which drove in pinch runner Tyler Tolbert. Frazier has been rock steady in his encore performance for the Royals, hitting .298/.331/.421 in 130 plate appearances with nine doubles. That’s good for a 105 wRC+ and 0.6 fWAR, which is about the best you can expect.

With Frazier at second and one out, the Royals couldn’t bring him home. The final out of the inning was off the bat of Jac Caglianone, a laser hit at 107.5 mph, but directly at Adell in right. Sigh.

Are you tired of Jo Adell? You should be.

In the eighth against Lucas Erceg, Yoán Moncada lined a double just over the head of Yastrzemski in right. He moved to third on a fly ball to right which set up a confrontation with Adell with two down and a runner on third. Erceg got a weak ground ball to short. A little too weak.

Witt charged the ball, but could not come up with it.

I think Witt gets Adell at first if he comes up with it cleanly. But there’s quite a bit going on in this moment. Witt is charging hard. Adell is busting it down the line. Moncada is heading for home with the lead run. It was going to take a perfect play from Witt to get that out. Field the ball…transfer the ball…make the throw…It broke down in the first stage.

It’s easy to point at this play…It was the pivotal moment in a close game, but Witt saves more runs with his glove that otherwise. He, as he said after the game, makes that play 99 times out of 100. But when things are going against you, they really seem to be going against you. Still, the offense needs to put up more than three runs in a game that is started by another rookie. For the second night in a row, the team could total just four hits. They went 1-7 with runners in scoring position.

Not good enough. (That’s the third time I’ve written this sentence in this post. I’m sensing a theme here.)

Against Andrew Chafin and Reid Detmers in the eighth and ninth innings, the Royals could only put one runner on base—a walk from Isbel to open the eighth. He advanced to second on a wild pitch but Witt struck out and Pasquantino battled for 11 pitches before he too went down swinging.

I’m all for scoreboard watching, but the reality is the Royals need wins. It doesn’t matter when they come, they need to grab some W’s. That said, last night would’ve been a good one for the Royals to come out on top as every single team ahead of them in the Wild Card race lost.

The only winners last night were the Rays and the Guardians, both teams are now firmly in the conversation for a playoff spot. The Royals aren’t making it easy on themselves.

Maybe they just aren’t good enough.