#RoyalRecap: Vargy dominates Rays in KC Royals series finale

We could talk about a lot of things—timely hitting, timely defensive mishaps, Alex Gordon in center—that came out of Thursday’s series finale for the KC Royals in Tampa Bay. But the only story that matters is that of Jason Vargas.

Wow.

Jason Vargas is fast providing a conundrum for the KC Royals.

As he keeps throwing zero after zero—no earned runs allowed in four of seven starts, 15.1 consecutive scoreless innings—he drives his value up. Homeboy is gonna get paid in the offseason, and that’s if Dayton Moore doesn’t lock him down right now. Or trade him off for a bounty before the trade deadline.

Vargas’ ascent to Modern-Day Sandy Koufax continued with another dominant effort in the series finale against the Tampa Bay Rays. He scattered three hits, struck out four and walked one over seven innings to cruise to his season’s fifth win and lower his ERA to 1.01.

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As I kept reiterating on Twitter, it’s May 11. ERA’s aren’t supposed to be in the 1.00 area at this point in the season. Aside from a couple of doubles, nobody on the Rays roster was able to square up on Vargy as his win helped the KC Royals take the series win.

And every inning for Vargas was a high-leverage inning, because the Royals offense didn’t truly get going until late. Part of that was Tampa’s defense—Corey Dickerson prevented Patrick’s prediction of an Eric Hosmer homer from coming true by bringing one back into the park in the first—and part of that was the fact that Vargas’ opposite number, Jake Odorizzi, was nearly as sharp on the day (6.0 innings, four hits, four strikeouts, one earned run).

The only one run given up by Odorizzi was via Whit Merrifield home run in the fourth inning. He danced out of trouble in the second (two on, one out, induced two fly outs) and fifth (runner on second, one out, back-to-back ground outs to the first baseman), but he wasn’t Jason Vargas Good, which is now the standard all pitchers must be held to against the KC Royals.

In the sixth, Future Gold Glove Centerfielder Alex Gordon did this:

Not sure how many of those he has to have to make up for yet another 0-fer, but one was enough for today.

A five-run KC Royals eighth took a tight game and blew it open.

Alcides Escobar and Mike Moustakas opened the frame with a single and a walk, leading to Chase Whitley’s removal. After an Eric Hosmer groundout moved everybody up 90 feet, Salvador Perez roped a double into the left field corner, scoring Escobar and Moose.

Jorge Bonifacio followed that with a run-scoring double of his own and then Whit Merrifield lined a single into center. The normally sure-handed Kevin Kiermaier’s series went from bad to worse when he misplayed this ball, scoring Bonifacio and giving Merrifield a Little League homer to conclude the Royals scoring.

In a follow-up from last night’s theatrics between Salvy and Chris Archer, it did not appear that anyone required a pound of flesh today.

Next: Yesterday was way less fun

The KC Royals return to the K to hose the streaking Orioles this weekend. Danny Duffy vs. Chris Tillman opens the series 7:15 p.m. (CT), Friday night.