Royals Report: Indians Smash Royals 7-2 In Listless Game

The Royals dropped their second game in a row, losing game one of their final series of the season to the Cleveland Indians 7-2 Friday night. Kansas City failed for the second straight night to guarantee a finish above .500 by winning their 82nd game.

The Kansas City Royals fell to 81-79 with their 7-2 loss on Friday night. Kansas City is now playing out the string and looked like it in this game.

Yordano Ventura made his last start of the season. He suffered through only one bad inning, giving up four runs in the third. Overall, he lasted 6.0 innings, allowing 8 hits, 3 walks, and 4 earned runs with 8 strikeouts.

The loss drops him to 11-12 on the season.

Brian Flynn entered in the seventh and promptly gave up a three-run blast by Cleveland shortstop Francisco Lindor. Lindor lit up Kansas City pitching with a walk, double, and three-run home run after entering the game riding an 0-27 streak.

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The KC Royals jumped out to a 1-0 lead in the first inning on Eric Hosmer‘s RBI single. But, Cleveland’s rookie starter Ryan Merritt held KC scoreless over the next four frames. It was Merritt’s first start in major league baseball. He also earned the first win of his career.

Merritt left after 5.0 innings with a 4-0 lead to earn the victory (1-0).

Kansas CIty did score a run in the eighth inning on a one-out single by Hunter Dozier and a triple by Drew Butera. But, KC couldn’t sustain the rally.

Hard To Care About A Meaningless Game

To be honest, it was hard for me to care much about this game. I spent most of my evening watching and re-watching the condensed version of the 2014 wild card games against Oakland on Youtube. I will post my take on that franchise-changing victory tomorrow morning since that game ended 7 minutes before midnight.

Even two years later, it gave me chills

Next: KC Royals Close Out The Season Against Indians

Let’s hope we can see something like it in 2017!