Kansas City Royals: Friday Night in the City of Angels

The Kansas City Royals are in LA playing the Dodgers. The West Coast series makes for a late night here in the Mid West. Let’s see if I can fight off the sleep that is creeping in and discuss what happened in tonight’s match-up.

The Kansas City Royals started their last series prior to the All Star break. Friday nights square off versus the Dodgers featured the two hottest teams in baseball. The Royals entered the night game with a 44-40 record. Only 1.5 games out of first in the American League Central.

Ned Yost looked to Jason Hammel to try and close the divisional gap. Hammel had his ups and downs early, but found a way to do his job through the first three innings. He was able to keep the Dodgers off the board early.

After the Kansas City Royals pushed across a run in the top of the fourth, Hammel ran into some trouble in the bottom of the frame. That has seemed to be the struggle all season for Jason. Believe me the struggle is real.

The evil Logan Forsythe singled home a run as did Corey Seager. While that did not end the scoring for the Dodgers, it proved to be enough to secure a victory. Two more runs, including a homerun from Yasiel Puig, would lead to the game’s final 4-1 score.

This is not the start to this series the Kansas City Royals needed.

After sweeping the Mariners in Seattle needed to come out and compete against one of the top teams in baseball. Instead the offense fell flat. Hammel battled on his way to yet another loss (now 4-8 on the year). On a night were the offense could muster a total of five hits it didn’t really matter anyway.

While there wasn’t much to get excited about tonight, seriously glad I stayed up late, I try my best to look for the positive. For to night I find solace in the fact that it was only one game. The Kansas City Royals have the opportunity to right the ship and still get a series win.

Next: Dodgers Series Preview

To do so the offense is going to have to produce. This is not the opponent you can afford to play like the April version of the team against. While it was cool that these teams came together this week to get Mike Moustakas and Justin Turner into the ASG, it is now time to drop the hammer and head into the break on a high note.