Maikel Garcia's breakout continues to keep KC Royals in heart of AL Wild Card race

The Kansas City Royals are coming off a week of nightmares after back-to-back sweeps last week, which only magnified what's been a largely disappointing start to the 2025 campaign as a whole.

But amidst the overall offensive shortcomings, as well as the individual key pieces that have had their blips in form throughout the year, there's been one constant in Maikel Garcia - who's undoubtedly been their unexpected leader in the lineup.

Wednesday night's 6-3 series-securing victory over the Texas Rangers only furthered that narrative, as the breakout sensation led the offensive charge once again, helping the Royals narrow the gap in the highly contested AL Wild Card race.

Maikel Garcia's breakout continues to keep KC Royals in heart of AL Wild Card race

Garcia looked to be on a mission on Wednesday night as he wasted little time flipping the script in this contest after the Royals found themselves down immediately after two first inning runs from Texas.

In the top of the third, he stepped up to the plate in 2-1 game with one out and runners on second and third and promptly deposited one into the seats for a three-run shot, giving the Royals an early three-run lead.

Then, in the eighth, with the lead cut to 4-3, Garcia made something out of nothing, as after Witt walked to lead-off the inning, Garcia slapped one just fair down the right field line for an RBI-triple.

For the night, the All-Star hopeful went 3-for-4 with a homer, four RBI and was just a double shy of hitting for the cycle.

As mentioned earlier, this has been the story of Garcia and the Royals offense all year. When so much has gone wrong he's been as stable a force as they come.

Entering Wednesday's action he was slashing .312/.372/.477 with seven homers, 32 RBI, a 136 wRC+ and 2.2 fWAR.

For context that ranked him as the team leader in AVG, OBP, OPS and wRC+, and his four RBI off Wednesday's homer and a triple catapulted him into the lead in both RBI and SLG as well.

And from a month-to-month standpoint, Garcia has had no weak showings, posting a 111 wRC+ in March/April, a 163 wRC+ in May and a 132 wRC+ so far in June.

Without him, who knows where this Royals team would be. And they're going to certainly need him to continue on this torrid pace if they're to not only climb back above .500, but also continue to climb the AL Wild Card ladder and reach postseason glory for the second straight season.