No ground gained in Wild Card race after huge sweep proves Royals can't catch a break

The Kansas City Royals entered a weekend series against the American League Central basement-dwelling Chicago White Sox with a great opportunity ahead of them to make up some ground in a tightly contested AL Wild Card race.

This weekend wasn't a complete loss by any means. They did both separate themselves from some competitive rivals and gain some ground on others, but at the end of the day they failed to decrease that magic "Wild Card games back" number, as apparently not every one of their rivals were in a giving mood over the weekend.

Royals fail to lessen Wild Card gap between Yankees despite impressive weekend series sweep

Kansas City entered Friday's action sitting 4.0 games back of the New York Yankees for the final AL Wild Card spot, with the Texas Rangers (0.5 games ahead) and the Cleveland Guardians (3.5 games ahead) sitting in between them.

While the Royals were able to make some moves on those two teams sitting between them and the Yankees - leap-frogging the Rangers after they dropped two of three to the Toronto Blue Jays and moving just 0.5 games back of the Guardians after they were swept by the Atlanta Braves - the Yankees did them no favors.

Despite having one of the harder series of the four teams vying for the AL's final postseason spot - with three games on the road against a St. Louis Cardinals team in a respective Wild Card hunt of their own - the Yankees took care of business by securing a series sweep of their own, ensuring the Royals were kept at bay.

It's a frustrating turn of events after Kansas City did everything in their power to narrow the gap, as they simply can't seem to catch a break lately.

Obviously they find themsleves in this hole by their own doing. A disappointing first-half of the 2025 season, spearheaded by a terrible overall offensive showing, is precisely why they find themselves on the outside looking in.

However, it's an annoying place to be in nonetheless especially considering they're in the midst of a solid stretch of baseball in the second-half - specifically at the plate too.

The Royals will hope for some favors from the Tampa Bay Rays this week as they'll play host to the Yankees in a three-game series starting on Tuesday.

At the same time, they'll hope the Arizona Diamondbacks can give them a boost in jumping ahead of their division rivals in Cleveland, while also attempting not to lose any of the ground they gained themselves over the Rangers this weekend, as they enter a four-game home series against Texas on Monday.