I’m grumpy today, not because the Royals lost. But because I stayed up way past my normal bedtime to watch the Royals lose. Again. For the third night in a row. West Coast baseball can be a drag. Thankfully, the Royals leave Los Angeles, head to Seattle for three, and never have to return to the West Coast. Until next year.
Hos Is Hot
As David Lesky noted earlier this week, it feels like the lineup has a sequencing problem. Manager Ned Yost took care of some of that when he bumped Eric Hosmer up in the batting order as a result of giving the struggling Lorenzo Cain the night off. Putting left-handed bats together must have been difficult for Yost, who is a fan of alternating handedness of hitters. Yet, it paid a dividend in the first after Mike Moustakas reached on another opposite-field single when Hosmer jacked one 441 feet on to the rock pile in left-center.
Had I known it was all the scoring the Royals would muster, I would’ve called it a night.
Hosmer now has a career-high 17 game hitting streak, but this was the kind of offensive output we’ve been waiting for from the first baseman. It’s too bad the rest of the lineup is dormant.
Escobar Is Not
Alcides Escobar is a problem. I realize I’ve reached old man yelling at cloud status here, but he absolutely has no business leading off for any baseball team that is serious about scoring runs. It deserves larger treatment than a game recap, so I’ll just note that Escobar came up with two runners on in the second, fourth*, and sixth innings. The Royals did not score. (Although the fourth inning deserves an asterisk because Jarrod Dyson was picked off first to end the inning.)
It’s also worth noting that in an offense that is struggling, Yost is purposefully giving the most plate appearances to his shortstop. Escobar had 14 plate appearances in the three losses in Anaheim. Moustakas, hitting behind Escobar in the order had 13. Yes, it’s just one plate appearance of difference, but extrapolate that over a full season. Lineup construction is generally overblown, but when you are hitting a guy suited for the ninth spot in the order at the top, it’s going to matter over the course of a full season.
WPA Play Of The Game
Mike Trout is a good baseball player. Chris Young is a fly ball pitcher. The two profiles don’t mix.
Trout crushed a Young pitch for a two-run bomb that tied the game and gave the Angels Win Expectancy a push to the tune of 23 percent. It wasn’t a poor pitch from Young, it was up and off the outer part of the strike zone. Yet Trout is damn good, and he waited, and he got his arms extended, and he destroyed it.
Young pitched well on Wednesday. But when the offense can’t score runs, it’s difficult to win. At least I’ve heard.
Up Next
A merciful off day on Thursday before the team travels to the Pacific Northwest for three against the Seattle Mariners. Time to catch up on your sleep.