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The Royals travel to the mystical land known as "Target Field" to take on their arch-nemesis, Andrew "Cy" Albers. Going for the Royals tonight is the prodigal hero known as Daniel Dick "Darkwing Duck" Duffy (that's not his real nickname, but it should be, just for the alliteration), as the Royals look to close the ever-shrinking seven-game gap between them and a postseason berth.
Danny Duffy's first two starts of the season were a mixed bag, with good strikeout numbers in the his struggles against the Twins, whereas he limited the Tigers to one hit and four baserunners over six innings while only K'ing three. It's the Royals, so of course that happened. Albers, by contrast, hasn't been able to miss bats at all, with 11 Ks in 30 innings. Nor has his ERA returned to Earth yet, mainly due to him only issuing three walks since his call-up. A low strikeout, low walk pitcher on the Minnesota Twins? This is new!
Carlos Pena is the latest old player that the Royals have signed to inject veteran moxie and the occasional extra base knock into the anemic line-up. After what happened with our last no-batteries-included acquisition (Miguel Tejada, just in case you had wiped him from your memories already) I give it three weeks before it turns out that Pena's been involved with Jesse Pinkman and Walter White.
Albers shut out the Royals for 25 outs last time we met him, so I fully expect Billy Butler to homer six times today.
Royals-Twins. We Come To Play!