Show Me How To Duffy! Royals Discontinue Twinkies, Climb to 68-64

Well, that went better than expected. Cy Albers was a lot more like Average Albers, Dancin' Danger Diamond Danny Duffy was delightfully destructive, dang it, and the Royals have won four in a row. It may be small consolation after sinking out of play-off contention, and it's probably helping preserve the job of a GM whose spent seven years trying to improve the team and largely failing at it (or we're ahead of schedule and everyone poops rainbows or something), but wins are wins. Plus, really, it's kind of awesome to see a starting pitcher developed in the Royals organization actually, you know, pitch very well. With any luck, I haven't jinxed Duffy by saying that.

• Perez and Gordon both hung dong; Perez actually hung two. They've both been streakier than your average bear this season, particularly Perez (coughhorribleplateapproachcough), but they're incredibly fun to watch when they're on. And Perez was quite on tonight, going 4-for-5 and charitably letting the Twins steal a couple bases to build their self-esteem back up.
• Dyson had a good game as well as well, going 2-for-4 with a two-bagger. Nice to see him healthy again. It's really kind of hard to believe that Frenchy was seen as a more viable option for a starting role than him. Ironically, Dyson actually IS a player who "does little things right," as he has a passable walk rate for a dude with little power, is above average in the field, and runs the bases well.
• The Twins "played the game the right way" the wrong way today, with five baserunners total and two errors committed.
• A big part of that was Duffy's start, in which he went 6.2 innings and K'd 7 Twins without issuing a free pass. All pitchers have nights like this, (even the guy who came in after him, Luke Hochevar, once threw a 79-pitch shutout) but tonight he looked like ace material.
• For the second straight game, the Royals exploded in the late innings, blowing a 3-0 game open to 8-0 by the hapless Minnesotans came up for their last ups. For tonight, at least, this felt like the Royals beating up a team that good teams beat up on.
• Second base continues to be a blackhole, production wise, and unfortunately whoever plays it (today it was Bonifacio) gets one of the first two spots in the order. If the Royals don't go second base shopping in the off-season, the rest of the position players should sue the front office.
• Aaron Crow surrendered the only Twins run, a dinger to the rumored-to-be-leaving-to-a-team-that-hasn't-noticed-his-production-dropping Justin Morneau. Shaaaame, Aaron!
• EDIT: I apparently can't type "double." Sorry for the false alarm on the Dyson homer. Apparently I really wanted him to have homered.