Hapless Royals shut down 4-1 in Seattle

We’ve officially reached the halfway point in the Royals’ 2018 season. 81 games down, 81 games left. At 31 games under .500 after losing on Friday night in Seattle, Kansas City is now on pace to lose 112 games.

Marco freaking Gonzales missed a shutout by an inch. That’s how pitiful this offense is.

Seattle used two home runs against Ian Kennedy to build an insurmountable lead against a hapless Royals offense. The Mariners won the game, 4-1.

A mediocre, slow-throwing left-hander shut down the Royals. Stop me if you’ve heard that one before! Gonzales completely bamboozled this pathetic offense all night long, holding them to five hits in a complete game effort. He came within a fingernail of a shutout, as Mike Moustakas hit an RBI single with two strikes at the very end to break that up. He had never gotten a second out in the seventh inning before tonight. Against this punchless offense, he looked like the second coming of Randy Johnson. I’m sure Ryan Lefebvre is all “Man, Hud, I’m not sure Gonzales would have beaten ANYBODY tonight!”

Whit Merrifield and Mike Moustakas had two hits. Rosell Herrera had one. And Adalberto Mondesi hit a double in the ninth inning. That was it for the offense. The bottom six hitters combined to go 1 for 16.

Mitch Haniger and Mike Zunino hit bombs for the Mariners. Ian Kennedy only lasted five innings despite a pitch count of 74. Brandon Maurer came in and promptly gave up another run, because it’s what he does.

Jorge Bonifacio made his 2018 debut after missing the first 80 games due to his PED-related suspension. He went 0-for-3.

Alcides Escobar, who is the worst player in baseball, continued his streak to 7,583,285,480 games in a row. Shocking, he went 0-for-3 to lower his average to .198. Tonight, it was Alex Gordon that rode the pine for the sake of keeping Escobar’s streak alive. Tune back tomorrow to see which competent player they’ll bench to keep that godforsaken streak going.

One freaking ninety-eight. And he’s started 81 out of 81 games.

Oh yeah, and Rex Hudler called Burch Smith’s stuff “amazing.” What a time to be alive.

The win: Gonzales, he’s 8-5. The loser: Kennedy, who is 1-8. One and eight. Hahahah.

The Royals are 25-56. They are 5-20 in June. They still have only won one baseball game this month when their opponent scores at least one run.

Tomorrow: Jason Hammel goes for his team-leading 10th loss when he takes on King Felix Hernandez. Only 81 of these things left.