Friday Afternoon Cyber Baseball Thread: Royals at Rays

We’re back with a new sim today but today will be a tad different. Today I’ll be taking control and trying to get the Royals the dub against the Tampa Bay Rays. So the angles will be a bit different and it’s almost guaranteed to be a quicker game considering my lack of plate discipline.

Recapping the last game

As I mentioned in the preview prior to Sunday night’s game against the Chicago White Sox, Junis and Carlos Rodon were both struggling and looking to rebound. Both pitchers got out to a rough start. In the bottom of the 1st, Junis allowed 3 runs to the first 3 hitters after a Tim Anderson big fly. Junis settled down and retired the next 3 batters on strike outs to get out of the inning after 24 pitches.

The Royals responded in the bottom half of the inning with a 2 out rally that plated 2 runs on a Ryan McBroom double. McBroom is now hitting .364 in 33 at-bats this season.

“I knew Rodon liked to pitch me in despite never having hit against him, so instead of letting him ride me in, I RODON on the fastball and ended up getting good contact.” McBroom said of the at-bat after the game. Overhearing the joke, Brett Phillips was frozen in this face for the next 43 minutes.

Credit: Milwaukee Record

The Royals tied it up in the 3rd on a Mondesi dinger just inside the left foul pole. Mondesi’s appearance went 8 pitches, which was the longest of the game thus far. The home run came on an inside fast ball that stayed in the zone a bit too long. It was Mondesi’s 2nd of the year.

The “Pale Hose” would retake the lead in the 5th after Tim Anderson hit a double with 2 outs, followed by a Mondesi brain fart error, putting runners at the corners. Edwin Encarnacion hit a screamer past Maikel Franco, scoring Anderson. The ball’s exit velocity was gunned at 173.8 mph off the bat. Junis walked the next batter, loading the bases, leading Matheny to turn to long reliever, Jesse Hahn, to face Nomar Mazara. Mazara worked the count fill and eventually hit a harmless pop fly to Salvy to end the inning.

The deficit would only be temporary as the Royals took the lead in the 6th inning. Another 2 out rally began when Salvy took a 5 pitch walk and was followed by a seeing-eye single from Nicky Lopez. Maikel Franco smashed a double down the left field line, scoring both runners and knocking Rodon out of the game.

All Hell broke loose from here...

Eloy Jimenez singled to start the top of the 7th and Encarnacion followed that up with lead changing 2 run dong. These were Hahn’s only 2 pitches of the 7th inning. Barlow was called upon to relieve Hahn, which he was able to do after getting into some hot water himself.

Whit led off the bottom of the 7th with a single, representing the tying run. Mondesi followed with his 2nd strike out of the game. Merrifield, after having seen 7 pitches from Dylan Cease, stole 2nd on a 1-1 count to Dozier. A couple pitches later, Hunter went HAM on an inside fastball and gave the Royals the lead once again with his 1st big fly of the year.

“I just went to the plate trying to CEASE my home run drought and I was happy to be able to do so.” Dozier said of his clutch performance.

Credit: Milwaukee Record

Jorge Soler followed the Bull-Dozier’s visit to Dong Town with a round trip of his own off power sinker-baller, Jimmy Cordero. Soler’s bomb went into the hydration station in left-center and was clocked at 110.4 mph off the bat.

Soler later said of the at-bat, “Cordero is a great pitcher and I just happened to get him this time.”

Photo by Ron Vesely/MLB Photos via Getty Images

The Royals’ bullpen would continue their solid start to the season with Kennedy and Rosenthal slamming the door shut with 2 shutout innings, bringing the series sweep to Kansas City for the 1st time since 7/23/2019 in Atlanta.

Since that game...

The Royals’ momentum from the sweep stopped almost immediately, dropping 2 of 3 to the visiting Orioles. Then it was time for the White Sox for the 3rd time in a month, where the Royals took 2 of those 3 games. Their next stop on the road trip was in Tampa Bay, to face the 17-9 Rays. The Royals took game one, 14-1, and took the defeat in game two, 0-4. You guys wanted to see our Boys in Blue take on the Rays in the final game of the series, so that’s what I’m going to do. This time, I will be handling the playing duties. I’ll keep an eye on the chats, so if you have any good heat, questions, suggestions, or anything else, throw ‘em at me.

We’ll be getting started at 3:05 so come join me and let’s have some fun! As always, you can comment in the thread below or in the chat on the Royals Review Twitch stream.

Here’s how they’re lining up.

Here’s the action.