Royals beat Tigers, 3-1

The Royals took down the Tigers, 3-1, to kick off a three-game series.

Carlos Hernandez was really good. He pitched five scoreless innings, and he was in line for the win until the bullpen gave up a game-tying run after he left. His line: five innings, two hits, three walks, and one strikeout.

Domingo Tapia gave up the tying run, but he earned the win after the Royals re-took the lead immediately afterwards. He is 4-0 on the year.

Scoring summary: Whit Merrifield hit a sacrifice fly in the third. The Tigers got the run back in the bottom of the sixth. Immediately after that, Ryan O’Hearn hit an RBI single in the seventh, and Merrifield added an insurance run with a second sacrifice fly in the eighth.

Kyle Isbel had two hits. Ryan O’Hearn did too. The Royals, as a team, only had five hits. But it was enough, because the Tigers managed just six, and they couldn’t get any sort of hit with runners in scoring position in the clutch innings.

The bullpen nailed down the win with Jake Brentz, Josh Staumont, and Scott Barlow finishing the seventh, eighth and ninth innings. Barlow has 15 saves on the year.

The record is 70-83. They have nine games left in the year, and they’ll go for the series tomorrow at 5:10 pm, when Jon Heasley makes his second big-league starts. Hopefully Salvador Perez hits a couple more home runs.