All your ducks are belong to pond; KC loses 3-0

Those of you who partook in the gamethread may recall that, ahead of the game, I highlighted the fact that Royals’ starting pitcher Carlos Hernández had walked as many as he had struck out - simultaneously finding the balance of too few strikeouts and too many walks. Unfortunately, that was not the case tonight as Hernández ended up walking five in his four innings while he struck out only three. More than that, it was excruciating to watch Hernández pitch, tonight. He had lots of deep counts and took several eternities between pitches.

There will surely be some who will argue that Hernández got no help from the umpires, but the handful of missed calls were not entirely responsible for all of those baserunners. Some will point out that he only gave up two earned runs as if he managed to work himself out of trouble, but the Yankees really helped out all night long by maintaining a station-to-station baserunning pattern; they did not once try to take home plate as an extra base on a hit despite at least three separate chances to do so, off the top of my head.

Gerrit Cole, on the other hand, had a pretty good night. The Royals had their chances, but he seemed to bear down whenever the Royals would seem to get something going. It helps that he was pitching against the Royals, though. He pitched six shutout innings and struck out six. He did walk two in one inning but, of course, the Royals failed to capitalize.

The Royals bullpen did bounce back with a strong night. Joel Payamps pitched two scoreless innings and Ronald Bolaños chipped in three scoreless innings of his own. Each only struck out one apiece, adding up to a total of five strikeouts on the night. Even with the lack of strikeouts and with all of Hernández’s problems, the real problem was once again the offense and their inability to hit with runners in scoring position. The Royals were hitless in five attempts in those circumstances.

Miscellaneous

• The Yankees scored all three runs on outs. The first scored on a double play, the other two scored on sacrifice flies.
• Hunter Dozier kicked his recent 0-14 slump with a two-hit night, including a hustle double.
• Whit Merrifield reached base three times for the first time this season.
• Andrew Benintendi saw his hitting streak come to an end, but Bobby Witt Jr. extended his to nine games before being hit on the hand.
• The Royals are now 0-1 while wearing the City Connect jerseys. They are expected to wear them for all Friday home games for the remainder of the season.
• This is, as the kids say, “Not Great, Bob!”

The Royals will try to avoid the sweep tomorrow and get May started off on a better foot than April ended when they finished the series against the Yankees. Daniel Lynch (2-1, 3.38 ERA) will go for KC against Luis Severino (2-0, 3.32 ERA) for the Yankees. Gametime is at 1:10 PM CDT.