Sunday Victory: Royals 5, Guardians 1

It was a good afternoon for the Royals, who beat the Guardians 5-1 and earned a series victory in the process. A nice crowd on a sunny, warm day at Kauffman Stadium enjoyed just a good pitching performance by both Zack Greinke and the Royals’ bullpen.

Greinke looked great, allowing just four baserunners in five shutout innings of work. Jose Cuas, Dylan Coleman, and Taylor Clarke each pitched a scoreless inning. They got within one out of a shutout, but Joel Payamps Joel Payamps’d and gave up a double and a wild pitch. 5-1. The Guardians were held to just three hits until Payamps entered in the ninth.

The offense: a Kyle Isbel RBI single, an Andrew Benintendi RBI single, an M.J. Melendez two-run single, and a Nicky Lopez single. The Royals had 10 hits, but all but three were singles. Hunter Dozier, who Josh Vernier tweeted a comparison to Bo Jackson about because they had the same number of extra base hits through this point in their careers, had two doubles.

Zach Plesac has owned the Royals in the past, but they scored five runs on him today. It felt like 50!

There really isn’t a ton to say here. You rely on me to blast the team, but I can’t really do that after a performance like this. Dayton Moore said that it takes 8-10 years to become a quality executive earlier today about Lonnie Goldberg, so I guess I can make fun of that? And also how I’d rather have a dead raccoon off the side of I70 be this team’s manager than Mike “hey we always compete and that’s the most important thing” Matheny? Other than that, good game today, boys.

Next: the Detroit Tigers come into town, and a doubleheader is on deck for tomorrow. First game is at 1:10 pm.