Royals sweep Twins in 4-1 afternoon win

Through his first 17 starts, Royals starting pitcher Jonathan Heasley had made it through at least six innings just five times. In just two of those starts did he give up one run or fewer. After giving Kansas City 6.2 scoreless innings in his last start against Boston, where he gave up just two hits, Heasley followed it up by giving up just two hits again, this time in 6.0 innings of one-run ball.

His strong performance, aided by a few solo homers, paved the way to a 3-1 Royals win, sealing a sweep over the Minnesota Twins. Kansas City’s record improves to 61-89 while the Twins fall to 73-77.

Both offenses started slow out of the gate and stayed mostly slow throughout the afternoon, but Kansas City drew first blood. The Royals scored a run in the 3rd, 4th, and 5th innings thanks to a broken bat RBI single from Salvador Perez and solo homers from Edward Olivares and Drew Waters. The three runs put Kansas City up 3-0 in the 5th and it was all that Heasley and the Royals pitching staff needed.

Heasley cruised through his first five innings, beginning his start with 3.1 perfect innings. The Twins managed just two hits against Heasley, one a single from Carlos Correa to break up his perfect start in the 4th, and another single from Luis Arraez in the 6th. Arraez’s single to right field allowed Caleb Hamilton to move to 3rd after he walked to lead-off the inning, eventually scoring on Nick Gordon’s sac fly.

The sac fly made it a 3-1 game, the only offense the Twins were able to put together against the Royals’ staff. Collin Snider replaced Heasley to begin the 7th after Heasley needed 89 pitches to get through his six innings. He struck out three Minnesota batters in those innings.

Kansas City added an insurance run in the 8th thanks to Nate Eaton’s RBI double. While Heasley was brilliant, the Royals bullpen did an equally, if not better job on the afternoon, with Snider, Carlos Hernandez, and Brad Keller giving up just a single base runner in three innings of work and zero hits.

The Royals welcome the Seattle Mariners to town tomorrow for their last weekend at the K this season.

Up Next: Royals v. Mariners, Friday, September 23, 7:10 PM CDT, Kauffman Stadium. TBD v. LHP Marco Gonzales (10-14, 4.01 ERA)