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Historical royals often exercised their sovereignty from thrones made of wood, stone, ivory, and sometimes gold. The Kansas City Royals, unfortunately, instead seem intent on emulating what is usually found inside thrones of the porcelain variety.
Kansas City dropped the final game against Houston 9-3, completing the sweep and ending the season with a 3-3 record versus the Astros who, in case you are unaware, are on pace for 96 losses and finished with more than 100 losses a season from 2011-2013. Kansas City, meanwhile, is on pace for 11 fewer wins than last season. Progress!
The game was never close. Danny Duffy only lasted through four innings, giving up 6 runs (5 earned) on 7 hits and 5 walks. Two of those hits were the extremely rare 'home run,' one of which was hit by a young man named George Springer who has hit 9 of them so far in this short season. Duffy's velocity was way down after he begun the game, leading to questions about possible injury. Regardless, this is the type of game you have when you don't strike out very many people, and Duffy has relied on the BABIP Fairy (and perhaps the LOB Minotaur) for the past few games, and this doesn't last forever.
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The Royals did not play good baseball, either. Eric Hosmer made an error on the very first batter, which is usually not a good sign. After the two-run Springer HR in the first inning, Dexter Fowler singled in the second, scoring two more. Carlos Corporan doubled in the third, scoring another. Curiously, Ned sent a struggling Duffy out for the fifth inning, who immediately gave up another homer, this time to Chris Carter, and a single to Jesus Guzman. Then the Duffster was pulled.
Offensively, it was standard ho-hum for the Royals, except that in the fifth inning...
BRETT HAYES SINGLED!
He would not come around to score, of course, as the Royals small ball'd that inning and scored with outs. Then, in the seventh inning...
BRETT HAYES HIT A HOME RUN!
Very selfish for Hayes to take away today's jokes about his .000 average and the team's streak of non-HR hitting, but I suppose neither can last forever. His average is all the way up to .067 now. Baby steps. The Astros scored more against Louis Coleman later, but it was essentially over by the time Duffy left.
The Royals finish the series outscored by the Astros 21-5, have lost 4 in a row, and are about to go on a road trip to face some good teams. People get fired over these kinds of games and series, and this game finally broke Rany if his tweets are any indication. I would not be surprised if someone or multiple someones were fired soon, so I put it at DEFCON 2: everybody but Dayton Moore's job is likely in jeopardy this very minute.
Maybe we'll get to DEFCON 1 sometime this season, but now is probably not the time.