Royal resolve: Kansas City snatches another victory from jaws of defeat
The Kansas City Royals may or may not be a team of destiny, but they are without question a team made of incredible resolve.
We’ve seen it time and time again over the past two seasons. With their backs against the wall, or like Saturday, with an opposing pitcher like David Price carving them up for six straight innings, all it takes is a tiny sliver of hope, and they’ll come back fighting. One sliver of hope, and they’ll find a way to crush your dreams.
[ALCS Game 2: Royals rally to beat David Price, Blue Jays 6-3, take 2-0 series lead]
The Oakland A’s can vouch for that from last year’s AL wild card. The Houston Astros can too. They were six outs away from finishing the Royals in ALDS Game 4. Then, in an instant, a seemingly comfortable four-run lead evaporated. In a span of eight batters to be exact, the Royals rallied in historic fashion, snatched a victory from the jaws of defeat, staved off elimination, and then advanced in Game 5.
Truth be told, the Royals resilience and resolve may be the strongest forces left in these playoffs, and both were on full display again on Saturday as they topped the Toronto Blue Jays 6-3 in ALCS Game 2.
With only an Alcides Escobar first-inning, first-pitch single to their credit, the Royals entered the seventh inning trailing 3-0. Then came the sliver of hope. Ben Zobrist popped up the first pitch of the inning into short right field. It should have been a routine out. Second baseman Ryan Goins and right fielder Jose Bautista were both there to make the play for Toronto, but failed to communicate and allowed the ball to drop right between them.
Chalk that one up to the Kauffman Stadium crowd.
The door opened the very instant that ball hit the ground, and the Royals powered right through. After having no answers for Price for six innings, every swing they took against the left-hander from that point on had purpose. And just about every baseball they hit found grass and produced a run.
When all was said and done, the Royals scored five runs on six hits. The game was now theirs to lose, and with Kelvin Herrera and Wade Davis waiting in the bullpen, losing wasn’t an option.
“Well, our guys, they never quit,” manager Ned Yost said of his team’s latest comeback. “They keep going. Even when I went to get Ventura, I told Yordano he was frustrated with himself. I’m like, Look, we’re going to get you off the hook here. Hoch (Luke Hochevar), you hold them right here. We’re going to score some runs. We’re going to make this game really, really interesting. Hoch came in and did a great job, bases loaded, one out, got out of it unscathed, Duffy with a great inning and put us in a position to get to Wade and Herrera to close it out.”
We knew the Royals wouldn’t quit, but Zobrist’s bloop hit was the jump start they needed. Lorenzo Cain and Eric Hosmer immediately followed with singles of their own to bring Zobrist around and further fuel the already fired up Kauffman Stadium crowd. Cain would then come home on Kendrys Morales’ ground out, and that set the stage for the two biggest hits of the game.
The first came from Mike Moustakas, who batting left-on-left against Price lined a game-tying RBI single.
The second came from Alex Gordon, who battled Price for eight pitches before delivering a ringing go-ahead double. Alex Rios also added a two-out RBI single in that frame before Mike Moustakas capped the relentless onslaught with another run-scoring hit in the eighth.
It was amazing to see how quickly and how completely the entire landscape of the game changed in that one instant. Perhaps the Royals still would have had a comeback in them had that baseball not dropped. Perhaps they would not. Either way, it’s a reminder that you can’t take one play or one pitch off against the Royals, or they will make you regret it.
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Mark Townsend is a writer for Big League Stew on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @Townie813
