The Royals have spent June being ferociously streaky

All teams are prone to streaky play. But the Kansas City Royals have taken that to a whole new level in June. Looking at the games they’ve played, it’s almost like they can only win or lose in streaks.

You can watch the Royals try to turn one win into a two-win streak when they take on the St. Louis Cardinals, and you can watch it for free because it’s Yahoo Sports’ MLB Free Game of the Day. The game, which starts at 8:15 p.m. ET, can be streamed on Yahoo’s Sports Home, MLB index, video home and right here in the story you’re reading. Local blackouts apply.

If we start at the beginning of June, the Royals ended a six-game winning streak on June 1. Then on June 2 they started a new streak, but of the losing variety. They lost eight games in a row, but once they won a game they won five straight games. After one loss, they started a mini-streak of three wins, then lost four games directly after.

All that streaking means there’s also sweeping going on. In June, they were swept by the Cleveland Indians and the Baltimore Orioles during their eight-game losing streak, and lost both games in a two-game series with the New York Mets. But they also got the Indians back by sweeping them during their five-game winning streak. And on the edges of both those streaks, they took two of three games against the Chicago White Sox, and three of four against the Detroit Tigers. Considering that the White Sox, Tigers, and Indians are all division foes, those are important wins.

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Taking apart their longest losing streak, it was the perfect storm of starting pitching implosions and lack of offense. When they were swept by the Indians and Orioles, they scored a total of eight runs over seven games, while their starting pitching gave up 29 runs. It’s not hard to see why they lost so much when you see numbers like that. On the flip side, the starting pitching during their five-game winning streak was much more stable — eight runs in five games (four of those runs were given up in one game alone). And (not) shockingly, their offense was the opposite, scoring 21 runs in those five games.

The Royals ended their recent four-game losing streak on Sunday with a 6-1 win against the Houston Astros. June’s not over yet, so maybe they have one more streak in them before the calendar page turns to July. If they do, that could take them from second place to first place in the AL Central.

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