Nine in a row, a number Kansas City has not seen since July 2017
The Royals beat Toronto 5-3 at Rogers Centre on Tuesday and pushed their winning streak to nine. The last time they ran this hot was July 19-28, 2017.
Nothing about it was spectacular. Salvador Perez singled home the go-ahead run in the fifth off Max Scherzer, who falls to 1-7 on the year. Seth Lugo handled the rest: five innings, one earned run, six hits, one walk, five strikeouts, and a record of 6-7. A sellout crowd of 43,245 watched it happen.
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Toronto gave away two runs in one inning
The sixth is where it slipped. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. picked up a Kyle Isbel bunt and threw badly to Ernie Clement covering the bag. Nick Loftin scored on it. Carter Jensen then lifted a sacrifice fly to bring in John Rave. Two unearned runs, a three-run cushion, and Toronto had done it to themselves.
Scherzer had not helped his own cause either, walking three in the first inning alone. His final line: five innings, five walks, four hits, two earned runs.
The Blue Jays kept putting runners in scoring position, in four of the first five innings, and kept leaving them there. One run came home, on a Jesus Sanchez sacrifice fly. They finished 1 for 11 in those spots.
Bases loaded, and it still went nowhere
Toronto filled the bases in the eighth. Clement flew out to end it. The ninth brought a Nathan Lukes single that scored two and dragged the Blue Jays back within range, then Lukes was thrown out at second and the game was over.
Kansas City did not escape clean. Michael Massey went down head first on a wild pitch and left dazed, with Tyler Tolbert taking his place.
Toronto sits 64-69, two back in the wild-card race, and has now lost four of six. Randy Dobnak takes the ball for the Royals on Wednesday.
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