Royals Bats Forget to Back Zack

When a team loses 14 out of 16 on the road, the losses tend to blur like a road during a cloudburst. The latest one, in a 1-0 loss to the Arizona Diamondbacks, in 10 innings, the Royals found a new way to lose. This one did not happen because of a bungled base running play or an error made by the defense. The Royals have become masters at those two means of losing. It certainly was not new because the D-Backs hit a walk-off home run. Again, something the Royals are familiar with quite well. No, this one was remarkable because of what happened the first seven innings of the game. What happened the first seven innings can be summed up in two words Zack Greinke.

If I showed you a pitching line that had seven walks, what would you think? Most knowledgeable baseball fans would expect a disaster of a game. But oh wait, we are talking about Zack Greinke. What if I told you he gave up only three hits and the stunner, he gave up zero runs? Yeah, that is right 10 base runners in seven innings and he gave up
zero runs. To say that his performance was Houdini like, he loaded the bases with two outs in two consecutive innings, is an understatement. Both times, he managed to get out of the self-imposed mess without yielding a run. The key may have been the fact he did not give up the walks until there were two out in the inning. If he had given up those walks to leadoff the inning, smart money is his pitching line would have looked quite different.

Zack again showed why he has a legit chance to be not just a good pitcher, not just a true Ace of a staff, but also one of the most dominant pitchers in baseball. On a night when he had less than stellar stuff, on a night when he gave up more than a handful of walks and only struck out five, he managed to give the Royals seven shutout innings. He matched Doug Davis inning for inning. In years past, the second a pitcher hit 100 pitches, the manager would bring in a reliever. Trey Hillman let Greinke come out for the seventh inning, already over 100 pitches. It was a great thing to see as a Royals fan. Considering lately, one tends to break in a cold sweat as soon as Hillman signals for the bullpen.

Doug Davis also allowed ten base runners, six via hits and four via walks. The Royals failed to capitalize on any of these hits, despite getting their lead off man on a couple of different times, something Arizona was not able to do. While I guess an argument can be made that Davis was just as Houdini like, it seemed that it was the ineptness of the Royals offense and not a great escape act by Davis.

The truth of the matter is, neither team from an offensive standpoint deserved to win this game. That said, this is a game that the Royals have to win. When your best pitcher goes out, without his best stuff and makes it through seven innings of shutout ball while giving the opponent seven free base runners, you have to win. More specifically, good teams win this game and bottom feeders lose this game. Hats should be off to Arizona. They pulled out the win. Doug Davis survived just like Zack Greinke but one team was able to score one run, all that was needed and one team was not. It should be no surprise that the team that is 37-31 won this game, and the team that is 26-42 lost the game.

Eventually, Yabuta, whom looked to be turning things around, gave up the homerun to Chad Tracy in the tenth. A walk-off homerun and perhaps a shaving cream pie in the face for Tracy. To add insult to injury, the winning pitcher, ormer Royals highly touted prospect Billy Buckner got the win.


Greinke was a shortstop in high school, draft worthy but not first round worthy. Perhaps he should have hit a homerun; he has one against Arizona because that seemed to be the only way the Royals were going to score a run to back his remarkable performance. Zack showed up for the game, gutted out seven innings, and deserved a win; it is shame that the rest of his teammates left their bats in Kansas City.