After two tense, well-fought games between these two teams, I fully expected a laugher tonight where one side or the other could fully relax and coast to a victory. It seemed like the natural baseball thing to do to balance out a pair of games decided by two runs or less with a game in which a position player had to pitch. Instead, and thankfully for the fans, we got the trilogy in the series with many of the same dynamics: relatively low-scoring, excellent defensive plays, and late-inning drama. Unfortunately for the D-Backs, they were on the wrong side of each of those phenomenon as the Royals rode one big blast from superstar Bobby Witt Jr to a victory and avoided the home sweep. That result combined with a San Diego sweep over Washington to run their win streak to four means that the D-Backs end the night on the outside looking in of the postseason picture and continue to jockey with Padres for that final Wild Card slot.
Frustratingly, the D-Backs were in the unenviable position of sending out starting pitchers coming off injuries on consecutive nights with the associated, necessary limitations on their range in the game. After Corbin Burnes’ (mostly) successful return to the mound last night, it was Zac Gallen’s turn tonight and it was much of the same as we saw earlier in the year. He was able to throw plenty of strikes (62% of his 68 pitches), but struggled to generate much swing-and-miss, allowed far too many baserunners, and failed to keep the ball in the yard. Altogether, it wasn’t a bad outing and he certainly gave the team a chance to compete – even with a short leash from Torey Lovullo and some poor defense behind him – but any semblance of hope that he would be able to regain the ace-like form he had early in his career can likely be put to bed once and for all. Interestingly, Gallen did display a radically different pitching arsenal by functionally ditching his four-seamer (13% compared to a 37% average on the year) to instead lean on his slider (37% and 22%) and knuckle curve (22% compared to 19%).
The Royals struck first on the backs of consecutive singles from John Rave and Kyle Isbel before a double steal and a poor throw from James McCann to third base allowed the former to score. They added another in the home half of the third when Carter Jensen destroyed a lifeless slider that hung right in the middle of the plate and deposited it into the Kaufmann fountains. After Derek Law continued his strong season in the desert with another scoreless outing, the D-Backs turned to yet another pitcher returning from injury in Michael Soroka for his first relief outing of the year. He successfully saved a desperately depleted bullpen, but made one crucial mistake that was absolutely punished. In his first inning of relief, he gave up a one-out single to Isaac Collins and then walked Jensen on just six pitches ahead of Witt Jr who promptly pounced on the very first pitch he saw and sent it deep into the Kansas City night to give the Royals the lead for good. He rebounded from that debacle of an inning to provide four innings of solid relief work ahead of a much-needed off day tomorrow.
For their part, the Arizona offense did create a few threats throughout the game, but failed to break through on any of their opportunities, including from the very beginning of the game when they put two runners in scoring position with one out but failed to score off an excellent play from third baseman Nick Loftin. Overall, they were a woeful 1-for-9 with runners in scoring position and failed to take advantage of nearly any of the scoring chances they had off Royals’ starter David Lynch or the gaggle of relief pitchers that followed. The offense will need to rediscover the magic that led them to such a strong offense earlier in the season if they have any hopes of making the playoffs and then making any noise once there. Maybe a long flight and an off day will help to reset the team on their final homestand of the season.
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