Kris Bubic lowered his ERA to a sparkling 1.47 and Vinnie Pasquantino crushed a two-run, go-ahead home run to power the Kansas City Royals to a 3-1 victory against the San Francisco Giants in Oracle Park. It was a nice victory and Kansas City’s second straight.
Let’s talk about Bubic a little bit: what an absolute beast he has been this year. While Bubic didn’t quite have his most devastating strikeout stuff going on, he managed to stymie Giants hitters again and again. Bubic lasted seven strong innings, striking out five Giants batters and walking three.
Bubic navigated the first six innings without any issue and with minimal resistance. During those six innings, he never once allowed more than one baserunner, and cruised through the Giants lineup like a hot knife through butter. He was efficient and unhittable.
By unhittable, I mean unhittable, literally—through those first six innings, Bubic didn’t allow a single hit. And with his efficiency, it wasn’t out of question that he could seal the deal.
Bubic’s no-hit bid did end in the seventh inning when Wilmer Flores sent a bouncing ground ball to Michael Massey, who overran the ball and slipped in the process. It was initially ruled an error but changed to a hit between innings, which is a dumb way to lose a no-hitter. Thankfully, Bubic gave up a second hit on a clean Casey Schmitt double one inning later, thereby ending what would have been a tiring debate about whether or not the Flores gounder was a hit or not before it really got off the ground. And since Schmitt didn’t score, it was the perfect baserunner.
To wrap up the seventh inning, Bobby Witt Jr. caught a soft line drive and flipped it to Maikel Garcia at third base for a clutch double play. It was payback for a line drive double play that Witt hit into earlier in the game.
Speaking of hitting, wouldn’t you believe it, but the Royals didn’t do much of that tonight. Lefty tight pants-wearing aficionado and mound vocalist Robbie Ray was also solid. Ray struck out seven Royals and only walked one. Ray also lasted seven innings, and through those innings Kansas City only really threatened in the third inning, when Witt’s aforementioned double play occurred.
The last two innings of the game were quite action packed, however. The Royals finally got on the board in the eighth inning—Jonathan India doubled, and Vinnie Pasquantino hit a baseball 400 feet to right-center field to tie the game.
Most Royals fans didn’t see it though because FanDuel Sports Network was blackout drunk over a chair for a bit and merely displayed “We are experiencing technical difficulties” in a fun font on the screen.
Then, the Giants struck back in the bottom of the eithth inning. Reliever Daniel Lynch IV managed to get one out, but gave up two consecutive singles to Sam Huff and Heliot Ramos. John Schreiber came in for relief and got one more out but then gave up a double to Jung Hoo Lee to put the Giants on the board and bring the tying and go-ahead run in scoring position.
For the final out, though, Matt Chapman popped out to Salvador Perez in foul territory. I’m not going to say that it made up for Salvy’s popup in foul territory to end the 2014 World Series, but the symmetry of the event did make me smile.
After managing to escape the eighth inning after only giving up one run, the Royals clawed it right back with some patented Kansas City small ball. Maikel Garcia hit a single and advanced to second on a Dairon Blanco sacrifice bunt. Hunter Renfroe managed to walk, bringing up to Kyle Isbel. Isbel, in the middle of a solid offensive campaign, notched a single of his own to drive in Garcia and make it 3-1 Royals.
Fortunately, they didn’t need it. Carlos Estevez navigated the ninth inning with minimal issue—just giving up one single in between another couple popouts and a strikeout. Game over.
The Royals are 27-22, gaining a game against the Detroit Tigers, who got walloped by the Cardinals. Onwards and upwards.
