The Royals avoided the sweep on Sunday afternoon at Comerica Park in Detroit, beating the Tigers 10-8 in a surprising Sunday slugfest.
It was definitely a rollercoaster of a game, emotions-wise, for Royals fans.
Things didn’t look good early on for Kansas City. In the second inning, Riley Greene launched his 31st home run of the year on an 89 MPH changeup that Seth Lugo left up too high in the zone.
With Tigers starter Jack Flaherty retiring the first eight Royals in order, it appeared that the Royals were due for a repeat of Saturday’s 4-2 loss, where the Tigers were in control for the entire game. However, with two outs in the third, the Royals’ bats came alive thanks to a string of clutch two-hit outs (which included a two-run bomb from Vinnie Pasquantino, his 28th of the season and sixth in seven days).
What seemed like a repeat of Saturday seemed to turn into something closer to what Royals fans saw during the Royals’ last homestand against the Nationals, White Sox, and Rangers. Unfortunately, as Royals fans have been accustomed to this season, the early success proved to be fleeting.
Lugo proceeded to give up three runs in the bottom of the fourth, and he and Angel Zerpa proceeded to give up another three runs in the bottom of the fifth. Thus, a five-run lead suddenly evaporated into a 7-6 deficit. It appeared that the Royals were in for another sweep at the hands of the Tigers, who were 7-2 against the Royals this season, heading into this game.
Thankfully, the Royals’ hitters didn’t pack it in and instead kept the line moving after Kansas City relinquished the lead.
With runners on second and third and facing lefty Tyler Holton, manager Matt Quatraro opted to keep Kyle Isbel in, and the move paid off with a big single to drive in two.
The Royals then added another insurance run in the seventh with Maikel Garcia going yard for his 13th home run of the season.
Lucas Erceg did give up a home run to Wenceel Perez in the bottom half of the seventh, but the Tigers were unable to do any damage beyond that. Jonathan Bowlan, fresh up from what seems to be his millionth call-up, had a clean 1-2-3 inning, as did Carlos Estevez in the ninth, collecting his 34th save in the process.
For as difficult as this series was, especially against a rival team like the Tigers, the Royals haven’t seemed to lose much ground in the Wild Card race. The Cleveland Guardians were swept by the Rangers (whom the Royals took three of four from in Kansas City), the Mariners have split against the Athletics at home, and the Yankees have lost three in a row to the Red Sox.
The Royals remain 2.5 games back in the Wild Card race with a 67-64 record after Sunday’s win.
Garcia Continues Sensational Season
It’s incredible to think that Garcia did not start on Opening Day (remember, Cavan Biggio started in his place with Jonathan India playing third base). And yet, the 25-year-old has proceeded to have another solid series in what has been an incredible offensive season.
In Comerica Park this weekend, Garcia collected four hits, scored three runs, had two walks, and drove in a run. That performance improved his slash to .300/.362/.469 for the season with an .831 OPS in 536 plate appearances. He also has 22 stolen bases, 62 runs scored, 58 RBI, and 13 home runs. His home run total is two more than the last two seasons combined.
When it comes to his Statcast metrics this season, Garcia has been a model of consistency, even if he doesn’t sport “traditional” power for a third baseman.
Here’s a look at his batter profile card via TJ Stats.
The batted-ball and hard-hit metrics leave a bit to be desired, but they’re still improvements from a season ago. He’s seen promising growth in barrel rate (2.0% improvement), exit velocity (0.9 MPH), Sweet-Spot% (0.4%), and hard-hit rate (1.5%).
The most significant change, however, has been in his plate discipline, which has seemed to morph him from a middling to mediocre hitter to an All-Star. His K rate is three percent down from last year, and his walk rate is 2.3% higher. Thus, it’s not surprising that his 0.67 BB/K ratio is a career-best.
Furthermore, everything about Garcia’s profile seems sustainable, as illustrated by his xwOBA rolling chart, via Savant. It has been consistently above league-average, which demonstrates that there is nothing flukey with what Garcia has done at the plate this year.
With a 126 wRC+ and 4.5 fWAR this season, according to Fangraphs, the Royals should seriously consider offering an extension to their young third baseman this offseason, especially with his power tool continuing to mature.
Lugo Struggles Again
Lugo entered this outing coming off one of his best starts of the second half. Against the Rangers on August 19th, the veteran righty went 6.1 innings and allowed only two runs on three hits and two walks while striking out five.
Thus, there was some hope that Lugo was on his way to turning things around after struggling on the mound since signing his extension at the Trade Deadline.
Unfortunately, today was another step back for the reigning AL Cy Young runner-up.
The Tigers were on Lugo today, as he gave up six runs on six hits and two walks. While he did strike out five batters, he also gave up two home runs. That gives him five home runs allowed in August and 27 home runs allowed for the season. For context, he only gave up 16 home runs a season ago.
Lugo was aggressive in utilizing the breaking ball primarily today against Detroit, and it produced mixed results, as demonstrated in his TJ Stats summary from today’s start.
Lugo threw the slurve 26.6% of the time and the curveball 24.1% of the time. He had some mixed success with the pitch on a batted-ball end, as he only allowed a .057 xwOBACON on the slurve and a .217 mark on the curve. The curve also sported a 50% whiff rate and 33.3% chase rate.
That said, none of his three pitches found the zone much, as the slurve, curve, and sinker all had zone rates under 39%. Furthermore, only his curve had a chase rate over zero. Thus, it’s not surprising that his overall zone rate was only 46.8% and his chase was only 16.7%. Add that with a whiff of only 20%, and it makes sense why the Tigers walloped Lugo so easily on Sunday afternoon.
Lugo’s command was just not good on Sunday, and that was further illustrated in the pitch type zone chart via Savant.
Lugo missed a lot on the armside end with the curve, a sign that he probably wasn’t getting the grip or feel that he wanted. He also left a lot of pitches in the middle, especially of the fastball variety (four-seamer, sinker, and cutter). An example of that was his home run allowed to Perez, a fastball hitter who absolutely mashed a four-seamer from Lugo.
Here’s a look at where Lugo specifically located that four-seamer (as well as the other three pitches before that).
A lot of hitters are going to damage pitches like that when they’re grooved in that part of the zone in a hitter’s count.
It’s been a season of regression for Lugo, who now sports a 3.99 ERA and 1.24 WHIP in 25 starts and 142 IP. He’s allowing a 10.8% barrel rate and 45.2% hard-hit rate, which are both career-highs. Thus, I would like to think some positive regression may be coming soon for Lugo, especially if he can hone in on his command somewhat.
That said, this may be who Lugo is: a high-three, low-four ERA pitcher who probably is more of a No. 3 or 4 starter than a No. 1 or 2 guy, like he was last season.
An Excellent Return for Bowlan
Right after I wrote my piece on Bailey Falter, the Royals proceeded to put him on the IL and bring up Jonathan Bowlan in his place.
The call-up for Bowlan is his eighth of the season, which means that the Royals can’t option him back to Omaha without first exposing him to waivers. Therefore, Bowlan will be in the Royals bullpen for the remainder of the season, unless he gets injured.
Matt Quatraro opted to bring in Bowlan in the 8th after bringing in Lucas Erceg to face the heart of the Tigers’ order in the seventh. The move was a masterful one (which we don’t hear about enough with Q on Twitter or Bluesky) as not only did Erceg hold the Tigers to only one run, but Bowlan absolutely mowed down Detroit hitters in the eighth.
In one inning of work and seven pitches, the Memphis product shut the Tigers down in order and also got a strikeout. Here’s a look at his metrics on Sunday, via TJ Stats.
Talk about efficiency. Not only did Bowlan flood the strike zone (71.4% zone rate), but he also induced 50% chase and whiff rates. The xwOBACON was high at .453, but that was on one hard-hit ball on his slider, so it makes sense why the data is skewed that way.
Here’s a look at how his seven pitches fared on a zone end on Sunday, via Savant.
Bowlan left a few pitches in the middle, but I applaud him for at least attacking the bottom-of-the-order hitters instead of being too fine, which was a bit of an issue for Erceg, as demonstrated in his pitch chart below.
Hard-hits have been an issue for Bowlan at the Major League level, as he is allowing a 40.5% hard-hit rate and 7.6% barrel rate in 27.2 IP with the Royals this season.
Nonetheless, the Royals are missing a guy with big stuff since Steven Cruz went on the IL. After today’s outing, Bowlan has demonstrated that he can fill in Cruz’s role in the later innings in medium leverage or spot high-leverage situations for the remainder of the season.
Photo Credit: Jamie Squire/Getty Images