Important stuff from a 10-1 kathunkering to the Royals

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The White Sox had a requisite number of clunkers in their supply for this year, so kudos to them for finding a foreign lawn to go drop this on. Very little went right! Until further notice, you have six innings to jump the Royals' starter in an alley, pick them up by the legs and shake all the runs out of their pockets, or you're screwed. Instead, Yordano Ventura kept the ball down, the Royals defense didn't spare any borderline basehits, and a shaky, slider-less Jeff Samardzija couldn't pitch over the Royals typical array of soft singles and Mike Moustakas' inevitable ascent to the MVP award. That the defense imploded and Kyle Drabek was awful was the icing on a cake that was already full of ricin.

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State of the Central: The Kansas City Royals

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Between the prominent presence of Royals fans in the Internet baseball writing landscape - Joe Posnanski, Rany Jazayerli, Jeff Passan, and Rob Neyer to name a few - the Royals' recent trolling of the White Sox, and my petty schadenfreude when they fail, I have paid a lot of attention to the Royals in the past few years. Dayton Moore has also just been interesting in his own right, making grand proclamations only to backpedal from them as his promises of a winning team in 5-years was then revised to 6, 7, 8 and then 10 years as the Royals kept losing.  Moore has his strengths as a GM.  He added a lot of talent to the Royals' minor league system* and got a very good return on Zack Greinke from the Brewers. Salvador Perez looks like a nice find, and he's squeezed more value out of Jeremy Guthrie and Bruce Chen than one might anticipate. At the same time, since his hiring in June of 2008, the only hitters on the major league roster who look like they can hack it are (1) Eric Hosmer, a #3 overall draft pick who plays first base and is currently slugging .391; (2) Lorenzo Cain, a player I like a lot, who was part of that Greinke trade I was praising earlier; and (3) Salvador Perez, not necessarily because I think he's a very good hitter, but rather that I think he's a good enough hitter for a good fielding catcher. Otherwise, the offense still largely depends on Alex Gordon and Billy Butler, two guys acquired by Allard Baird before Moore arrived.

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White Sox get just enough of everything to take second straight over Royals

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Pitching, hitting and defense—the White Sox did just enough of all three to beat the Royals 7-6 for their second-straight victory over their divisional foes.

Offensively, the top of the order consistently got on base, as Gordon Beckham and Conor Gillaspie collected a combined six hits and scored four runs.  Each of them scored on Adam Dunn’s three-run home run in the eighth inning, which extended the White Sox lead at the time to 7-2.

Andre Rienzo had a quality start, allowing only two earned runs on five hits in six innings.  Rienzo also struck out eight, while walking just two Royals hitters.  The outing brought Rienzo’s season ERA down to 4.00 and raised his record to an unblemished 4-0.

Young phenom Yordano Ventura pitched for the Royals and the four earned runs he gave up over six innings matches his season-high.  Ventura allowed seven hits, while only striking three White Sox hitters.

“Fresh” off a two-inning appearance last night, Zach Putnam pitched out of a jam in the eighth inning to help preserve a two-run lead going into the ninth inning.

Putnam was helped out on a spectacular defensive play from Alexei Ramirez, who robbed Norichika Aoki of an RBI single.  Ramirez threw out Aoki from his knees on a ground ball in the hole.

The dramatic anticipation of who would be the White Sox closer after Matt Lindstrom was placed on the 15-day disabled list lasted only one night as Ronald Belisario struck out Lorenzo Cain with the tying run on second base to preserve the one-run victory.

The White Sox go for the sweep tomorrow and a chance to return to breakeven on the season when Jose Quintana opposes Jeremy Guthrie at 7:10 PM.

This One Should Have Less Comedy - Game Preview & Lineups 5/20

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Last night was a rare occurrence. The starter gave up 6 runs in just 4 innings of work and somehow the team emerged victorious. Help from the opposing pitcher is necessary for this of course. Tonight that help is unlikely to come. Royals fans have come to look forward to Yordano Ventura outings much the same as White Sox fans do with Chris Sale. They don’t win every time he steps out but there’s always strikeouts. Lots of strikeouts.

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