Kansas City Royals
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Kansas City Royals OFFICIAL GAME NOTES Texas Rangers (44-45) @ Kansas City Royals (44-44) Kauffman Stadium - Saturday, July 15, 2017 Game #89 - Home Game #45 FS 1 (HD) & KCSP Radio (610 Sports) UPCOMING PITCHING PROBABLES Sunday, July 16 vs. Texas Rangers: RHP Yu Darvish (6-8, 3.49) vs. RHP Ian Kennedy (3-6, 4.45), 1:15 p.m., FSKC (HD) & 610 Sports Monday, July 17 vs. Detroit Tigers: TBA vs. LHP Jason Vargas (12-3, 2.62), 7:15 p.m., FSKC (HD) & 610 Sports Tuesday, July 18 vs. Detroit Tigers: TBA vs. LHP Travis Wood (1-2, 6.06), 7:15 p.m., FSKC (HD) & 610 Sports Wednesday, July 19 vs. Detroit Tigers: TBA vs. RHP Jason Hammel (4-8, 5.02), 7:15 p.m., FSKC (HD) & 610 Sports Thursday, July 20 vs. Detroit Tigers: TBA vs. LHP Danny Duffy (5-5+ tonight), 7:15 p.m., FSKC (HD) & 610 Sports Tonight’s game can be heard back home on KCSP Radio (610 Sports) and the Royals Radio Network with Royals Hall of Famer Denny Matthews, Steve Physioc and Steve Stewart on the call, while Don Free controls the dials as the producer/engineer…tonight is being televised in HD on FS 1 with Ryan Lefebvre and C.J. Nitkowski in the booth...tomorrow’s series finale will be back on FOX Sports Kansas City with Ryan, Rex Hudler, Joel Goldberg and Jeff Montgomery. Royals vs. Rangers DONE IN BY THE LONG BALL--The good news from Friday night is that everyone in the A.L. Central Kansas City’s struggles agianst the Rangers continued with lost, while the bad news is that everyone in the A.L. Central lost as the Royals could’ve picked up a game last night’s defeat, the 11th straight to Texas...KC’s last win was on the pack...while the rest of the Central was scuffling along, KC incurred a 5-3 loss here in “The K” here on July 22 of last year...KC still leads the all-time series by a last night, as Texas clubbed a pair of home runs that turned a 3-0 deficit into a 2-run advantage...Jason 277-272-1 count, including a 152-125-1 mark in Kansas City, 138- 112-1 in Kauffman Stadium. Hammel opened the contest with 5.0 hitless innings, but then his deflection of a one-out ground ball by Date Site Score WP LP Att. Elvis Andrus went for the Rangers’ first hit of the night and also set the stage for Adrian Beltre’s 3-run 4/20 @ Tex L, 0-1 (13) Alvarez Wood 26,898 homer which knotted the game at 3-3...Mike Napoli then came off the bench with his second career pinch 4/21 @ Tex L, 2-6 Hamels Karns 31,320 homer, clubbing a towering shot to left off of Mike Minor to stake Texas to his deciding lead...the Royals 4/22 @ Tex L, 1-2 Bush Wood 41,446 4/23 @ Tex L, 2-5 Darvish Hammel 37,177 had jumped out to a 2-0 advantage on Alcides Escobar’s third homer of the year, a 2-run ricochet off 7/14 KC L, 3-5 Perez Minor 35,591 the leftfield foul pole in the second...Jorge Bonifacio then expanded the lead to 3-0 with an RBI single, 7/15 KC knocking home Whit Merrifield, who had doubled with one out in the fifth...the loss was Kansas City’s 7/16 KC fourth in a row, the longest slide for the team since a 9-game losing streak that ended the month of April. HOME STREAK BEING TESTED--Last night kicked off the third and final 10-game homestand of the season for Kansas City with the Rangers here through tomorrow, followed by a pair of A.L. Central rivals with Detroit in for four and the White Sox next weekend for a 3-gamer...the Royals entered this set winners of three straight series here and unbeaten in the last five (4-0-1), including a 7-3 mark in the last homestand...KC is now 24-20 on the year in Kauffman Stadium...once this extended stay is completed, the Royals will have just 28 home games left on the 2017 docket while 37 are slated for the road, including a make-up game in Yankee Stadium on September 25 (12:05 KC time) from a May 25 rainout in the Bronx. BACK TO BREAK EVEN--The rollercoaster ride better known as the 2017 season is now 88 games old and the Royals are back to square one with a 44-44 ledger and 76 games remaining...Kansas City finds itself in third place, three games out in the cramped A.L. Central, while trailing in the Wild Card by a 1 1/2 games...this was the fourth straight year the Royals resumed post-break play with a winning record (44-43)...the 2014 club was 48-46 when the All-Star Game came around, then lost the first four games out of the break to fall to 48-50, before a 24-6 stretch put the Royals in the Wild Card hunt and eventually landed in the World Series. TIGERS NEXT--This 10-game stay will continue with the arrival of the Detroit Tigers on Monday in the first of a 4-game series, all contests ticketed for 7:15 first pitches...the Royals are just 2-4 against the Bengals to this point, posting 1-2 marks both here and in Comerica Park during the first two sets. ACE 30 REMEMBERING YO--The morning of January 22, 2017 will always be remembered as one of the most tragic days in franchise history when word was received that pitcher Yordano Ventura had his life cut short due to a car accident in his native Dominican Republic...signed as a 17-year old in 2008, the fireballing right-hander compiled a 38-31 during his abbreviated Major League career...among many highlights, “Ace” will be most remembered for blanking the San Francisco Giants over 7.0 innings in Game #6 of the 2014 World Series to force a seventh and deciding game, while pitching with a heavy heart himself due to the untimely passing of his friend Oscar Tavares...to honor the late Ventura, all uniforms in 2017 will be adorned with the ACE 30 patch. TONIGHT’S STARTING PITCHERS: LHP Cole Hamels (4-0, 3.51) vs. LHP Danny Duffy (5-5, 3.76) 2017 2016 Career 2017 2016 Career Cole Hamels vs. Royals 1-0 2-0 3-1 Major League Record 4-0 (3.51 ERA) 15-5 140-96 Danny Duffy vs. Rangers 0-0 1-0 1-1 Major League Record 5-5 (3.76 ERA) 12-3 41-38 DANNY DUFFY takes the hill for his 14h start of the season, the 120th of his career and 148th appearance…he’s facing Texas for the second time this season, making his sixth start against the Rangers all-time...the 28-year-old left-hander signed a five-year deal in January to stay in Kansas City through the 2021 campaign…he was originally selected in the third round of the 2007 Draft. Danny’s 2017 Starts .500 WEEK VS. ACES--A Southern California native, Danny made his first start DATE OPPONENT SCORE IP H R ER HR BB SO TP-K LEFT 4/3 at Minnesota ND, 1-7 6.0 3 1 1 1 3 8 100-62 1-1 at Dodger Stadium last Sunday, squaring off against 3-time Cy Young winner Clayton 4/8 at Houston W, 7-3 7.0 8 2 2 1 2 3 87-54 7-2 Kershaw, just five days after knocking off Seattle’s Felix Hernandez in Safeco Field... 4/14 LA Angels W, 7-1 7.0 3 1 1 0 2 6 103-68 6-1 4/20 at Texas ND, 0-1 (13) 7.1 4 0 0 0 3 5 100-65 0-0 things didn’t go quite as well against Kershaw as they did against “the King”, as Duff 4/25 at Chi. White Sox L, 5-10 4.2 9 6 6 0 2 2 96-61 2-6 incurred a 5-2 loss to the Dodgers...he was charged with five runs on six hits over his 5/2 Chi. White Sox L, 0-6 5.0 10 6 6 0 2 3 103-64 0-4 5/7 Cleveland L, 0-1 6.2 6 1 1 0 2 2 104-67 0-1 7.0 innings, with no walks and nine strikeouts...a 3-run third was his undoing, allowing 5/12 Baltimore ND, 3-2 7.0 8 2 2 0 1 6 97-65 2-2 5/18 NY Yankees W, 5-1 7.0 3 0 0 0 2 10 108-69 5-0 an RBI single before Justin Turner clubbed his second homer of the day, a 2-run blast... 5/23 at NY Yankees W, 6-2 7.0 6 2 2 2 3 7 105-72 6-2 Danny’s nine strikeouts were his second-most this year and most without issuing a walk 5/28 at Cleveland L, 1-10 4.0+ 9 6 6 0 3 2 89-57 1-4 7/4 at Seattle W, 7-3 5.2 5 2 2 0 2 4 86-58 6-2 since fanning 10 at Target Field on September 7 of last season...he suffered his first loss 7/9 at LA Dodgers L, 2-5 7.0 6 5 5 3 0 9 102-76 2-5 since May 28 at Cleveland – his last start before going on the disabled list...it was also 2017 Totals 5-5 3.76 81.1 80 34 34 7 27 67 1280-838 65.5% Career Totals 41-38 3.72 704.1 657 305 291 78 258 607 - - Duff’s first Interleague defeat since August 20, 2014, when he fell 5-2 at Coors Field.