Matheny on Rough Loss to Twins: ‘Can’t Let Those Go'
The Kansas City Royals have been playing better baseball as of late, but the club is settling into a bit of a slump now. Kansas City has lost four of its last five games, and that includes games one and two of an ongoing series against the Minnesota Twins.
Losers of four road games in a row, the Royals are looking to end the streak and avoid a series sweep on Wednesday. Tuesday night's loss wasn't remotely close at Target Field, as the home team won by a final score of 9-0. Starting pitcher Zack Greinke got hit around (nine total base knocks for Minnesota), but his final stat line — six innings, five strikeouts, one earned run — left Kansas City in the game.
A fielding error by rookie Bobby Witt Jr. and a questionable throwing decision by Greinke left the Royals with three total runs allowed through his six innings of work, but that was still good enough to give the Royals a shot in the end. After the outing, manager Mike Matheny praised Greinke for having a decent start and not allowing the game to get completely out of hand.
"I thought he looked strong today," Matheny said. "I thought he had good stuff. He gave up some hits, but he really limited the damage. The one play that he didn't make ended up costing him a couple [of runs]. Easily walks out of there [with] six innings and one earned run. Giving us a chance — that's all we can ask."
Failing to capitalize was a theme for the Royals all night, and Twins starter Sonny Gray had just about everything going for him. He struck out a whopping 10 Royals hitters through six innings of work, including multi-strikeout games for MJ Melendez, Michael Massey, Michael A. Taylor, Nick Pratto and Nicky Lopez. The Royals' bats have been hot in recent weeks, yet Gray extinguished that fire in epic fashion en route to his seventh win of the 2022 campaign.
Opportunities were few and far between for the Royals on Tuesday, as the club had runners in scoring position just five times and left five runners on base. Going 0-for-5 in those scenarios is a recipe for disaster, and only managing to swipe one bag all night doesn't make for great odds at snapping out of a funk. It was a night to forget for Kansas City, but Matheny doesn't want anyone to forget what went wrong.
"You can't let those go," Matheny said. "We've got to make a mark. Unfortunately, those are catching up with us. We keep talking about the kind of team we are. We've got to figure out how to grind, fight and take those gritty at-bats to where we put something in play to put pressure on the defense to where we can get something across the board."
The Royals will have the aforementioned shot at righting the ship to a degree on Wednesday afternoon. After the series finale in Minnesota, Kansas City's road trip continues with a four-game set against the Tampa Bay Rays. Now 22 games below .500 on the year, the season has been well over with for all intents and purposes for quite some time. With that said, the young Royals are learning on the fly and are currently going through one of their first mini-skids together. Time will tell how long it takes for them to snap out of it.
