Three Takeaways From the Royals' 7-5 Series-Tying Victory Over Detroit

The Kansas City Royals move to 21-23 on the year with a 7-5 win over the Detroit Tigers.

While unofficial closer Josh Staumont made it interesting, the Kansas City Royals were still able to knot up their series against the Detroit Tigers with a 7-5 victory.

Kansas City moves to 21-23 on the year behind three RBIs from left fielder Andrew Benintendi, who went 2-for-3 with a walk and a stolen base on the day.

The Royals got 6 1/3 strong innings from starting pitcher Brady Singer. In his ninth appearance of the season, Singer allowed three runs on eight hits while striking out six.

Here are three things I took away from Kansas City's series-tying victory.

Kelvin Gutierrez is seeing the ball well.

In a limited sample size, third baseman Kelvin Gutierrez has been solid at the plate. Before Saturday's game, Gutierrez was slashing .421/.421/.421 in six games with a 135 OPS+. The 26-year-old went 1-for-3 with his first extra-base hit and RBI of the young year. With the way Gutierrez has been hitting the ball, it's going to be hard to take him out of the lineup when usual third baseman Hunter Dozier returns from the injured list. 

Kelvin Gutierrez has been hitting the ball well lately. I don’t know how you can take him out of the lineup for Dozier when he comes back.

— Tucker D. Franklin (@tuckerdfranklin) May 22, 2021

Pitching needs to be better after scoring

Following nearly every Royals score in this series, the Tigers have scored in the next half-inning. I'm not sure if that says more about Kansas City's pitching or Detroit's resilience, but I think it's a combination of both. The Royals pitching seems to relax after the offense brings some runs in. If Kansas City is wanting to continue their winning ways, the pitchers are going to need to clamp down on opposing hitters.

Scott Barlow continues to do his job

After Royals manager Mike Matheny sent starting pitcher Brady Singer out for the seventh inning, he was able to get a quick out but walked the next batter. Saturday's felt eerily similar to the one on Friday, as Matheny pulled his starter after 6 1/3 innings. With a runner on first, the Royals turned to arguably their best reliever in Scott Barlow and he did his job. While things got a bit dicey, Barlow was able to pick up the final two outs of the inning by striking out Jeimer Candelario and Miguel Cabrera looking. 

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