Vinnie Pasquantino Makes Candid Admission About Royals' Struggles Vs. Yankees
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The New York Yankees came into Kauffman Stadium and laid a smackdown on the Kansas City Royals.
The Yankees won 10-2 on Tuesday night, 6-3 on Wednesday, and then stole a 1-0 decision on Thursday without Aaron Judge in the lineup. The Royals lost all six games to the Yankees this season, scoring a grand total of 11 runs.
You can't win if you don't hit with runners in scoring position. And the Royals went 0-for-17 in such situations this series, squandering what few opportunities they had to make some noise against their tormentors from the Bronx.
After the dust settled, Royals first baseman Vinnie Pasquantino lamented his team's inability to cash in when they had opportunities to do damage.
“I think it is actually becoming a weight,” Pasquantino said, per Anne Rogers of MLB.com. “And I probably shouldn’t say that. But yeah, when there’s a guy in [scoring] position, like when you get up to the plate, you really want to get him in. And we don’t have an answer to solve that right now. At least, we haven’t up to this point.
Pasquantino also noted how those at-bats with runners in scoring position reflected on the differences between the 41-25 Yankees and the 34-35 Royals at this point in the season.
“You never want to give a team that just beat you credit,” Pasquantino said, per Rogers. “But you just watch the at-bats and how they approach their at-bats, and how they just make the pitchers grind it out. We just got to do a better job of that. Find a way to get the extra 90, find a way to score somebody.
Fortunately, the Royals won't be left to dwell on the loss for long. They start a home series against the Athletics on Friday night, which is a great opportunity to get themselves straightened out against a last-place ballclub.
But if they can't find a way to beat a team that's lost 24 of its last 28 games, the negativity will start piling up fast.
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Jackson Roberts is a former Division III All-Region DH who now writes and talks about sports for a living. A Bay Area native and a graduate of Swarthmore College and the Newhouse School at Syracuse University, Jackson makes his home in North Jersey. He grew up rooting for the Red Sox, Patriots, and Warriors, and he recently added the Devils to his sports fandom mosaic. For all business/marketing inquiries regarding "Kansas City Royals On SI," please reach out to Scott Neville: scott@wtfsports.org
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