The Kansas City Royals are one win away from advancing to the American League Championship Series. Anyone following this dynamic team within the past few weeks can see that the Royals are playing inspired, almost magical baseball now, which is exactly what fans want to see from their team competing in the postseason.
Kansas City has now played all three of their playoff games this season in extra-innings. According to MLB Network’s Friday night edition of MLB Tonight, the Royals are the first team to perform this task. Few could have expected to see this kind of resilience from the underdogs, but it has been fun to watch. It is not an easy feat being down 7-3 in the bottom of the eighth inning against the Athletics and Jon Lester to come back twice and win an elimination game. Then, they had to play in Anaheim against the top team in the league in a best-of-five series, a daunting task for anyone. However, the Royals are now on the brink of an ALDS Championship after their 4-1 win in Game 2 Friday night.
With the series now headed to Kansas City, the Los Angeles Angels will have to figure out how to win three games in a row against a team that has every reason to believe this season was not a fluke. The odds are not looking good for the Halos as the Royals will now need one more win with a roaring crowd behind them for the next two games.
The Angels went into the postseason with much confidence, having the top seed in the American League, but things have quickly gone south as their offense has failed them for the second night in a row on Friday. By the way, if anyone has seen or heard from Mike Trout, please be sure to let him know that his team has been looking for him.
The Angels’ only run of the night came from an Albert Pujols single in the bottom of the sixth inning that drove in Kole Calhoun. It was quite a pitchers’ duel until the top of the 11th inning when Eric Hosmer hit a two-run home run to give the Royals the lead.
Salvador Perez added some insurance with an RBI single to make it 4-1, a score from which the Angels would not recover. That 4-1 score turned out the final.
Game 3 will occur on Sunday with C.J. Wilson (13-10, 4.51 ERA) pitching for the Angels and James Shields (14-8, 3.21 and 0-0, 7.20 in the postseason) for the Royals. The Angels will look to stop the bleeding as the Royals will look to close the series in, preferably, nine innings.
For the Angels to have any chance. they will need to see much more from their offense than they have these last two games. Trout, Pujols, and Josh Hamilton are a combined 1 for 25 with one RBI in the first two games. As for the Royals, things are really starting to get interesting over in Kansas City.
PHOTO CREDIT: Denis Poroy, Getty Images Sport
