This story was excerpted from Anne Rogers’ Royals Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.

KANSAS CITY -- Royals starter Alec Marsh has only made 21 appearances in the Major Leagues, and thrown just 96 2/3 innings with Kansas City.

Yet, he’s already made it to the record books -- right next to teammate Brady Singer.

With six strikeouts against the Orioles in a 9-4 victory on Friday night, Marsh became the second-fastest Royal to reach 100 career strikeouts. The milestone came on his fifth strikeout of the night, on a curveball that Orioles shortstop Gunnar Henderson swung through for strike three.

Marsh reached 100 strikeouts in his 21st appearance. Singer was the fastest to reach the milestone, doing so in his 20th game, which came on May 21, 2021, against White Sox first baseman José Abreu.

The punchout milestone speaks to how the game has evolved to a more strikeout-oriented pitching approach, yes, but the two sitting atop the leaderboard speak to the Royals’ belief in their young starters. Singer and Marsh, along with Cole Ragans, are key to the rotation this year and in the future, despite the Royals bringing in veteran pitchers to help.

Marsh is the least experienced of the group, but he’s learning fast. Key to his 5 2/3 scoreless innings against the Orioles on Friday night -- earning him his third win of the season and bringing his ERA down to 3.22 across four starts -- was slowing the game down.

“I think I was rushing through a lot of stuff the last couple starts,” Marsh said. “So I made it a point to just get in the zone, be in the zone more often, see how fast I can get to two strikes. And good results will follow.”

Marsh found the strike zone 49% of the time and registered 12 whiffs on 40 swings (30%) on Friday. His fastball got seven of those whiffs, on 17 swings (41%), and later on, was able to induce chases on his secondary pitches outside of the zone.

Marsh’s mindset in the early part of 2024 has been about calming himself down on the mound and not being so tense physically and mentally, which he felt hindered him in '23 during his rookie year. To him, “Slowing the game down” has nothing to do with how many hits he’s given up; regardless of the situation, he’s trying to relax pitch-to-pitch, take more deep breaths and be smoother with his delivery to be in the strike zone.

“I’ve got the ball, so I dictate the game.” Marsh said. “Taking it easy, being smooth and staying back on my mechanics, and everything else will follow. Sticking with my process.”

Marsh made a conscious effort this offseason to focus on his body and how he was moving to be smoother in his mechanics.

“I used to be a huge heavy lifter, so I’m in the gym all the time, I’m super tight, and that starts to translate to throwing,” Marsh said. “I realized that my natural athletic ability comes when I’m as relaxed and smooth as possible. I just really focused on that in my throwing program all offseason, and it started to translate.”

Marsh’s strike-throwing and efficiency this spring were the major reasons he won the fifth starter job out of camp. His composure and confidence added to it.

Now, the Royals are seeing it in games that matter.

“I think it’s really evident,” manager Matt Quatraro said. “The pitch efficiency was much better. He was getting into better counts. … When you look back to the Mets game [Marsh started on April 13], he hung in there and battled, but there were a lot more hitters’ counts, and he had to force the issue later instead of putting them on the defensive.”