KANSAS CITY -- Baseball is a funny game. Sometimes a team that has largely struggled faces a National League Cy Young Award candidate who has a strong chance to start the All-Star Game… and they score nine runs on him, chasing him from the game in the fourth inning.
Take your odds, expected stats and predictions, and throw them out the window, and now we can present Monday’s game at Kauffman Stadium.
Against one of the best pitchers in baseball this season in Cristopher Sánchez, the Royals scored six in the first inning and forced the Phillies' ace out of the game after 3 1/3 innings, not letting up in their 15-1 rout to earn a series victory in their final game of the homestand. The Royals scored in all eight innings, and their 15 runs and 22 hits were both season highs.
After Royals starter Noah Cameron tossed a 31-pitch first inning, the Royals faced an uphill battle against Sánchez as they grabbed their bats. The lefty was 10-3 entering Monday with a 2.00 ERA. He had never had a start shorter than five innings. He’s been dominant all season long.
But when Lane Thomas led off with a four-pitch walk, things got interesting. Bobby Witt Jr. beat out a double-play ball, Salvador Perez singled, and the Phillies' defense didn’t help matters when they couldn’t turn another double-play on Jac Caglianone’s grounder, leading to the first run scored.
Nick Loftin, Starling Marte and Tyler Tolbert followed with two-out hits. Then veteran catcher Luke Maile, on the roster because Perez is dealing with elbow soreness that has limited his catching recently, stepped to the plate and promptly lifted a three-run home run on an in-zone changeup that landed just over the fence in right-center field.
Sometimes it’s so unexplainable that you just have to enjoy it.
So, as difficult as this season has been for the Royals, and as tough as this stretch has been with injuries and roster moves, and at times, simply trying to survive games, they did enjoy Monday.
As Cameron grinded through his start, not allowing another run, but needing 105 pitches through five innings, the Royals' offense didn’t let up. Perez hit his 11th homer of the season in the second, bringing him to 314 career home runs and three away from tying George Brett’s franchise record (317). Thomas added his sixth homer of the year in the fourth.
Tolbert, who is on the roster more for his speed and appeared in just his 29th game on Monday, hit his first home run of the season, too, as part of his first career five-hit game that had him just a triple away from the cycle. With Tolbert’s single off position player Garrett Stubbs in the eighth inning, he logged the first five-hit game by a Royal since Hunter Dozier on May 13, 2022, at Colorado.
Seven Royals logged multi-hit games, including Loftin, who reached base five times with four singles and a walk.