CLEVELAND -- In the third inning Tuesday night, Zack Greinke cracked a rare smile.
Guardians center fielder Myles Straw walked up to the plate for the first time and had a new walk-up song, chosen especially for Greinke: John Anderson’s "Seminole Wind," which Greinke warmed up to when he was with the Astros and teammates with Straw.
As soon as Greinke heard the opening notes, his head snapped up, and he looked at Straw with a grin and a nod.
“He loves that intro,” Greinke said. “They liked it when I was in Houston. He talks about it a lot with me. So he finally did it, I guess.”
"I thought I would get a smile out of him, and that's about what it was,” Straw added. “Maybe a little bit more than I thought. Pretty cool to see that. He's one of the best. Hall of Famer. Great person. I'm glad I got a smile out of him."
At that point on Tuesday, before the Royals’ eventual 5-1 loss to the Guardians at Progressive Field, Greinke had more to smile about because he was cruising. It wasn’t until the fifth inning that he really faced trouble with a 27-pitch, three-run inning that ended his night on a sour note.
“Just ran out of gas there,” manager Matt Quatraro said. “I probably left him in one batter too long, obviously.”
Three of the four runs Greinke allowed in his five-inning start came from Guardians rookie Bo Naylor’s two home runs. The first was a solo shot on a middle-middle fastball in the third inning. The second was a two-out, two-run blast on an up-and-away fastball in the fifth.
“Just finished bad is the best way to describe it,” Greinke said. “Still need to look back on Naylor to see his scouting report, felt pretty good going in. Obviously [it] didn’t work out very good. I’ll dive in a little deeper and see why he was able to do what he did.”
Greinke had thrown 44 pitches through four innings and ended his night at 71. Quatraro called the decision to leave Greinke in to face Naylor for a second time in the fifth an “easy second guess,” given it was Greinke’s second start coming back from the injured list without a rehab assignment.
Greinke said he felt strong to start Tuesday’s game; he just fatigued earlier than ideal. But the 39-year-old has only finished six innings three times this year, so getting through five innings on 71 pitches and only facing the Guardians lineup twice is something the Royals will take as he looks to wrap up his 20th Major League season.
“I was throwing a little harder the last two games, so maybe I’ve got to dial it back so I can last a little bit longer,” Greinke said.
With his 11th loss of the season on Tuesday, Greinke is still searching for his first road win since Aug. 13, 2021; in 27 road starts since, he’s 0-16 with a 6.43 ERA. And the Royals failed to back Greinke with run support again, scoring just one run against Guardians righty Aaron Civale across eight innings before getting shut down in the ninth against closer Emmanuel Clase.
“Nothing really goes straight,” infielder Nicky Lopez said of Civale. “Cutter, four-seam, curveball. You can’t cover both sides of the plate. You got to give him at least one. So you just got to see it up and try to put a good swing on it.”
Lopez got a curveball up in the zone in the top of the fifth inning and lined it into left-center field for an RBI single. That was one of just two times the Royals had a runner on third base.
Drew Waters was on third with no outs in the eighth before Maikel Garcia grounded into a double play and Bobby Witt Jr. grounded out on the first pitch he saw.
“When these losses pile up -- even though we won yesterday -- you try not to put more pressure on yourself, but it’s like, ‘Hey, these runs matter,’” Lopez said. “Majority of the year, we haven’t been able to capitalize, haven’t been able to get those runners in. … We haven’t done it in the past. So it’s like, ‘When is it going to turn?’ But you can’t put too much pressure on yourself to do that. You’ve just got to find a good pitch to hit [and] put good swings on it. It’s where you can win and lose games.”