Texas toast: Royals lose 10th straight against Rangers with 5-2 defeat on Sunday

The torment had lasted for days, the punchless nights piling up, so Royals manager Ned Yost went to work inside the visitors dugout on Saturday night at Globe Life Park.

His team was in the midst of a third straight loss to the Texas Rangers, a stretch that included just three total runs. Yost’s mind wandered to possible solutions. They had already optioned Raul Mondesi and Paulo Orlando to Class AAA Omaha. They were still waiting for Alex Gordon and Eric Hosmer to break out. As the struggles persisted for another night, a new lineup formed in Yost’s head.

It was one part desperation (“Just try something different,” Yost would say) and one part imagination. It would end with a new leadoff hitter (Whit Merrifield); a rookie in his second career game batting third (Jorge Bonifacio); and a new spot in the order for Gordon (sixth). It could not fix the Royals’ most pressing flaw.

On Sunday afternoon in Texas, the Royals dropped a 5-2 decision to the Rangers, falling here for a fourth straight day. The loss completed a series sweep and prolonged a team-wide slump, a hideous skid that erased the progress made during a 5-3 home stand last week.

The numbers have inched toward historic. The Royals, who totaled five runs in Texas, tied a team record Sunday by scoring two runs or fewer in seven straight games. The loss was the 10th straight against the Rangers, dating back to last year. The new lineup offered a tease in the form of back-to-back homers from Mike Moustakas and Bonifacio in the third inning. But that’s all it was, a fleeting barrage before the new normal settled back in.

“You think: ‘OK, here we go,’ ” Yost said.

And then they didn’t. Royals starter Jason Hammel could not survive the fourth inning. The Royals, 7-11, are now 2-8 on the road as they prepare for a three-game series against the White Sox in Chicago.

“It was really tough for us today,” Moustakas said.

On Sunday, the Royals’ league-worst offensive attack was limited to just two runs — the homers from Moustakas and Bonifacio, which came in consecutive plate appearances against Rangers starter Yu Darvish in the third.

Moustakas stroked an 0-1 cutter into the seats down the right-field line. Bonifacio, who recorded his first career hit in the first inning, whacked a hanging slider 421 feet to left for his first career home run.

In seconds, the Royals had a 2-0 lead, scoring twice in the same inning for the first time since April 14, a span of three series and seven games. Wild as that statistic sounds, they could not find a way to tack on more against Darvish, who struck out seven in eight innings while retiring the final 16 hitters he faced.

“He kind of settled down and started making a lot of pitches to everybody,” Moustakas said. “Obviously, you saw what happened after that.”

The Royals were playing without starting catcher Salvador Perez, who is battling a stiff neck, and center fielder Lorenzo Cain, who drew his first day off. The lack of production spelled doom when Hammel allowed an RBI single in the third and came apart in the bottom of the fourth. He opened the inning with a walk before hitting Joey Gallo and Robinson Chirinos to load the bases. Hammel would say he was trying “to do too much,” to be too perfect. The gambit quickly backfired.

“For whatever reason,” he said, “I shifted into trying to make the perfect pitch and overthrowing, and really got myself and us in trouble.”

His pitch count at 66 after three innings, Hammel could not regain control. He issued another walk to Jurickson Profar in the fourth, tying the score at 2-2. Moments later, Yost emerged from the dugout and called on left-hander Scott Alexander.

As he stood near his locker afterward, Hammel sought to put the loss on his own shoulders.

“We should have won that ballgame,” he said. “The guys came out early and put up some runs against Darvish, who doesn’t give them up. So that one’s on me.”

The inning could have been worse. Alexander induced two grounders, and the Rangers scratched out just one more run, emerging with a 3-2 lead. They were never threatened again.

At this point, to sift through the Royals’ offensive numbers is to wade through charred-out remains. After 18 games, they are averaging just 2.55 runs per game, and the problems are numerous, from lack of patience to lack of hard contact.

Before Sunday, the team had swung at 34.3 percent of pitches outside the strike zone, the highest rate in the majors. On the whole, the Royals’ identity as a contact-hitting team has crumbled in this young season.

Entering Sunday, they were making contact on 75 percent of all pitches, which ranked 28th in baseball. It paled in comparison to two years ago, when the Royals led the majors by making contact on 81.9 percent of pitches.

The number dipped slightly last year, to 78.2 percent, and the Royals did not make up the difference with additional power. This year, they have hit 18 homers in 18 games, but even that number features a catch: 16 of those have been solo shots.

There were two more solo homers on Sunday, of course. And for a moment, as he sat inside the third-base dugout, Yost wondered whether the reshuffled lineup would produce more. Maybe, he thought, this was the start.

“We’ve been getting some pretty good pitching,” Yost said. “ ‘Maybe this will get us going.’

“We pieced together three hits that inning, but that’s all the offense we could muster.”

This story was originally published April 23, 2017 at 5:16 PM with the headline "Texas toast: Royals lose 10th straight against Rangers with 5-2 defeat on Sunday."