Yordano Ventura ejected as Royals fall to the A’s 5-0

Yordano Ventura’s first pitch to the A’s Brett Lawrie during Lawrie’s second plate appearance bounced in the opposite batter’s box. The next pitch was equally misguided — but by the unspoken rules of baseball gamesmanship, placed precisely where Ventura wanted it.

The 99-mph fastball drilled Lawrie’s elbow, and Kauffman Stadium erupted in cheers as Lawrie walked to first base without looking at Ventura. The A’s expected the delivery.

So did home-plate umpire Jim Joyce, who immediately tossed Ventura. As that was happening, the dugouts and bullpens emptied, but without confrontation.

The deed was done.

By then, so were the Royals, 5-0 losers to the A’s on Saturday.

The plunking traced its roots to the seventh inning of Friday’s game, when Lawrie’s slide into second base was late, hard and took out Royals shortstop Alcides Escobar, who was waiting for a throw.

The collision looked worse than it turned out for Escobar, who suffered a knee strain and bruise and missed his first game since 2013 on Saturday. He could be back in the lineup as early as Sunday.

There was another element: The batter before Lawrie, Josh Reddick, had crushed a three-run homer.

“He drilled him right after a home run,” Joyce said. “I know all the stuff that happened yesterday, but like I told (Royals manager) Ned Yost, this also pertains to drilling somebody right after a home run.”

Hard feelings persisted with the Royals after Friday. Escobar called it a “dirty play” before Saturday’s game, and even Yost, who wasn’t critical of the play after Friday’s game, took a more neutral stance Saturday.

“You can ask five people … who said it wasn’t and five who said it was (a dirty play),” Yost said. “I’m not so sure if he had not done a pop-up slide or slid straight into the base that he wouldn’t have been safe.”

On Saturday, Ventura came inside once on Lawrie’s first plate appearance, which ended with a ground-out. As Lawrie stepped in the box for that appearance, he spoke with Royals catcher Salvador Perez.

“He just apologized about what happened yesterday,” Perez said.

Perez responded: “Everything is good. The only thing I can tell you right now is that we’re going to play the game the right way and we need to protect our guy.”

Ventura spoke with reporters after his 3 1/3 inning outing through interpreter Jeremy Guthrie but said he wouldn’t address the hit by pitch.

But the A’s did.

“We knew it was coming after the home run,” Reddick said. “You’re down five, he’s pretty much got nothing left to look forward to at all. All of us were celebrating the home run, and after the first pitch we were already on the top step waiting for it.

“It’s bush league. There’s no need for that. I don’t think it’s professional at all, it’s a joke.”

Lawrie said upon the drilling he didn’t want things to escalate.

“I just walked to first base,” Lawrie said. “Didn’t say a thing. If I go and try to make something ridiculous out of it and we have a huge fight, three guys get hurt, it causes something that I don’t think is needed.

“What’s the whole crowd want me to do there? They want me to blow up, create a huge scene, but why fuel the fire? I don’t want to have any problems. Sometimes you can’t control what the other team is doing. I can only control what I’m doing, and I did the right thing.”

The A’s had broken through in the fourth inning before the fireworks.

Ventura opened the inning with a full count walk to Sam Fuld, who motored around the bases when Stephen Vogt bounced a double off the wall in left.

A wild pitch moved Vogt to third, and with one out Billy Butler damaged his former team with an RBI single to left. That extended Butler’s hitting streak to all 12 games this season, and it’s the longest streak to begin an Oakland A’s tenure in club history.

Ike Davis’ single preceded Reddick’s 426-foot blast over the right-field bullpen.

The Royals lost a chance to move ahead in the third inning. Omar Infante sent a ball into the left-field gap, where Fuld did a good job keeping the ball from rolling to the wall. But he undermined his effort with a spinning, off-balance throw that landed in short center field, and Infante didn’t stop until he got to third with no outs.

But with the A’s infield pulled in, Christian Colon sharply grounded out to shortstop, and Paulo Orlando, batting leadoff in place of Escobar, hit a one-hopper back to pitcher Jesse Hahn. Mike Moustakas ended the inning by flying deep to right.

The Royals didn’t get two men on base in an inning until the ninth, but the uprising ended quickly.

The best thing that happened to the Royals on Saturday was the performance of Ventura’s replacement. Yohan Pino. Called up from Class AAA Omaha earlier in the day to replace closer Greg Holland, who was placed on the 15-day DL because of a right pectoral muscle strain, Pino tossed 4 2/3 scoreless innings.

Athletics 5, Royals 0

E: Fuld (1). LOB: Oakland 5, Kansas City 7. 2B: Vogt (3), A.Gordon (1), Infante (3). HR: Reddick (1), off Ventura. RBIs: Vogt (9), B.Butler (7), Reddick 3 (5).

Runners left in scoring position: Oakland 1 (Reddick); Kansas City 3 (Moustakas, S.Perez 2). RISP: Oakland 2 for 5; Kansas City 0 for 4. Runners moved up: I.Davis. GIDP: Reddick, K.Morales, S.Perez. DP: Oakland 2 (Lawrie, Sogard, I.Davis), (Semien, Sogard, I.Davis); Kansas City 1 (Infante, C.Colon, Hosmer).

Inherited runners-scored: Pino 1-0. HBP: by Ventura (Lawrie). WP: Ventura.

Umpires: Home, Jim Joyce; First, Greg Gibson; Second, Marvin Hudson; Third, Chad Fairchild. Time: 2:34. Att: 33,151.

This story was originally published April 18, 2015 at 9:15 PM with the headline "Yordano Ventura ejected as Royals fall to the A’s 5-0."