Kris Medlen stands tall as Royals shut out Indians 2-0

Kris Medlen took the mound with precisely one weapon, in his estimation, on Tuesday evening. His changeup lacked movement. His curveball lacked life. In a 2-0 victory over Cleveland, his lone, reliable option was his fastball.

His performance for Kansas City provided a model for their mindset as the team looks to burst through a late-season funk. He spun 6  1/3 scoreless innings, relying on his defenders behind him and challenging Indians hitters as best he could.

“It’s just a matter of not panicking,” Medlen said. “You don’t panic yourself into first place. But you can probably panic yourself out.”

With only their third victory in the last 11 games, the Royals (85-59) solidified their standing in the American League Central. A loss by Toronto extended Kansas City’s edge to three games in the race for home-field advantage.

The Royals survived a pair of late-inning scares. Ryan Madson struck out two to strand two runners after Medlen departed in the seventh. With his fastball hovering around 89 mph, Greg Holland put a pair of runners in scoring position in the ninth. Holland produced enough momentum for a 93-mph fastball to strike out rookie third baseman Giovanny Urshela to end the game.

Even amid the celebration, manager Ned Yost admitted his concern about Holland, who recorded his 31st save this season. Holland’s fastball sat at nearly 96 mph in 2014. The velocity dipped to 93 this season. In recent outings he has clocked in the upper 80s. Yost praised Holland for possessing “the heart of a lion,” but acknowledged his physical decline.

“It’s just the pounding that his arm and shoulder have taken over the years,” Yost said. “Everybody takes a big amount of pounding over the course of the season. We’re at the end of the season now.”

When October begins, the Royals still intend to use Holland as their closer. The club had been adrift heading into Tuesday. They still may be — the club has not won two games in a row since Sept. 2 and 3 against Detroit. The team can rectify that on Wednesday.

But they will settle for Tuesday’s outcome. Pitching into the seventh inning for the first time in 718 days, back before his second Tommy John surgery, Medlen became the first Royals starter to last that long without allowing a run since Johnny Cueto spun a shutout against Detroit on Aug. 10.

A Cleveland mistake let Mike Moustakas score a second-inning run. Alex Rios hit his second homer of this trip. Otherwise, the group stayed quiet. Indians starter Josh Tomlin pitched all nine innings. The day’s most exciting moments involved the Royals defense and gaffes away from the field, like an accidental fireworks display after Rios’ homer or a foul ball conking a bald man in the stands.

But it was a victory. Kansas City will accept all of those it can these days.

“We’re trying to win the division,” Medlen said.

As the losses mounted before Tuesday, the players refused to show signs of strain. Several referenced the size of their lead in the division after Monday’s defeat. Yet away from the public eye, Yost said, “They’re edgy.”

As Yost spoke inside the visiting manager’s office, a roar radiated from the clubhouse, where a few players were vying in Nintendo. The noise made Yost smile.

“They’re loose,” he said. “But when we get out for B.P., they’re edgy. They’re edgy in a good way. But they maintain their looseness. They’re not all sitting around, pouting.”

Indeed, the Nintendo battle between Eric Hosmer and Moustakas captivated a sizable chunk of the roster. The commotion caused a reporter to peek around a clubhouse pillar at the scene.

“Oh, here comes a story,” backup catcher Drew Butera said.

“ ‘The Royals were playing Nintendo,’ ” former starter Jeremy Guthrie said.

The media criticism delighted the group as much as the video game. Less amused was pitching coach Dave Eiland. He conducted a series of meetings before the game in addition to his usual slate of bullpen sessions and pregame preparation with that day’s starting pitcher.

About two and a half hours before first pitch, Eiland gathered the entire pitching staff inside the weight room. The group entered Tuesday with a 6.46 ERA in September. Eiland intended for a 10-minute meeting. The discussion lasted closer to 30. One key concept was accountability, he said.

“I see some pitchers going out there, starters and relievers, and it looks like they’ve got the weight of the world on their shoulders,” Eiland told The Star. “I reminded them how good they are. That we’re still a good pitching staff, and we’re going to get out of this thing.

“But the only way to get out of it is to keep working. We’ve got to prepare, and we’ve got to prepare properly. We can’t assume. We’ve got to prepare properly.”

Medlen did his part on Tuesday. Through the first four innings, he gave up two hits. He recorded 11 of 12 outs on groundballs. Unable to master his mechanics, he tried his best to keep the baseball low in the zone.

The Royals led by two after five innings. The team benefited from a mistake by Indians catcher Yan Gomes in the second. Gomes lost a foul pop-up by Moustakas. Moustakas had begun to walk back to the dugout, only to hear the baseball fall behind him.

Granted a second change, Moustakas laced a double to the center-field wall. The ball sizzled past the outstretched glove of outfielder Abraham Almonte.

“Any time you get an extra shot, you’ve got to really take advantage of it,” Moustakas said. “It doesn’t matter if you’re scuffling or not. But especially right now.”

Facing Salvador Perez, Tomlin threw an 0-1 curveball in the dirt. Perez swung anyway, whiffing on a wild pitch. For some reason, Tomlin threw Perez a strike next. Perez punched the cutter into center for an RBI single.

Hilarity ensued in the fifth inning. Rios bashed a solo shot just inside the left-field pole. As he rounded the bases, a fireworks erupted around the stadium. The pyrotechnical display typically greets homers hit by the home team. In this case, human error intervened.

The sparse crowd howled their displeasure. High above the field, seated in a chair overlooking the diamond, the fireworks operated put his head in his hands. He hid his face inside a hat until the boos subsided.

“It was nice,” Rios said. “It was the first time that I’ve had that happen to me on the road.”

In order for Cleveland to produce fireworks of their own, they needed to lift the baseball in the air. Medlen did not allow that occur until the fifth inning. Six of the last seven outs he procured came through the air. But the Indians still never scored.

“It was a tough, grinding kind of game,” Medlen said. “But that’s why I love the game. You just offered a little bit of competitiveness to your team. A little grit, a little grind. It’s baseball. It’s a dirty game. It’s a blue-collar game.”

This story was originally published September 15, 2015 at 8:47 PM with the headline "Kris Medlen stands tall as Royals shut out Indians 2-0."