The Royals’ nonstop attack is taking its toll on the reeling Orioles

As he pondered the notion that the Orioles had yet to lead a game as they drifted behind the Royals 2-0 in the American League Championship Series, Baltimore manager Buck Showalter stressed Saturday what it had taken just to tie each game.

“Sometimes you spend so much energy and concentration trying to get back to that point, it’s hard to take that next step,” he said. “But I think about a hundred percent of that is what they’re doing, not what we’re not doing.”

That’s exactly the point, maybe more so than Showalter meant even as he aptly spoke to the state of the series entering game three Monday night at Kauffman Stadium … weather willing.

So far this has been all about what the swarming, energized Royals are inflicting on the apparently flustered and stiffening Orioles, not the least of which has to be the permeating of their thinking.

And Baltimore’s state of mind could only get toyed with more if it can’t summon the energy and concentration to start immediately working back toward a tie in the series, as Royals outfielder Jarrod Dyson was pleased to explain.

“I’ll just tell you this, man: If we win game three, it’s going to be hard for them to just sit there and look themselves in the mirror and be like, ‘Hey, we can win the next four,’” Dyson said Sunday in the Royals’ clubhouse. “That’s tough to do, man. … I’m sorry, that’s pretty tough. Everything must click. I mean, everything must click. I’m just being honest.”

He needed no prompting to elaborate.

“If we take game three, I guarantee there’s going to be multiple people in that clubhouse over there like, ‘Man, ain’t no way we’re going to beat these guys four in a row,’” he added. “It can be done, but everybody ain’t going to be on the same page, I don’t think.

“There’s going to be some people ready to go home. There’s going to be some people not cheering in the dugout.”

Dyson allowed as how it would likely be that way vice versa, too, and he hardly was guaranteeing the Royals would win game three.

Dyson and the Royals know the complexion and direction of the series will hinge on this game, and the tone to date can be punctured or flipped or reset in an instant.

Showalter offered an even more astute observation on all this, not to mention some fine words to live by, on Sunday.

“You never assume anything — that something bad is going to happen or something good is going to happen,” he said. “Just go out there and let your curiosity be satisfied.”

So far, the curiosity of the series has been this:

All indications are that the Royals have knocked the Orioles off-balance and left them muttering to themselves.

You can hear it in their protests of the Royals’ “luck” in the games in Baltimore.

Alex Gordon’s bat whirs through a buzz-saw … and drives in three runs. Eric Hosmer bloops in a couple.

Then Alcides Escobar smacks the game-winning double Saturday, and exasperated Baltimore reliever Zach Britton sums up the feeling of all those puny hits by saying he “beat him pretty good” on the pitch.

“I thought he was late,” Britton told the Baltimore Sun, later adding, “The way he swung at it, it was like he didn’t even know where it went. … They got on a roll.

“They got a guy in scoring position, and it seems like they get the breaks.”

You can see the tentativeness in how they opted not to run on Gordon on Saturday in what appeared a fertile enough opportunity that Gordon would have been challenged to make a perfect throw.

You might see it in how they’ve been left incredulous by the Royals’ fielding, particularly in the outfield, where teleporter Lorenzo Cain has roamed the range to swipe several would-be extra-base hits.

“Think about it: If you felt like you had a triple off the bat in the gap, and somebody runs it down and catches it, how you going to feel going back to the dugout?” Dyson said, adding, “You’re going to be (bothered, and thinking), ‘Aw, man, what do I have to do to get a hit?’ ”

The mind game has been apparent, too, in the Orioles’ extreme efforts to curtail the Royals’ running game, which in fact has been slowed down … but at what cost in concentration, emotional energy and other gaps created?

Among the Orioles’ radical maneuvers to hold on Dyson and pinch runner Terrance Gore has been positioning first baseman Steve Pearce several feet toward the mound and up the line.

Pearce then is left scrambling back, either for the pitch or to take a pickoff throw.

“All of that is to make you flinch back. I didn’t flinch at all,” Gore said, smiling. “I just stared at the pitcher. It’s tough on (Pearce), too. So, basically, they’re giving away that whole side, and that right there tells you they’re so worried about the running game.”

Then picture the jarring impact of dousing the Royals’ bases-loaded, no-outs opportunity in the ninth inning of game one … only to have Wade Davis shackle the middle of the Orioles’ order with three straight strikeouts in the bottom of the inning…

And then have the power-challenged Royals win with home runs by Gordon and Mike Moustakas in the 10th.

Now the Royals, the team with the fewest regular-season home runs in baseball, have four home runs to one for the Orioles, who had the most.

So, suddenly, the Royals are floating like gnats … then stinging like bees.

That might have been the last thing the Orioles would have concerned themselves with.

“They’re so worried about our speed,” Dyson said, “the home runs are killing them.”

The Orioles, of course, won’t concede this deflated, distracted dynamic, and, besides, it can all change abruptly in an at-bat or an inning.

If they so much as win game three, in fact, you could argue that the burden of pressure is back on the Royals.

If that does happen, Dyson may reflect on the potential bulletin-board material he’s offered.

He already knows that Baltimore tends to get back up when knocked down by tying each game, and that no victory will be easy.

As for now, though, he’s not concerned about how his words will be taken or used.

“I don’t know what they’re going to do, but I know what we’re going to do,” he said. “We’re going to go back out there and try to him ’em in the mouth early, and (hope) they don’t get back up when we knock them down.”

This story was originally published October 12, 2014 at 7:55 PM with the headline "The Royals’ nonstop attack is taking its toll on the reeling Orioles."