Royals’ bullpen yields four runs in ninth in 4-0 loss to Angels

Good pitching only takes you so far.

The Royals wasted Brett Tomko’s seven shutout innings Monday night in a 4-0 loss to the Los Angeles Angels at Kauffman Stadium. The bullpen coughed up all four runs in the ninth inning.

That was a problem, of course. But the bigger concern is this was another punchless effort. Another night of wondering why this team can’t score.

And another night with no answers.

Much of the problem, this time, was Angels starter Ervin Santana, who is now 6-0 after dominating pretty much everyone this season.

“He was ahead of most guys,” right fielder Mark Teahen said, “and he was getting his breaking ball over for strikes. When he did fall behind, he threw his pitch and not a pitch you could really drive.”

True enough, but this is happening way too often. The Royals have scored just 107 runs in their 31 games. Every other American League team has scored at least 124. Had the Royals scored just one run in the first eight innings, then closer Joakim Soria, and his 0.00 ERA, would have pitched the ninth.

The lack of offense is squandering the club’s best pitching in years. Tomko produced his best outing of the season Monday, and it came to nothing — nothing in the short-term, anyway.

“Give Ervin all of the credit,” Tomko said. “The guy has been lights-out all year. It’s not an easy task to go up against him. But on a personal level for me, I’m feeling 100 percent better, and I got some immediate feedback on the changes I made.”

The Angels scored the game’s first run on Casey Kotchman’s one-out RBI single in the ninth inning against Jimmy Gobble.

That opened the flood gates.

The Angels blew the game open with successive two-out homers by Garret Anderson and Brandon Wood against Joel Peralta.

That was plenty for Santana, who was efficient and dominant in a 97-pitch performance that included nine strikeouts and no walks. Twenty-one of the Royals’ 31 batters saw three or fewer pitches.

“If you look at a lot of his strikeouts,” Angels manager Mike Scioscia said, “there weren’t too many that were in deep counts. When he’s on and he can be as aggressive as he was tonight, he has the potential to not only strike guys out but keep his pitch count relatively low.

“Very low, actually.”

Tomko limited the Angels to two singles while striking out seven and walking two. So this was, at least, a much-needed personal turnaround after allowing 16 runs and 24 hits in 14 1/3 innings in his previous three starts.

“With what’s gone on the last three games for me,” Tomko said, “it’s nice to make some adjustments and feel like I did at the end of last year. I really felt it right away in my bullpen (workouts) and when I was warming up. But after the first couple of innings, it was like, ‘All right, this is the way I should pitch.’ ”

The Angels didn’t get a runner past first base until Erick Aybar opened the ninth inning with a triple into the right-center gap against Ramon Ramirez, 0-1.

“I threw the ball down the middle,” Ramirez said, “and he hit the ball well.”

Vladimir Guerrero grounded to third with the infield in, and Alex Gordon held Aybar at third before throwing to first for the first out.

Manager Trey Hillman then summoned Gobble for a lefty-lefty matchup against Kotchman.

It didn’t work.

Kotchman whacked Gobble’s first offering into center field for an RBI single.

“We know Kotchman is hitting pretty good off of left-handed pitching,” Hillman said. “But he hasn’t faced Jimmy Gobble this year. He put a good swing on a decent pitch. It was down. It kind of dominoed from there.”

Peralta entered at that point and retired Torii Hunter, but Anderson yanked a 413-foot homer into the right-field bullpen for a 3-0 lead. Wood followed with a 381-foot shot to left.

Santana lowered his ERA to 2.02 by getting his second career complete game and second shutout. The other one was a 4-0 victory over the White Sox on May 23, 2005, at Angel Stadium.

Neither team got a runner past first until Mark Grudzielanek opened the fourth with a double into the left-field corner. He got no farther. Gordon flied to center before José Guillen and Teahen struck out.

“You’ve got to take advantage of opportunities,” Hillman said. “Alex didn’t get around on a ball that was left out over the plate. He hit it to center field and just didn’t pull it.

“That’s a mistake, unfortunately, we made. You hope you learn from it and do a better job of playing situational baseball and get a guy over when you do lead off with a double.”

The Royals never had another chance. They managed just two runners in the last five innings. Neither got as far as second.

To reach Bob Dutton, Royals reporter for The Star, send email to bdutton@kcstar.com.