An inside-the-park homer from Drew Butera keys Royals’ sweep of Twins

On an afternoon the Royals sought their first series sweep of the season, they struggled to muster offense against the Twins. They were held to two hits through six innings, limited to a couple of runs and otherwise neutralized by one-time Royals prospect Jake Odorizzi.

But when Drew Butera, the very same backup catcher the Royals were forced to use as a reliever at Kauffman Stadium two weeks ago, connected a hit in the seventh inning of Sunday’s 5-3 win, the Royals’ inability to create opportunities faded into the background.

Butera’s go-ahead hit bounced in front of diving center fielder Jake Cave. As the ball trickled to the warning track, Alex Gordon and Alcides Escobar scored easily to give the Royals a two-run lead. By the time Max Kepler reached the ball in deep right-center field and started a relay to the infield, Royals third base coach Mike Jirschele had given Butera the sign.

Butera, free-wheeling but losing speed, headed home and slid feet-first into the plate with an inside-the-park homer. When he got to his feet, he slapped hands with a buoyant Escobar and took a hard smack in the helmet from Gordon.

Such was the scene that sealed the Royals’ first three-game series sweep since July 24-26, 2017, in Detroit.

“Just add it to the list of really weird things I’ve done in my career,” Butera said.

Joked manager Ned Yost: “We clocked him, and from the time he hit third to home it was 15.7 seconds. It was quite a long time. ... He was increasingly slowing down. Just like Evel Knievel, he pulled the parachute too early. As soon as he hit third base, I mean, he looked like he was running underwater.”

Earlier, those in the announced crowd of 18,107 saw Gordon rip his 500th career extra-base hit to left field. His double drove home Rosell Herrera and Lucas Duda, who reached base on shifted third baseman Eduardo Escobar’s error in shallow right field to start the game-tying rally.

They saw Odorizzi allow one walk while striking out eight in six innings.

And they saw a pair of spectacular stretches by Royals outfielders. Herrera robbed Mitch Garver of a hit in the second inning, tracking his line drive toward the left-center field gap against the sun and laying out on his right side to come up with the frame-ending out. In the next inning, Gordon charged and dived for a two-out line drive hit by Jake Cave in the third, stifling it with his glove as he crashed into the grass. The Twins challenged the play but New York umpires, unconvinced there was enough evidence to overturn it, ruled that the call on the field stood.

“I felt it bounce,” Gordon said, “but did it bounce in my webbing or the grass? I still don’t know.”

The decision caused a ripple effect in the seventh inning. Gordon smacked the fourth pitch of his at-bat against reliever Zach Duke right at second baseman Brian Dozier, who started a routine double play. But when shortstop Ehire Adrianza hauled in the throw and transferred it to first baseman Logan Morrision, Gordon was ruled safe at the bag. Replays showed the play was close, but the Twins were unable to challenge the call.

Gordon scored the go-ahead run on the Royals’ first regular-season inside-the-park homer since Jarrod Dyson’s on July 8, 2015. As the Royals improved to 30-68, Wily Peralta recorded his second save in three days of work here.

And rookie Brad Keller, whose ERA had ballooned more than one run to 3.13 after his last two starts, corrected his course. After being buffeted for nine earned runs on 13 hits in outings against the Red Sox and White Sox, Keller racked up a career-high eight strikeouts and scattered three hits on Sunday. He allowed three runs in seven-plus innings, one of them on Kepler’s lead-off homer in the eighth.

“It was good just to have a reset,” said Keller, who hadn’t allowed a home run in 63 1/3 innings. “A few rough starts, especially the one right before the break, and I used the break as a reset to clear my mind and come back out here today and go to work.”

This story was originally published July 22, 2018 at 4:03 PM.