Jason Adam’s emotions spiral as frustrating season continues with Royals’ loss to White Sox

In a span of 13 minutes at Guaranteed Rate Field on Friday night, the Royals went from clinging to a one-run lead over the White Sox in the seventh inning to trailing by six in what became a 9-3 loss.

Royals reliever Jason Adam went from being a rookie pitcher his manager had regained trust in, to being a rookie pitcher walking off the field with his road jersey pulled over his mouth and his second blown lead of the season searing a brand in his mind.

He had entered the game for Tim Hill after the first batters of the inning reached on a single and then an error by Alcides Escobar. Adam was supposed to be get a ground ball, induce a double play. Instead, he threw a first-pitch fastball belt-high to White Sox first baseman Jose Abreu, who crushed a three-run homer to give the White Sox a 5-3 lead.

From there, things spiraled. Adam struck out Matt Davidson, who has hit eight homers against the Royals this year, but Adam never got another out. He sandwiched a walk between singles from Leury Garcia and Tim Anderson. The latter scored Garcia, who had stolen second base when Omar Narvaez was batting. Anderson scored when Nicky Delmonico shot a three-run homer of his own to right field.

“I think I kind of just let probably the emotions get to me,” said Adam, the Blue Valley Northwest alum.

Manager Ned Yost pulled Adam for Burch Smith. Adam retreated to the Royals’ dugout, having allowed a homer for the eighth and ninth times this season and a career-high five runs.

“He was rested. He had two days off,” Yost said. “He’s been throwing the ball good. Wanted to see if he could get us through it, but he just couldn’t.”

The Royals have watched this before: Just more than two weeks ago on Aug. 2 in this very ballpark, Whit Merrifeld became the first Royals player to hit a pinch-hit home run since Erik Kratz hit one in Minnesota on Aug. 18, 2014. Merrifield’s three-run blast gave the Royals a 3-2 lead in that game two weeks ago

Adam, called on to keep the peace in that game, retired his first batter. Then Adam’s hard change-up ran away from Abreu, who squared up the pitch and drove it 408 feet to center field. Adam allowed the next two batters to reach base; Jason Hammel came in to relieve him and allowed them both to score on a Daniel Palka home run.

The Royals lost then, too. A despondent Adam sat at his locker after the game, chair turned out toward the middle of the room and gaze pointed at nothing. He would say later that the loss stung and that it was the least fun he’d ever had playing baseball.

“Obviously I’d given up home runs before,” Adam said earlier this month. “I’ve given up runs. I’ve even lost a couple games before. But that was the first time we’d been ahead when I came in and I blew it. Especially after a huge momentum swing, that one hit me hard.”

Adam bounced back, though. He pitched in the Royals’ next two games in Minnesota, logging 1 2/3 scoreless innings, striking out three and allowing one base runner. Before he entered Friday’s game, opponents were batting just .056 against him in his last 5 2/3 innings — all scoreless.

Therein lies the frustration. Adam has a 6.12 ERA but has shown promise with a biting curveball and a high-80s change-up that generates 31.8 percent whiffs.

But on Friday, composure failed him. Adam’s efforts wiped out a strenuous two-run, 5 1/3-inning effort from Jakob Junis, who issued three walks and struck out five batters, and a three-run third inning from the Royals offense.

“(Abreu’s) got me twice now,” Adam said after the Royals fell to 37-85 on the season. “I need to study him a little harder, make some better pitches to him. He’s a good hitter but not as good as I’m making him look the past few times I’ve faced him.”

Tough luck Gordon

According to MLB’s Statcast system, there was only a 21 percent chance that Alex Gordon would suffer the fate of an out in his first at-bat against James Shields on Friday. Gordon reached for a first-pitch fastball that tailed outside the zone and barreled it. The ball whistled through the air with an exit velocity of 101.1 mph, destined to glance off the padding of the wall in left field. But White Sox outfielder Nicky Delmonico followed the ball’s trajectory and backed up to the warning track. He ran into the wall to haul the ball in before it could become an extra-base hit.

Such luck has plagued Gordon all season. Entering Friday, he possessed a hard-hit rate of 40.4 percent — his best percentage of the Statcast era that started in 2015 — and was making hard contact a career-high 37 percent of the time, according to Fangraphs’ quality of contact statistics.

MLB’s advanced metrics peg Gordon as a .271 hitter based on his average exit velocity and launch angle.

Yet he’s only batting .236 through 103 games. Gordon was 0 for 3 with a sacrifice fly on Friday night.

Versatile Rosie

Playing second base for the third time this season as a Royal — and just the 11th time in his professional career — Rosell Herrera again looked like a natural on the right side of the infield. He robbed Omar Narvaez of a hit in the second inning when he dived to his right on the grass behind second base, gloved the ball on the back hand, got to his feet and threw a dart to Lucas Duda at first base.

Herrera, whose versatility drew the Royals to him, back when he was a minor-league free agent in November, will continue to float around the field.

This story was originally published August 17, 2018 at 10:23 PM.