What we remember from the Royals’ clinching ALDS Game 5 win against the Astros
Five years ago this fall, the Kansas City Royals won their second World Series championship.
Fox Sports Kansas City is re-airing the Royals’ 11 victories from that postseason this month. At 7 Wednesday night, May 6, FSKC is re-airing ALDS Game 5. To help you relive the moments from that magical October, we’ve dug into our archives. You can read our coverage of that game here.
Columnists Sam Mellinger and Vahe Gregorian and reporters who covered the 2015 postseason had these thoughts looking back on the Royals’ series clinching win.
Johnny on the spot
This game was all about Johnny Cueto, the supposed ace acquired at mid-season who instead had become a wild-card inside a box of chocolates within a loose cannon. You NEVER knew what you might get. But part of the ride was the upside: Cueto was masterful in the 7-2 clincher against Houston, giving up two runs and two hits in eight innings.
No stopping this team
Like many Royals players and their fans, I likened the Game 4 comeback victory to the rally in the Wild Card game, and they were identical in four-run deficits when the Royals came to bat in the eighth.
What I also recall as the series headed to Kauffman for Game 5 is that there was no way the Royals would lose the series. Just like the Wild Card comeback sparked the eight-game winning streak to open the 2014 postseason, I thought this rally would inspire a similar burst of confidence.
The Royals won Game 5 and Johnny Cueto pitched a terrific game, going eight innings with a two-run homer as his only blemish.
It occurred to me that as we made our way back to the press box from the clubhouse that Cueto had thrown one pitch from the stretch in the game. He gave up the homer on the first pitch after allowing a single and no other runner reached base in his eight innings.
Cueto had been inconsistent at best since coming to the Royals in late July and although he got the victory in the second game against the Astros, he wasn’t sharp. His money performance in Game 5 is why the Royals traded him for three young pitchers, even if they only had him for a few months in 2015.
Early celebration
The Royals likely had the game in the bag with a 4-2 lead in the eighth inning and Wade Davis ready to finish it out. But Kendrys Morales put an exclamation point on the win by crushing a three-run homer off Dallas Keuchel, who had come on in relief. That ball was smoked, and I remember some of the Royals spilling out of the dugout to celebrate, including Salvador Perez, who was wearing his chest protector ahead of taking the field in the ninth.