For openers, Royals will start Kennedy instead of Jake Junis Friday night against Twins
Royals manager Mike Matheny voiced a desire to get right-handed reliever Ian Kennedy back on the mound quickly after his outing went awfully awry Wednesday night in Cincinnati against the Reds.
The Royals will waste no time doing so, as they’ve named Kennedy their starting pitcher for Friday night’s series opener against the Minnesota Twins at Target Field.
Originally, right-hander Jakob Junis had been scheduled to start the first game of this series against the Twins with the Royals coming out of an off-day Thursday. Instead, Kennedy will serve as an “opener” and Junis is expected to follow Kennedy in a reliever/piggyback starter setup after the first inning or two.
“To me, just talking it through for a couple days with the staff and then realizing we need to get Ian back out there, one,” Royals manager Mike Matheny said of how he arrived at this arrangement. “Then there’s some things that we know he’s doing already (and) thinking about mechanically to get him locked back in.
“But also getting him kind of — whether it’s that set knowledge of how to go about it as a starter and he also had kind of that prep time as a closer to know, ‘This is when I’m going to pitch.’ So we’re trying to let him get his prep ready.”
Kennedy, who transitioned to the bullpen last season after having been a starter throughout his major-league career, has struggled to keep the ball in the park this season. He enters Friday night’s game with a 7.88 ERA despite averaging 10.1 strikeouts/per nine innings
In eight appearances (eight innings) this season, he has allowed 10 hits ... and six of those hits have been home runs. That includes giving up a pair of home runs — a solo homer and a two-run shot — Wednesday night in the seventh inning to a Reds lineup that had been held scoreless to that point in the game.
The Twins, meanwhile, counter with the core of a lineup that set the major-league record for home runs in a season last year.
Last season, Kennedy became the fifth Royals pitcher to record a 30-save season, joining Dan Quisenberry (five times), Jeff Montgomery (five), Joakim Soria (three) and Greg Holland (also three). He also became the fourth pitcher since 1969 (when saves became an official stat) to record both a 20-win season and a 30-save season in his career, joining Dennis Eckersley, John Smoltz and Derek Lowe.
Kennedy tied for fourth-most saves in the American League, and he had a MLB-best 28 saves from May 30 through the end of the season. His save percentage of 88.2 (30-for-34) ranked third in the American League, and he posted a 3.41 ERA with a 1.28 WHIP and 10.4 strikeouts per nine innings.
Junis, who got a late start to this season because of a COVID-19 infection, has made two starts and allowed four runs on 11 hits and four walks in nine innings.
Opponents have enjoyed significant success against Junis their third time through the batting order during his career in the majors. Compared to the first time around, batters have had a much better strikeout-to-walk ratio (1.89-to-1 compared to 4.42-to-1), batting average (.295 to .269) and on-base percentage (.360 to .317) the third time through.
“The whole theory behind the opener is, ‘How do you eliminate the third time through the order, being the meat of their order?’” Matheny said. “That’s always made sense to me. … You look at every one of these games as we get through right when a guy is at his pitch count and he is at his most vulnerable spot, we’re trying to run two through five in the order. That’s a tough ask.”
Matheny also referenced Junis’ work on the curveball this offseason as a means of getting through lineups a third time. But too much focus on the curveball can adversely affect his best weapon, his slider, and the Royals don’t want him to take away from that pitch.
