Kansas City Royals and Kris Bubic trounced by Cleveland Guardians in Sunday matinee
The previous two games for the Kansas City Royals had served as an ode pitching and defense. Neither aspect had been completely flawless, but they’d seemed so much in sync that they’d smoothed out any and all of each other’s respective rough edges.
Well, Royals left-hander Kris Bubic ran into big trouble in the first inning Sunday that the bullpen couldn’t smooth out. The Cleveland Guardians took advantage and grabbed a sizable early lead, then they built on that throughout the afternoon.
Royals pitchers gave up 22 hits, including a pair of home runs — one a grand slam — in a 17-3 drubbing at the hands of the Guardians in front of an announced 20,165 at Kauffman Stadium.
The Royals (2-1) had allowed one run in the first two games, including a 10-inning outing on Saturday.
However, Bubic and reliever Taylor Clarke combined to give up six first-inning runs and put the Royals on their heels from the start.
“(I have to) forget about this one, but also work my butt off to make sure this doesn’t happen again because it affected the rest of the game,” Bubic said. “The way we pitched the last two days, we want to carry that momentum to the rest of the series and then to the early part of the season.”
Bubic allowed five runs, three hits and two walks in two-thirds of an inning.
“Not much positive to take out of that one,” Bubic said. “I kinda put myself in a corner from the jump. Couldn’t get ahead of anybody. I just made it really hard on myself. I made it really hard on the team to, obviously, be in a hole like that early. It kind of sets the tone for the rest of the game.”
When Bubic left the mound, he’d just walked Ernie Clement to load the bases with two outs. He’d given up just two runs to that point.
Clarke took over and gave up a grand slam to Oscar Mercado on a 3-2 pitch that landed in the bullpen behind the left field fence. The three men on base were all runs charged to Bubic, while Mercado’s run went on Clarke’s tab.
“It just backed up,” Clarke said of the pitch to Mercado. “I didn’t want to walk him, cash in one of his runs. A slider just kind of backed up on me and he ran into it.”
Clarke, an offseason free-agent acquisition, struck out the only batter he faced on Saturday in the eighth inning of scoreless game with a runner on base.
After Sunday’s game, Royals manager Mike Matheny took blame for not giving Clarke a heads up that he could be the first one called on out of the pen if things went bad early for Bubic.
“Put it on me,” Matheny said, and he reiterated that Clarke will be “really good” for the Royals this season.
Clarke, now in his fourth season in the majors, didn’t seem to want to make any excuses even after being told of Matheny’s comments. Clarke stressed that he couldn’t afford to fall behind in the count against Mercado.
“I take pride in being able to come in pretty quick and get ready quick,” Clarke said. “That’s our job in the bullpen, to pick our teammates up. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get it done today.”
Jackson Kowar, who’d came into spring training vying for a spot in the starting rotation, came on in relief after Clarke. The Guardians gave Kowar a rude welcome in the second inning. Kowar gave up four runs, five hits and a walk as the Guardians pushed their lead to 10-0.
The Royals cut the deficit to 10-2 in the third when rookie third baseman Bobby Witt Jr. drove in their first two runs a double to the wall in left field, his second major-league hit.
The Guardians scored the next seven runs and the Royals didn’t score again until Carlos Santana (1 for 4, double) scored on a fielder’s choice in the ninth inning.
“That was kind of a flashback to the ones we had last year that kind of would spiral out of control,” Matheny said. “It’s hard for a club to fight back when you’re putting up big numbers in the first and second, but we had an opportunity to keep it close and didn’t. Then it just kind of got out of hand. Those are the kind you learn from and move on from.”
Despite the rout, the Royals can still take three of the four games in the season-opening series with a win on Monday afternoon.
This story was originally published April 10, 2022 at 4:26 PM.
