Dozier collects 5 hits, Benintendi 3 RBIs in Kansas City Royals’ 14-10 win over Rockies
A Kansas City squad went to Denver and scored two touchdowns in a victory, yet Patrick Mahomes was nowhere to be found. This time, the Kansas City Royals were the ones handing out disappointment to fans in the Mile High City.
Royals slugger Hunter Dozier enjoyed a career day at the plate with five hits, while Andrew Benintendi had three, including a home run, and drove in three runs as part of a 14-10 win over the Colorado Rockies in front of an announced 35,176 in the series opener at Coors Field on Friday night.
The Royals collected 18 hits, including seven extra-base hits, and they went 6 for 17 with runners in scoring position.
“A lot to like,” Royals manager Mike Matheny said of his team’s offensive production. “We came in and guys who’ve been able to play around here understand. You’ve got to be relentless. You’ve just got to keep coming.
“But to see hard-hit balls and have it carry for them — it’s the first time really all season — 18 hits is just a beautiful thing.”
In the process, Dozier (5 for 5, four runs scored, RBI) also surpassed 400 career hits.
Benintendi, who learned he’d won his salary arbitration case earlier in the day, ended up a double shy of hitting for the cycle.
The Royals matched their season-high for runs in a game (eight) by the end of the fifth inning. Their 14 runs were their most since June 4, 2021, against the Minnesota Twins.
“You feed off each other, for sure,” Dozier said of the offensive outburst. “It’s a good place to hit. We knew we just needed to keep tacking on runs. But yeah, I think it’s just momentum and feeding off each other. It just happens, I guess.”
Royals center fielder Michael A. Taylor went 3 for 4 with a walk, two RBIs and a run scored, while Salvador Perez (2 for 5, run, RBI) and Whit Merrifield (2 for 5, two runs, two RBIs) also had multi-hit performances.
Perez tied former teammate Alcedes Escobar for ninth place on the franchise’s all-time leaderboard for multi-hit games (320).
Ryan O’Hearn came off the bench and hit a mammoth 445-foot home run, his first of the season for the Royals (11-19).
“It’s great,” Benintendi said of having so many guys enjoy good days at the plate. “We’re in a tough stretch right now, so when you’ve got guys hitting up and down the lineup, it’s huge. So we’ve just got to continue to do that tomorrow.”
A back and forth affair early
After a Merrifield leadoff single, Benintendi gave the Royals a two-run lead two batters into the game with his second home run of the season.
He hammered a first-pitch fastball from Rockies starting pitcher Kyle Freeland into the thin Denver air and over the right-center field wall. He clobbered it 433 feet, the fifth-longest of his career.
The Rockies took advantage of a break in the second inning after Brandan Rodgers blasted a one-out double to right field. Elias Diaz’s grounder to third base should have been the second out of the inning, but Dozier, the first baseman, couldn’t handle the high throw from third baseman Emmanuel Rivera while looking into the sun.
Instead of two outs and one on, the Rockies had one out and two runners on. Jose Iglesias’ single scored a run and cut the Royals’ lead in half. Then Sam Hilliard singled up the middle and Diaz scored to tie the score.
Yonathan Daza’s sacrifice fly then gave the Rockies a 3-2 lead on what could have been an inning-ending fly ball.
The lead changed hands again in the top of the third as the Royals put four straight men on to start an inning for the second time in the game. Benintendi’s infield single started things off, then Perez belted an RBI double to center field. After Carlos Santana’s second walk of the night, Dozier singled to drive in the go-ahead run, and Witt tripled off the wall in right field to drive in two more runs.
The Royals flipped their one-run deficit into a three-run lead, 6-3, in the third inning.
They pushed their run total to eight with two in the fifth inning thanks to a fielding error on a grounder off the bat of Witt that scored Dozier and a Taylor RBI single that drove in the speedster Witt.
The Rockies got within one run, 8-7, in the bottom of the fifth.
The Rockies weren’t able to tie the game or take the lead late. A four-run seventh inning for the Royals provided breaking room, and O’Hearn’s two-run homer in the eighth got them to 14 runs.
Greinke grinds through at Coors Field
Royals starting pitcher Zack Greinke tied Burleigh Grimes for 50th place on MLB’s all-time starts list (495). Greinke also passed Bud Black for 26th all-time in franchise history for games played (216).
Greinke went 4 2/3 innings and allowed seven runs (five earned) on eight hits in a no-decision. He matched his season high with four strikeouts.
Greinke, who spent nine seasons pitching in the National League combined between stints with the Milwaukee Brewers, Los Angeles Dodgers and Arizona Diamondbacks, has had plenty of familiarity with Coors Field.
Between the spaciousness of the playing surface, the thin air playing at altitude that tends to make the ball carry farther and the way altitude affects pitch movement, it can be a house of horrors for an uninitiated pitcher.
“I don’t really pay too much attention to the ball carrying,” Greinke said. “Just, your pitches move a little different sometimes. Usually, I have a pitch that’s working really good. Today, none of them (were). A lot of times I’m here and I have a pitch working better here than anywhere else in baseball. Today, all of them were a little bit worse than normal.”
Greinke nearly got through the inning having allowed just two runs. He struck out Randal Grichuk with two outs, but the third strike that Grichuk swung at hit the ground and bounced away from Perez behind the plate and allowed Grichuk to take first base and extend the inning.
The next batter, Brendan Rodgers doubled to left field and drove in two runs to get the Rockies within a run. Rodgers was the last batter Greinke faced. Left-hander Gabe Speier came on out of the bullpen and got the final out of the inning on an infield grounder to keep the score 8-7 at the end of the fifth.
“Most of the inning was actually pretty good,” Greinke said of the fifth. “I got kind of a seeing-eye ground ball hit, then a flare, then a hard ground ball — I made some pitches that at-bat that were good, but that one was a bad one — then struck out a guy and got a bad bounce. It bounced kind of weird in the dirt. Then I made bad pitches to Rodgers. So good pitches to four guys then bad pitches to two guys.”
The teams will continue their three-game series on Saturday night. First pitch is scheduled for 7:10 CT. Right-hander Carlos Hernandez (0-2, 7.15) will start for the Royals, while right-hander German Marquez (0-3, 6.47) starts for the Rockies.
This story was originally published May 13, 2022 at 11:40 PM.
