O’Hearn’s clutch hitting lifts Kansas City Royals, Keller to a win over the A’s in Oakland
Kansas City Royals first baseman/outfielder Ryan O’Hearn sat most of the day, then stepped into the box for one at-bat in a potentially game-changing situation.
O’Hearn delivered the biggest hit of the game and drove in the run that propelled his club to its third straight win.
O’Hearn smacked a pinch-hit RBI double in the seventh inning of a 2-0 win over the Oakland Athletics in the second game of a three-game series in front of an announced 10,936 at the Oakland Coliseum on Saturday afternoon. The Athletics have now lost a season-high eight in a row at home.
“I was happy I was able to get it done today,” O’Hearn said. “We’ve got three wins in a row now, and we’re just going to keep it rolling.”
The Royals (23-41) have now won three consecutive road games for the first time this season. They’ve clinched a series win, and they can sweep the series with a victory on Sunday afternoon.
Neither team had scored going into the top of the seventh. Royals starting pitcher Brad Keller and Athletics starter Cole Irvin were locked in a pitchers’ duel.
Michael A. Taylor tripled off Irvin with one out in the seventh. He hit a low line drive to left field where Athletics outfielder Seth Brown charged aggressively but failed to make a play on the ball.
Brown dove head-first and face-planted into the turf as the ball skipped past him. Once he hit the ground, it assured Taylor extra bases.
When the Athletics called upon right-handed relief pitcher Domingo Acevedo, Royals manager Mike Matheny turned to the left-handed hitting O’Hearn to pinch hit for Emmanuel Rivera.
Because the batting cage at the Oakland Coliseum is located behind the center field wall, O’Hearn didn’t have access to it to take swings or hit off a machine or a tee before his at-bat.
“It’s the hardest job in baseball, no doubt — being a pinch-hit guy,” Royals two-time All-Star Whit Merrifield said. “(O’Hearn) has done as good a job as anybody I’ve ever played with doing it. Especially here. The cage is in center field, so he’s cold. Coming in pure cold. He’s been the best pinch-hit bat off the bench I’ve ever played with.”
Saturday was the first time this season O’Hearn didn’t take any swings in the cage prior to the game because of the backlog of everyday players waiting to get their time in the cage.
“I said, ‘Here we go! It’s a fist fight. I’m just going to put the ball in play, get this run in,’” O’Hearn said. “Baseball is like that sometimes. It worked out. Not the prettiest way to get it done, but I’ll take it every time. It’s a beautiful thing.”
Despite going in “cold,” he chopped a 2-0 changeup down the first-base line and into right field.
O’Hearn entered the day batting .546 (6 for 11) with three RBIs and one home run as a pinch hitter this season.
“You’ve got to own it,” O’Hearn said of dealing with the pressure-packed situation. “This is my role. This is my job. This is what I’ve done all year. This is what I’ve been successful at. So you own it.
“As soon as I knew it was my at-bat, figured out what he throws, what pitches, what (velocity), and I went up there and went to work. I’m not trying to be pretty. Just get the job done. That’s it.”
The Royals manufactured the insurance run in the ninth after Kyle Isbel, who pinch-ran for O’Hearn, got hit by a pitch and advanced on Nicky Lopez’s sacrifice bunt. Merrifield singled to left to drive Isbel in with one out.
A win for Keller
Keller didn’t allow a hit until the sixth inning, then had to pitch out of trouble in that inning to keep the Athletics (22-45) scoreless.
Keller (2-8) finished the day having allowed just one hit in seven innings. He struck out a season-high six batters and walked three.
“He was so great all day,” Matheny said. “You go back and look at the charts, I think he hit the middle of the plate maybe 10 times out of almost 100 pitches. So he was trusting the movement.”
Matheny and Keller both credited work Keller did with pitching coach Cal Eldred between starts to correct issues with his pitching delivery that plagued his previous outing (five runs on seven hits in 1 2/3 innings against Toronto).
“Me and Cal worked on a lot of stuff between last start and this start,” Keller said. “I felt like today we accomplished a lot of it, especially driving the ball towards the plate and actually getting ahead of guys.
“I felt like that’s what made my fastball work so well today. Just because I was able to drive it and put it where I wanted it to go. It felt like I had some pretty late movement to it.”
Keller didn’t allow a hit through 5 2/3 innings. He struck out five and walked one up until that point. Yet he found himself locked in a 0-0 dogfight with neither team having mustered any offense.
“I didn’t even notice it was happening until going out there for that inning,” Keller said of having a no-hitter through five innings. “I didn’t put too much thought into it. I was just trying to get deep into the ballgame, go out there and keep putting up zeros. There guy was putting up zeros, so I had to try to match him as much as I could.”
Irvin allowed just two hits and two walks through the first six innings.
The Royals had two men on in the second inning after Hunter Dozier was hit by a pitch and Carlos Santana drew a walk. But they could not make anything happen. In the third, they also had a pair on when Lopez hit a leadoff single and Merrifield followed with a walk. Again, they came away empty.
Keller entered the day having received two runs or fewer of run support in 11 of his 12 previous starts, including one run or fewer in eight of those starts.
Keller pitched into a jam with two outs in the sixth inning, after he allowed his first hit of the day to Jonah Bride. Bride’s double put a runner in scoring position with two outs. Then back-to-back walks loaded the bases. However, Keller got an inning-ending fly ball to right field to keep the Athletics out of the scoring column.
Relief pitchers Jose Cuas (2/3 of an inning) and Scott Barlow (1 2/3 innings) completed the shutout for Keller. It marked the fifth shutout of the season for the Royals pitching staff. Barlow now has eight saves in nine chances.
O’Hearn’s game-changing at-bat helped Keller earn his first win since May 3.
“We didn’t throw a lot of offense on there for him,” Matheny said. “Fortunately, Michael being able to leg that out gave us a chance, and O’Hearn came through big in a tough situation to just find a spot where they weren’t to get the big RBI for us to give Brad what he deserves.”
This story was originally published June 18, 2022 at 6:01 PM.