Brady Singer continues dominance over Tigers in the Kansas City Royals’ 4-0 victory
Kansas City Royals pitcher Brady Singer held the Detroit Tigers scoreless for seven innings and allowed just four hits as he once again thrived in the role of “stopper” after a pair of Royals’ losses.
Royals rookies Michael Massey, Drew Waters and Nick Pratto drove in all of the runs in a 4-0 win over the Tigers in front of an announced crowd of 13,150 in the finale of a three-game set at Kauffman Stadium on Sunday afternoon. The Royals shut out an opponent for the eighth time this season.
“I think that was as good of a display of setting the tone, setting the tempo (as you’ll see),” Royals manager Mike Matheny said of Singer. “He came out right away and it was a different slider than he had last time out. It was really catching. You could tell by their reactions. … It was Brady as good as we’ve seen him all season.”
The game time of 2 hours, 11 minutes was the fastest Royals game since April 24, 2021, against the Tigers in Detroit (2 hours, 10 minutes) and the fastest at Kauffman Stadium since Aug. 13, 2014, against the Athletics (2 hours, 6 minutes).
The Royals (57-84) compiled a 2-4 record on their homestand. Following a day off on Monday, they’ll begin a six-game road trip on Tuesday night in Minnesota.
Singer improved to 8-4 this season. He struck out six and walked just one in seven innings, his second outing of at least seven innings in his past four starts.
Massey went 1 for 3 with a home run and a walk, Waters went 1 for 3 with a double and two RBIs, while Pratto drove in a run with a sacrifice fly. Royals rookie infielder Bobby Witt Jr. went 2 for 4 with a double and a run scored.
Royals center fielder Michael A. Taylor (1 for 2, run scored) reached base three times with an infield hit and a pair of walks. Salvador Perez and MJ Melendez also had hits.
Singer, who made his debut during the pandemic-shortened 2020 season, set a new career-high for innings pitched in a season. He came into the day just 2/3 of an inning shy of his previous mark of 128 1/3 innings set last season.
Singer the Tiger tamer
Singer entered the day having already demonstrated mastery over the Tigers. In nine previous career starts, he’d gone 5-0 with a 2.79 ERA, 51 strikeouts and 16 walks in 48 1/3 innings. He said there’s nothing particular about the Tigers that provides extra motivation or focus.
Being the guy to take the ball when the Royals have scuffled undeniably brings something out of Singer.
“We’ve known Brady Singer, his makeup and how he’s wired, how he thrives in situations that are tough or a little different,” Matheny said. “He knows we’ve lost a couple games. It’s almost like he wills it to happen. The ‘I’ve got to be good today. This team needs me.’ That’s what the good ones do. Whether they have their good stuff or not.
“You take that mentality and you mix it with good stuff for highly talented people, you’re going to see special things happen. Today was a special outing for Brady.”
The Tigers put two men on with two outs in the second inning via a walk and a single, but Singer got an inning-ending ground ball.
Singer retired 10 consecutive batters from the end of the second inning through the fifth inning. He racked up four of his six strikeouts during that stretch, and only allowed one fly ball during that stretch.
The Tigers (54-86) scored 18 total runs in the previous two games against the Royals.
“I try to keep the mentality the same every time, but with the two losses before — yeah, the mentality was a little bit better today — just going out there and trying to get deep in the game,” Singer said. “Just going right at them. They had two good offensive days the past two days. So just to go out there and do that was good.”
The Tigers’ best chance to make a dent in the lead against Singer came in the seventh inning. Spencer Torkelson doubled with one out and advanced to third on a wild pitch.
However, Singer struck out his former high school teammate Kerry Carpenter for the second out, and then Jonathan Scoop grounded out to end the inning. The Tigers went 0 for 4 with runners in scoring position against Singer.
This season, Singer had held opponents to a slash line of .200/.298/.313 with runners in scoring position (entering the day). That was lower in every regard than his overall opponent’s slash line this season of .251/.306/.385.
“I think staying on the attack with runners in scoring position has helped me a lot,” Singer said. “I think the past few years I’ve kind of been picking around guys, trying to get them to chase.
“Now, I’m trying to throw competitive pitches in the zone and kind of understand where the runners are, how many outs there are and stuff like that. I feel like I’ve done a lot better job this year than I have in the past.”
Royals relievers Dylan Coleman and Scott Barlow didn’t allow a man to reach base in the last two innings.
Massey goes deep, offense provides breathing room
The Royals grabbed a 1-0 lead for the second day in a row. Witt flared a one-out single into right-center followed by a Perez single up the middle, which put runners on the corners with one out.
Pratto’s fly ball to left field was deep enough for Witt to tag up and score from third. Perez was thrown out trying to advance to second on the through from the outfield.
Waters added to that lead in the second with a two-out, two-run double into the right-field corner that brought home Taylor (walk) and Nate Eaton (hit by pitch). That gave Singer a 3-0 edge going into the third inning.
“Especially when you’ve got a guy like Brady on the mound, really anybody, you get a lead early and you start playing with some confidence,” Massey said. “It’s cliche, but I think hitting is contagious.”
Massey’s first home run at Kauffman Stadium gave the Royals a 4-0 lead in the fourth inning. He smashed a first-pitch cutter from Tigers left-hander Tyler Alexander over the right-field wall. Nine of Massey’s last 17 hits have been extra-base hits (six doubles, one triple, two home runs).
“The hitting (coaches) did a great job with the report, and just from watching the game you could tell he liked to get ahead,” Massey said of Alexander. “I was just trying to get a good pitch early. I’ve been struggling a little bit of late. So I was trying to stay away from two strikes, and I was able to put a good swing on it.”
This story was originally published September 11, 2022 at 3:33 PM.
