Frustration, A Crazy Slide and a Wild Ninth

The Royals don't make it easy, but they did get a win to keep (slim) hope alive.

I may have found the cure for the Royals. The anecdote is to start writing something scathing about the team, ready to absolutely eviscerate them, so they force you to back off because a gutty and gritty win isn’t the time or place to blast them. It’s not that the offense doesn’t deserve it, because they do, but timing is everything. And after a first three innings that were as bad as any three innings they’ve had in 2025, they did turn things around with much better plate appearances (still missed opportunities) and ultimately had a great inning that allowed them to take the game and tie the series.

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Now 88 games in, the Royals are six games under .500. The dream of consecutive trips to the playoffs is absolutely on life support, but it isn’t dead. And I think it would have been very close to dead had they dropped to eight games under .500 last night. What they did last night, and Bobby Witt Jr.’s slide, which I’ll obviously get to, is one of the games you’ll likely point to if the Royals end up pulling it off and getting back into a playoff position. I can’t say I think it’s especially likely, but I also have seen weirder things happen.

One quick note before I get really into the game, if you’re not a paid subscriber, I do have some thoughts on a big Royals rumor that broke yesterday in a special Crown Jewels section at the bottom, so click that link above if you want to read those thoughts.

Okay, back to the game. I was mad. Fans were probably mad, but I’ve been trying to avoid social media a bit because, well, it’s kind of a toxic place. But Logan Evans took the hill in place of Bryan Woo and he was mowing down the Royals. If you’re wondering who Evans is, that’s a fair question. He was a 12th round pick of the Mariners in 2023 who had a solid year last year in AA and then had a 5.40 ERA in AAA this year, albeit with good strikeout and walk numbers. In his last start, he gave up eight runs on nine hits in three innings. That was in AAA. So when he came out and mowed down the Royals through three perfect innings, that’s when I started to set the fire.

Jonathan India had one of the worst first at bats of a game you’ll see. He took a first pitch strike. Then he took a second pitch down the middle that was asking to be crushed. Then he swung and missed a pitch that was so far off the plate that if you look at the Gameday graphic, you may not realize it’s listed because it’s out of the line of sight. Witt had an ugly at bat of his own, but he was able to lay off the sweeper that was admittedly a good looking pitch. But he ended up striking out on a cutter that was never a strike. Through two, Evans had thrown 17 pitches. Through three, it was 32.