Nelly Nuke and Wacha Too

The Royals turned a loss into a win with a big swing from Nelson Velazquez and some great pitching from Michael Wacha.

Isn’t it funny how one swing can change basically everything you’re feeling? As the Royals were batting in the top of the seventh inning against Logan Gilbert, I was beginning to craft today’s newsletter in my head. I was going to write about how frustrating it is when a team can’t score runs. When that inning started, Logan Gilbert had faced just one over the minimum. He’d allowed two hits and a walk, but after one of the hits and one of the walk, he was able to get a double play. He was cruising. But then he wasn’t anymore.

He walked Bobby Witt Jr. to start the seventh inning. Then his defense failed him. He did get the ground ball he was looking for from Vinnie Pasquantino. It was hard hit, and just hard hit enough that Josh Rojas bobbled it, which took away the chance at a double play (that was pretty much a sure thing with Pasquantino running). Salvador Perez was walked, both unintentionally and intentionally because of something I’ll get to in a second, and then Michael Massey struck out.

But the swing we’ve been waiting on for what feels like months but is really only about a month came from the Royals best power bat from the last two months last year.