KANSAS CITY -- As the Royals prepared to welcome the Yankees to town this week, they felt like their rotation was in a good spot with who they had lined up to start and how the six-man rotation was shaping up as a whole.
Instead, the first two games have been disappointing and largely one-sided. After losing by eight runs on Tuesday, the Royals dropped Wednesday’s game, 6-3, and were on the verge of being shut out if not for Salvador Perez’s home run in the ninth inning.
What's more, Wednesday started with tough injury news for starter Cole Ragans, who was placed on the 15-day injured list with a left rotator cuff strain.
With one game against New York left on Thursday, the Royals haven’t won a game against the Yankees yet this year. Since the start of 2024 and including the playoffs -- when the Yankees beat the Royals in the American League Division Series -- the Royals have won just three of 16 games against the reigning AL champions.
Wednesday’s loss dropped the Royals to .500 (34-34) for the first time since April 29.
"We haven’t scored enough, we haven’t suppressed runs enough,” manager Matt Quatraro said. “We’ve gotten beat on both sides of the ball. … Our expectation of ourselves is to win, and when you don’t, you leave frustrated.”
Starting for the first time since June 1 -- a full nine days of rest as the Royals monitor his innings this year -- Kris Bubic turned in his worst start of the season, allowing five earned runs in 4 1/3 innings.
In his first full season removed from Tommy John surgery and the long rehab that comes with it, Bubic has burst onto the scene this year and become not only one of the Royals’ best starters, but also one of MLB’s best starters. Bubic entered Wednesday with a 1.43 ERA across his first 12 starts, and his 0.56 ERA in May earned him American League Pitcher of the Month honors.
He looked like he was only going to continue that stretch with a 10-pitch, 1-2-3 first inning that saw him strike out both Paul Goldschmidt and Aaron Judge.
"Came out feeling pretty hot, feeling pretty good in the first inning,” Bubic said.
The second inning was the complete opposite.
Bubic threw 41 pitches, walked three batters in the frame and allowed five runs. It started with a first-pitch leadoff triple from Cody Bellinger. Then Bubic issued an eight-pitch walk to Jazz Chisholm Jr., although the seventh pitch of that plate appearance appeared to be a strike. The Yankees scored a run on Anthony Volpe’s fielder’s choice RBI, but Bubic recorded a groundout to get to two outs and nearly out of the frame.
Instead, it went off the rails.
A walk, double and two singles followed. Bubic walked Judge to bring Bellinger up again, finally getting the third out of the inning with a groundout.
While the close calls may have altered the inning and the outcome, Bubic didn’t want to linger on that.
"It doesn’t change the fact that I fell behind in counts,” Bubic said. “It doesn’t change the fact that [my] stuff wasn’t sharp after that first inning, and it doesn’t change the fact that I threw 41 pitches in an inning. Those are things you never want to do, regardless of what the umpires are doing and what the calls are. It just comes back to me.
"... At the end of the day, to let it spiral like that definitely sucks. A lead like that, they get momentum pretty early.”
The Royals had no answer for the five-run hole they were in early. They recorded just two hits off Yankees starter Clarke Schmidt, who threw six scoreless innings with seven strikeouts.
The Ragans news Wednesday was undoubtedly a hit for the roster, but the rotation has been a strength for the Royals this year.
Bubic’s season thus far has been a key reason why. They need him now more than ever.
He’ll have to put Wednesday’s start behind him -- and the Royals will have to do the same with these first two games.
"If you want to be the best, you've got to beat the best,” Bubic said. “They were the best in the American League last year. You could argue that’s the best lineup in the game right now. And if we want to win, if we want to be where we want to be at the end of the year, those are the teams you've got to beat and be competitive against them.”