Give Me Five!

The Royals won tonight 9-6, completing the sweep of the Dodgers, and winning their fifth straight. We made a ton of mistakes, but the offense covered those mistakes rather nicely. First let's talk about the good stuff.

For the third straight night, the Royals got off to an early lead by scoring in the first inning. Berroa and DeJesus singled in the first and Stairs hit a sac fly to left field to get Berroa in.

In the second inning, Teahen doubled and Castillo came up with a big single to give the Royals a 2-0 lead.

Lowe settled down and got the Royals in order in the third, fourth, and fifth innings. In the sixth inning though, the Royals sent 11 guys to the plate and broke the game open. One of the big blows came off the bat of Castillo again when he doubled in two runs. The Royals scored 6 runs on 7 hits in the inning and they tacked on a run in the seventh inning to make it 9-3.

Now for the negatives.

Greinke, while he was sharper than he's been in recent outings, still didn't look like he had his act together. He fell behind hitters too often, and ended up throwing 111 pitches in 5 IP, giving up 3 R, 8 H, 2 BB, and hitting two guys in the fourth inning—both times when he had two strikes on the guy. He's not going to win many games with those numbers.

Teahen, while going 2-for-4 with a RBI at the plate, looked less than average in the field again. He knocked down one ball that he should have fielded cleanly. He made a bad throw on a play in the eighth and he should have been charged with an error in the ninth. He's not looking like the guy we heard about who was solid with the glove, but needed some AB's before he'd start hitting at the major league level.

Berroa went 2-for-5 tonight, but he's driving me crazy at how undisciplined he is at the plate. He swung at the first pitch during his first AB (a hit). In his second AB, he put the second pitch in play, grounding out to third. In his third AB, he put the third pitch into play. In his fourth AB, he put the second or third pitch into play (I lost count) and during his final AB, he put the second ball into play. I know that the game plan was to be aggressive against Lowe, but how can a guy not get past the third pitch in five AB's?

Gotay is another one who shows no patience at the plate. In the second inning, Teahen doubled and Castillo drove him in. Royals were up 2-0 with one out. Gotay swings at the first pitch and hits into a double play. In his second AB, he put the third pitch into play. In his third AB, he put the second pitch into play. And in his final try, he actually drew a four pitch walk from a wild Scott Erickson who walked three guys in the inning.

In spite of all that, the Royals won anyway. Let's see if we can keep it going against Roger Clemens (4-3, 1.64) tomorrow night. The Royals send J.P. Howell (1-0, 1.80) to the mound.