Comeback Falls Short

I attended the game yesterday in the new Busch Stadium. As I was waiting to get in, I saw Mike Wood and Mike Sweeney walk by completely unnoticed by the St. Louis faithful. Apparently the Royals stayed in a hotel just across the street or at least within walking distance of the stadium. The stadium was packed and I saw a lot more people in Royal blue than I expected—certainly not anything close to the amount of red in Kauffman Stadium a few weeks ago, but at least we had some representation.

The new Busch is spacious, with lots of great amenities. The walk-ways are big, they have lots of tables and places to eat, and the seats are big enough to where you aren’t rubbing elbows and knees with the people on either side of you. I was under an overhang in left field, so a large portion of the scoreboard wasn’t viewable, and they apparently don’t have the entire PA sound system in place yet, so I couldn’t hear the PA announcer at all. But they had a scoreboard on the side of the façade that was easily viewable—although not always accurate. Hopefully they’ll get that figured out soon. They did have a neat sign that keeps a running total of pitches for each pitcher, so you always know his pitch count. Once the fixes are completed, St. Louis will have a nice park to enjoy for many years to come.

As you know by now, Mike Wood wasn’t sharp. The Cardinals got to him the second time through the line up and before he escaped the third inning, he’d given up six runs, to make the score 6-1 St. Louis. As the pitches mounted, I kept waiting for Bell to remove Wood in an attempt to keep us in the game, but it didn’t happen. He didn’t even pinch hit for Wood in the fifth inning even though he’d thrown 86 pitches and obviously didn’t have good stuff. He gave up two more runs in the bottom of the fifth and the Royals were down 8-1. Then Bell removed him from the game. It made no sense whatsoever to let Wood hit and then send him back out to the mound to give up two more runs, but Affeldt did keep us in the game by turning in a good performance.

Then, in the seventh we posted a run to make it 8-2. In the eighth we scored three more times to make it 8-5 and St. Louis fans started to squirm. They’d seen our ability to come back over the previous two games. They scored an insurance run in the bottom of the eighth to make it 9-5, but the Royals still didn’t give up. They scored twice more and had a guy on base when John Buck came to the plate with two outs and a chance to tie it. Unfortunately that didn’t happen, but you’ve got to feel good about the way the Royals stayed in the game. If Bell had removed Wood when he should have, the Cardinals may not have scored two runs in the fifth and who knows what would have happened.

The Royals open a new series at home tonight against the Twins. Scott Elarton (3-9, 5.13) will need to bring his A-game since he’ll be going against Johan Santana (9-4, 2.59).