Let’s take a look at the visual heritage of the defending AL champions, the Kansas City Royals. They have a WHIP of 1.20 on the year, good for fifth in the league. He goes on to shout out his favorite players: “H-Town, you don’t want it down here/we got Carlos Correa, he’s the rookie of the year”, and then four bars for Dallas Keuchel, Tony Sipp, Evan Gattis, Hank Conger, Colby Rasmus, Carlos Gomez, George Springer, Chris Carter, and Luis Valbuena.
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July 26: Royals 5, Astros 1. But the Astros find other ways to make things happen.
“There is very little room for error if you’re going to win a World Series or advance in the playoffs”, Moore said Tuesday, before greeting thousands of fans who showed up for a pep rally.
Grifol, a Miami native who helped FSU reach the College World Series in 1989 and 1991, has not been back to Tallahassee in more than 10 years. Cain was 5-for-7 against Keuchel this season, including two doubles and this beauty of a home run.
The Astros are a mix of power, speed and strikeouts. They beat the New York Yankees 3-0 on Tuesday night in the winner-take-all AL wild-card game, earning the right to open against Kansas City at Kauffman Stadium. During the regular season, the Astros won the season series 4-2, including winning the first four match ups between the two teams. The only time McHugh pitched against the Royals he didn’t allow a run, pitching seven scoreless innings and striking out nine in May 2014.
Astros – McHugh, Scott Kazmir (2-6, 4.17 ERA with Houston), Keuchel and Mike Fiers (2-1, 3.32 ERA with Houston).
Ventura finished 13-8 with a 4.08 ERA in 28 regular-season starts.
Yordano Ventura has been the ace Johnny Cueto was supposed to be: It’s no secret that Cueto has struggled since donning a Royals uniform, but his issues have been mitigated by the rise of Ventura. For instance, did you know that a psychedelic cow was in the mix to become the Kansas City Royals’ first ever logo?
For the Astros, the bullpen is the big question mark heading into October. The Royals, meanwhile, have about the best bullpen in the game even with Holland out.
The Astros can cancel out the Royals’ best quality: Not many teams can say this, but the Royals’ greatest strength might be their outfield defence.
With playoff experience and home-field advantage on their side, it’s hard to bet against the Kansas City Royals in this series.
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The Kansas City Royals were just happy to be invited to the party a year ago, ending a 29-year postseason drought before squeaking through a dramatic wild-card game against the Athletics. Now the Astros are giving the baseball to 19-game victor Collin McHugh, who leads their rotation in the Divisional Series looking to steal a game from the Royals in Kansas City. The balance, they have a lot of balance on their team, and so do we up and down the lineup.
