BALTIMORE — The superstar of Kansas City’s first playoff team since its 2015 World Series squad, Bobby Witt Jr. said this year’s Royals entered the postseason aiming to create their own October legacy.
After two games, they’ve taken the first step.
Witt delivered the go-ahead RBI for the second straight day and the Kansas City bullpen protected the lead to secure a 2-1 win over the Orioles on Wednesday and send the Royals to the American League Division Series.
Kansas City swept the best-of-three wild-card series after winning Tuesday’s opener 1-0. The Royals now face the top-seeded New York Yankees in a best-of-five round. Game 1 is Saturday at New York.
“I think it’s the start of something special,” Witt said. “Like I keep saying, we didn’t come this far just to come this far, so we’re going to keep getting after it.”
Witt plated Tuesday’s winning run with a two-out single in the sixth inning. He delivered in the same fashion Wednesday.
Kansas City put runners on the corners with two outs in the sixth and the game tied at 1. Yennier Cano relieved Cionel Perez (0-1) to face Witt, who legged out a run-scoring infield grounder toward the middle.
The Royals’ bullpen took it from there.
After Angel Zerpa (1-0) came into the game in the fifth inning, he and John Schreiber pitched the bottom of the sixth before Schreiber and Sam Long worked through the seventh. Kris Bubic handled the eighth, and Lucas Erceg worked the ninth for his second save. Erceg fanned Gunnar Henderson for the final out.
“It’s incredible,” Kansas City manager Matt Quatraro said. “You come here against that team and give up one run in 18 innings, sign me up.”
Witt’s go-ahead hit came an inning after Baltimore scored its first run of the series but blew a chance to add on.
Cedric Mullins led off the fifth with his first career playoff homer before the next three batters reached, with pitcher Seth Lugo’s fielding error loading the bases with no outs.
Lugo exited after getting Anthony Santander to pop out, and Zerpa struck out Colton Cowser swinging on a fastball that hit Cowser on the hand before retiring Adley Rutschman on a grounder to Witt at shortstop.
Cowser exited the game in the seventh inning. The Orioles later announced Cowser fractured his left hand on the strikeout.
That missed opportunity came after Baltimore left runners at second and third in the fourth inning. Michael Massey saved a run earlier in the inning with a diving stop at second to keep the game’s potential first run at third base.
The Orioles stranded 16 runners in the series and went 1-for-13 with men in scoring position. Baltimore was swept out of the playoffs for the second straight year and has lost its last 10 playoff games dating to the 2014 ALDS.
“I think especially when you lose like this, there’s frustration, there’s anger, there’s disappointment because you felt like there (were) opportunities there in those couple games to change the score, and it didn’t happen,” Orioles manager Brandon Hyde said.
Lugo was charged with one run on five hits over 4 1/3 innings. He walked one and fanned six. Orioles right-hander Zach Eflin allowed one run on four hits and a walk with three strikeouts over four frames.
Baltimore was 57-33 after a win on July 7 but went just 34-38 the rest of the way. The Orioles scored 22 runs during their three-game sweep at Minnesota to finish the regular season before managing just one on 11 hits against the Royals.
“I thought we battled as well as we possibly could,” Hyde said. “We persevered. We got into the postseason. We hosted a wild card. We just had a tough time offensively these two games against a really good pitching staff and a scrappy team.”
Now that scrappy team is headed to New York.
–Tanner Malinowski, Field Level Media
