Kansas City Royals lose series finale to White Sox as season-high slide reaches 8 games

It’s been a long, tough week for the Kansas City Royals. They surely would’ve liked nothing more than to flip the page with a victory Sunday afternoon at Kauffman Stadium.

Instead, they’ll drag an eight-game losing streak into Monday’s scheduled day off, like an anchor weighing them down, after getting swept for the second consecutive series to wrap up a winless homestand with a 9-3 loss to the Chicago White Sox in front of an announced 12,102.

The Royals (16-17) dropped below .500 for the first time this season. Following the day off, they’ll begin a six-day, seven-game road trip on Tuesday in Detroit.

“Every team goes through stretches like this,” Royals third baseman/outfielder Hunter Dozier said. “This road trip is huge for us. I can tell you in that clubhouse we’re still the same team we were a week ago.

“We still have a ton of confidence. We know we’re really good. We still have that attitude. It’s just a matter of going out and doing it. So nothing has changed in that clubhouse. We still have a ton of confidence. We just have to get this thing turned around.”

Whit Merrifield went 2 for 3 with a double, a run scored and an RBI in Sunday’s loss. He also entered the day leading the American League in stolen bases, and he added to his total with his 11th of the season.

Carlos Santana walked twice, and Nicky Lopez (1 for 3, run) snapped an 0-for-17 stretch with his seventh-inning triple.

The Royals’ current slide is their longest since a skid of 10 straight from March 31-April 11, 2019. Opponents have outscored the Royals by an average of five runs per game during the eight-game losing streak that started against the Minnesota Twins in Minneapolis on May 2.

The first loss ended a 6-3 road trip, and the Royals began their seven-game homestand with the best record in Major League Baseball.

“It all comes down to maybe getting that hit when we needed that hit or making that out or making the pitch, whatever it is,” Dozier said. “Each game is a different story, but I’m sure you can go back to each game and there’s that moment that if we just get that hit or get that out or make that pitch then things kind of turn around and we kind of build off of that.”

Royals starting pitcher Mike Minor (2-2) gave up five runs on four hits, two walks and one hit batter in five innings. He struck out seven. Royals manager Mike Matheny said Minor fell victim to the “wrong things at the wrong time.”

After the Royals grabbed a 1-0 lead in the first inning, Minor gave up three runs on two hits and a hit batter in the second, and two more runs on two hits in the third.

The White Sox (19-13) pushed their first run across on an RBI triple by Yermin Mercedes to right-center field. Mercedes hit a ball that sliced away from center fielder Michael A. Taylor, who had been shaded to the left field side of center.

After a walk put runners on the corners, Leury Garcia hit a sacrifice fly to center field that scored Mercedes. The runner on first, Andrew Vaughn, advanced into scoring position on Taylor’s throw home over the cut-off man in a failed attempt to cut down Mercedes at the plate.

The next batter, Danny Mendick, hit an RBI single to right field to score Vaughn and make it 3-1.

In the third inning, a Yoan Moncada hit a one-out single up the middle, advanced on a two-out walk by Yasmani Grandal and scored along with Grandal on Mercedes’ two-run double down the left-field line and into the corner.

Lopez’s relay throw from shortstop to home looked to be in time, but it short-hopped catcher Salvador Perez, who did not catch it cleanly and never had a chance to apply a tag.

“I hate saying it because I felt pretty good today, felt like I made a lot of good pitches, but a couple balls there in the second and third inning didn’t help me,” Minor said. “The free passes didn’t help me. I think all of them scored today. But I felt like I made a lot of good pitches, and I guess luck wasn’t on my side. I don’t know. I don’t want to give excuses. They beat me today.”

Minor handed the ball over to the bullpen after five innings with the Royals trailing 5-1.

The White Sox added a run against reliever Jakob Junis in the sixth, two against Greg Holland in the seventh and another in the ninth against Josh Staumont.

“We’re getting beat, but I feel like their team is finding holes and we aren’t,” Minor said. “We’re hitting balls hard, and they’re getting caught. I feel like our pitching is doing a pretty good job, and they’re finding holes on us.

“I think it was (Saturday), they pretty much hit it where we weren’t a lot of times. Today, I think I only gave up four hits, but I gave up a couple free passes and they get five runs on them. We’ve got to keep our head up and keep going, though. It’s a long season. We can come back from it. It’s not a big deal, but we need to turn it around.”

The seven-game losing streak at home is the club’s longest since June 12-20, 2018. They’ve now lost nine of their last 10 games at Kauffman Stadium.

“We haven’t even played our best baseball yet,” Matheny said. “We got some wins. It was with a fight and effort and just a grinding style, which I believe we should be able to bring every single day regardless of how well we’re going. That is always going to be part of the conversation — that our best baseball is ahead.

“But that doesn’t make it any easier for the fact that we just had a great opportunity in front of our fans to put out a really good show. We’re not happy, and it’s embarrassing when we don’t play the kind of baseball that we know that we can play.”