Kansas City Royals complete sweep of Orioles in ALCS, head to World Series
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Version 0 of 1. KANSAS CITY, Mo. — As the fireworks exploded overhead, they converged in a mob near the mound: youth, inexperience, joy and exuberance. The Kansas City Royals bounced together and shouted and danced. Their manager stood back, content to watch the celebration from afar. “These kids, from the minute you saw them,” Ned Yost said, “you knew they were going to be special.” An American League afterthought entering this postseason, the Royals are returning to the World Series after a 29-year absence thanks to an unsung and unbeatable cast that managed to upend the Baltimore Orioles in four straight games. They topped the Orioles, 2-1, in Game 4 on Wednesday at Kauffman Stadium to complete the AL Championship Series sweep and became the first team to open the postseason with eight straight wins. Ninety minutes after it all ended, the party was barely warming up. Fountains were still bubbling in the outfield, and champagne was shooting through the Royals’ clubhouse. Some players returned to the field to dance on the dugout while their teammates sprinted through the outfield, arms spread wide and spirits flying high. Innocence is not wasted on the youth. “You can’t predict stuff like this, man,” Royals reliever Danny Duffy said. The Royals’ roster this postseason featured only five players with any playoff experience. But that was never a burden. It was a non-factor, in fact, as game after game the Royals showed they slowly have evolved into perhaps the most complete team in baseball. “Right from the beginning of the playoffs, I don’t know what clicked for them,” Yost said, “but something clicked. They were totally used to this atmosphere. There was no pressure.” The Orioles only could watch the Royals’ celebration in stunned silence. The talented Baltimore squad won 96 games in the regular season, spent 91 days atop the AL East standings and somehow lost this series’ four games by a combined six runs — plus countless bloop hits off the Royals’ bats and defensive thievery by Kansas City gloves. “The baseball gods will be kind to you,” Orioles Manager Buck Showalter said not long before the start of Game 4, “if you stay true.” Perhaps, but the Orioles were always on the wrong side of the unlucky bounces and twists of fate. To be sure, though, the pennant never hinged on luck or fate. For the Royals, ALCS MVP Lorenzo Cain had eight hits and five runs in four games. Mike Moustakas blasted a pair of homers. The defense consistently stole hits and saved runs, from Moustakas’s stellar glove work to the sprinters in the outfield. In the fifth inning Wednesday, Alex Gordon reached over his head on the run and made a catch just a second before he crashed into the left field wall. And the Kansas City bullpen allowed just two earned runs in 16 innings of work. Meanwhile, the Orioles kept waiting for big hits that rarely came. When they did, they were never big enough. Their best bat, Adam Jones, produced just four hits in the series and whiffed five times, while Steve Pearce managed just one hit in 17 at-bats. And not a single Baltimore starter lasted six innings on the mound. Miguel Gonzalez came the closest in Game 4. He allowed two runs — only one earned — in 52 / 3 innings and took the loss. As they had in three previous games, the Royals had little interest in style points or knockout blows in the deciding game. The contest had barely started before Baltimore watched its hopes of climbing out of a three-game hole unravel — and in a manner that has come to typify the quirky Kansas City bunch. The Royals managed four base runners and scored a pair of runs in the first inning before hitting a ball out of the infield. Alcides Escobar led off with a soft grounder up the middle that was just good enough to be called a hit. The second batter, Norichika Aoki, was hit by a pitch, and Yost instructed Cain, the team’s top hitter this postseason, to lay down a sacrifice bunt. “Whatever it takes,” Cain said later. With runners on second and third, Eric Hosmer then tapped a grounder to first, and Pearce fired the ball home. The throw was in the dirt, and as Escobar slid into the plate, he booted the ball to the backstop, which allowed Aoki to score, too. Pearce was charged with a throwing error, and the lights began to dim on the Orioles’ season. “Everything was just going their way,” Gonzalez said, “and nothing our way: Broken bats, base hits, they were finding the hole.” The Orioles managed to put a dent in that lead in the third on Ryan Flaherty's leadoff homer to right but stood no chance against the Kansas City bullpen. Three Royals relievers combined to allow just two hits in 32 / 3 scoreless innings to secure the win and bring the World Series to Kansas City for the first time since 1985. Starter Jason Vargas picked up the win for the Royals, allowing just one run on two hits while striking out six in 51 / 3 innings. Greg Holland pitched his way through the heart of the Orioles’ lineup in the ninth, earning his sixth save of these playoffs and fourth in as many games against Baltimore. In a quiet visitors clubhouse, the Orioles packed away the season, their bats and gloves ready to hibernate for the winter. Across a hallway and behind two sets of doors, the party raged on — loud music and booze spraying every direction. The buoyant young players feel they’re unstoppable this postseason — and they just might be right. “We don’t really care what anybody believes in us,” Kansas City pitcher James Shields said. “We believe in ourselves. Hopefully, everyone realizes what kind of baseball we play.” |