Game Thread #48; Cardinals at Royals

Kansas City looks to bounce back after dropping six of their last seven

After being one of the hottest teams in the major leagues through the end of April, the Royals have started to slump and have lost four straight coming into today. Kansas City has run into the same offensive woes that plagued the lineup to start the year. Over the last four games, Kansas City has only scored a combined 7 runs, and has yet to score more than three runs in the previous four games.

Today, the Royals will look to bounce back against an excellent pitcher in Matthew Liberatore. In his eight starts this year, Liberatore has posted a 3.11 ERA, a 1.01 WHIP, and a 3.8 BB%, which is one of the lowest rates in the major leagues. Liberatore makes it hard for opposing offenses to get on base, and today, a sputtering Royals offense will hope to do enough against him to come away with a much-needed win.

Liberatore has impressive stuff with a great slider as his primary offering, as well as three low to mid-90s fastballs. He also offers a subpar changeup, but will mix in a huge curveball that can reach almost 3000 RPM. Liberatore won’t rack up a ton of strikeouts, but he’s great at forcing bad contact and ground balls. Kansas City needs to look for the hard stuff and tag him on the fastballs (which have been his least effective pitches so far) while also trying to avoid chasing out of the zone.

Fortunately for the Royals, their pitching has remained stellar, and they continue to play like one of the best pitching staffs in baseball. Today, for the Royals, Michael Wacha will take the mound for his tenth start of the year. So far this season, Wacha has been one of the Royals’ best pitchers, with a sub-3.00 ERA on the year over 51.2 innings.

Wacha has had immense success with his changeup and slider this year, with teams hitting below .200 on both of them. His fastball has had much better command this year, and teams have struggled to square him up to get big hits. Wacha has done a great job forcing soft contact this year with an average exit velocity of 87.1 MPH and will hope to continue his success today to help avoid the sweep in Kauffman.

The Royals will need the bats to come alive if they want to stay in the game and get a much-needed win to avoid a sweep in the I-70 series. Michael Wacha will keep them in the game, but at the end of the day, the team was shut out yesterday, and you can’t win baseball games if you don’t score runs…

In today’s lineup, the Royals roll out a right-hand-heavy lineup as they look to find a spark as they face a strong lefty today. Originally, India was the leadoff man playing second base, but was scratched due to injury. Massey will come in at second, and Garcia will move up to the leadoff spot.

Vinnie was the only lefty originally scheduled as he is the DH, and Salvy will be at first. The biggest change is Dairon Blanco getting his first start in center. Freddy Fermin is in against the lefty to give the lineup another right-handed bat and to give Salvy a break behind the plate. Blanco was great against lefties in 2024, and Matt Quatraro hopes he can provide a spark to an offense that has struggled immensely over the last few games.

The Cardinals will roll out the same first six hitters they have used all series, and Victor Scott II remains in the nine hole playing center field. The only changes come at the seventh and eighth in the lineup, with the lefty Alex Burleson getting in at left field, and Yohel Pozo at catcher to give Herrera and Pages a day off.