Erceg plays Lucy to the Royals’ Charlie Brown; Rangers win 7-6

Just when you thought the Royals had run out of ways to lose baseball games.

In case you’re too young to understand the reference in the headline, there was an old Newpaper comic strip called Peanuts by Charles Schulz. One of the running gags was that Charlie wanted to kick a football. Lucy would always promise to hold it for him, but when he ran up to kick it, she’d yank it away, and he’d go flying through the air when there was no ball to meet the resistance of his kick. Another common gag in Peanuts was for Charlie Brown to pitch in a baseball game and have a line drive hit so hard past him that it would send him tumbling and blow all his clothes off. Perhaps that would have been the better metaphor.

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This one was 3-0 heading into the seventh inning despite the fact that Seth Lugo had pitched a real gem, allowing only a single earned run while striking out 6 in his third straight quality start. Josh Jung hit a one-out home run in the first. Later, the Royals’ vaunted left-side-of-the-infield each had an error in the bottom of the fourth to help Texas score two more.

In the top of the seventh, the Rangers went away from their middling starter, Kumar Rocker, in a shutout despite the fact that he had only thrown 85 pitches. The Royals immediately went to work against the Rangers bullpen. They scored four runs off of Tyler Alexander and old friend Jakob Junis.

Isaac Collins led off the inning with an opposite-field automatic double. Lane Thomas pinch-hit for Michael Massey but struck out looking on a pitch he probably should have challenged, even though it might have been confirmed. Nick Loftin pinch-hit for Kyle Isbel and yanked a single into left to put runners at first and third for today’s leadoff hitter, Carter Jensen. Carter managed a looping liner to left to score Collins. Bobby Witt Jr. pulled a line drive into left to send Loftin home and then Maikel Garcia, batting third for the second straight day, pulled a single of his own into left to tie the game and put Bobby at third. Up came Vinnie Pasquantino, who, infamously, had not hit for extra bases with runners on all year. He finally changed that with an RBI double to left center, giving the Royals the lead. But Garcia went hopping into third and was almost immediately pulled from the game with what was eventually declared a left hamstring strain. He is almost certainly destined for the IL. Salvador Perez and Jac Caglianone each struck out to end the inning.

Then, in the top of the eighth, you really began to think the Royals might be able to pull this off when Young Carter hit a flyball to left that just kept carrying until it left the field.

In the bottom of the eighth, recently anointed eighth-inning guy, Daniel “Danny Drips” Lynch IV was tasked with getting the game to the ninth with the Royals still in front. He’d been asked to get the final out of the seventh and succeeded but seemed to struggle in the eighth. He was pulled after allowing a run with only one out and two on for John Schreiber. Schreiber, miraculously, got a pop-up for the first out and then Carter Jensen made a fantastic play to catch the final out in foul territory.

The Royals went quietly in the ninth, and on came the artist formerly known as “Lights Out” Lucas Erceg to try to collect the save.

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Leadoff home run for Joc Pederson to cut the lead to one. Josh Jung singles on a grounder to Bobby that probably should have been an out, but for Bobby’s second awful throw to first in the game. Brandon Nimmo chopped one to second, but Erceg attempted to intercept it, and instead of perhaps getting two outs, the Royals got none, and the go-ahead run was on. Jake Burger singled to right to tie the game and Ezequiel Duran, who has been tormenting KC this weekend, did the same to complete the comeback, walkoff victory.

Lucas Erceg has pitched three times this week; he has allowed 8 runs while recording only 6 outs. That’s right, he didn’t get a single out today. His ERA has ballooned from 3.26 all the way to 6.33. His SIERA has gone from 2.83 in 2024, to 3.78 last year, to something more than 4.47 this year after today’s game. Either he’s hurt, or he’s simply become very bad. Certainly, there has been an element of bad luck to his appearances, but you don’t pitch that poorly without both bad luck and poor performance.

It feels like the Royals simply can’t continue using him as the closer, but even though Matt Strahm is likely to return tomorrow, he hasn’t been significantly better. Carlos Estévez still hasn’t restarted his rehab assignment. Danny Drips has quietly given up 10 hits and 4 walks while striking out only 7 in 7.2 innings over his last 8 appearances. The next man up might be former Tigers closer Alex Lange, who has had several scoreless appearances recently, but also stopped striking guys out.

I’m not going to pretend like I know how the Royals can fix this. The bad news is, Royals General Manager J. J. Picollo isn’t going to either; he offered up this quote to Anne Rogers in her most recent Royals newsletter:

“The only thing we can do is keep competing, keep believing in ourselves, ask the right questions. Are there things that we can do to help us get back on track? Right now, we’re searching for it.”

Anyway, the Royals will show up at Globe Life Field again tomorrow. Michael Wacha will take the mound for the Royals’ final game in May 2026. Jack Leiter will pitch for the Rangers. The game will start at 1:35 Central. If you plan to watch it, you’ve got a stronger stomach than I do.