Those were not the 2015 World Series champion Kansas City Royals on the Great American Ball Park playing field the last three days.<\/p>\n
The Cincinnati Reds just made them look like the 2015 World Series winners instead of a team 15 games under .500.<\/p>\n
The Reds wasted another top-shelf pitching performance from Chase Burns because their offense was as dormant and dead as Tyrannosaurus Rex.<\/p>\n
And there also was The Tony Santillan Factor.<\/p>\n
The Royals applied a 5-2 win over the Reds on Wednesday, June 3 and took the series two games to one.<\/p>\n
Burns gave up a walk and a home run to Vinnie Pasquantino in the first inning, then nothing more.<\/p>\n
He pitched six innings and gave up those two runs, one walk and struck out nine. It was his eighth straight game of giving up two or fewer runs.<\/p>\n
The performance came after illness pushed Burns\u2019 start back two days from his scheduled start Monday, June 1.<\/p>\n
\u201cLike D.J. (pitching coach Derek Johnson) said, he looked a little sluggish even when he was warming up,\u201d Reds manager Tito Francona told reporters.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd it showed in the first inning, but after he gave up the home run that took the sluggish away. He was (ticked) and then he was really good.\u201d<\/p>\n
When Burns walked the second batter and the third one hit a home run, it was evident Burns was burned up about it, out of sorts.<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah, after walking Bobby (Witt Jr.) and giving up the bomb (to Pasquantino), that definitely (ticked) me off,\u201d he said. \u201cI just can\u2019t walk somebody like that then miss my spot.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat kinda (ticked) me off and helped me the rest of the game,\u201d he said, indicating that those two hitters grabbed his attention and his focus the rest of the way.<\/p>\n
But the Reds were helpless against Kansas City starter Steven Kolek. Blake Dunn rocketed a two-run home run in the fifth inning to tie it, 2-2.<\/p>\n
And that was it. Nothing more.<\/p>\n
Asked if the offensive blahs is due to Elly De La Cruz\u2019s absence and if the team is trying too hard, trying to do too much, Francona told reporters, \u201cThe offense is harder for us than we want it to be sometimes.<\/p>\n
\u201cHaving Elly is great, but I don\u2019t think it is because he is not in there,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
It remained anchored at 2-2 until the ninth inning and the much-battered Santillan took the mound.<\/p>\n
At the time, both teams were 0 for 5 with runners in scoring position.<\/p>\n
Santillan\u2019s first pitch to Jac Caglianone was ripped into right field for a single.<\/p>\n
The Royals went smallball at this point and had Isaac Collins bunt pinch-runner Tyler Tolbert to second base.<\/p>\n
Michael Murphy battled Santillan for 10 pitches and the 10th pitch was belted into center field to score Tolbert.<\/p>\n
It was 3-2 and still reachable for the Reds against Kansas City\u2019s highly suspect bullpen. But the next batter, Nick Loftin, crushed a two-run home run and it was 5-2.<\/p>\n
Santillan has give up seven home runs in his last 11 appearances.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s location. . .and it may be different at different times,\u201d said Francona, trying to explain the Santillan phenomenon.<\/p>\n
\u201cAgainst the right-hand hitter (Loftin\u2019s home run), he didn\u2019t locate his fastball where he wanted to,\u201d Francona added. \u201cThe other day it was the same thing with a right-handed hitter. And at times his breaking ball has been in and out.\u201d<\/p>\n
With the bullpen depleted by injuries and populated by a gaggle of Triple-A plug-ins, Francona realizes that Santillan has to find the method that made him successful last season.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re at the point where we need some stability,\u201d said Francona. \u201cAnd he\u2019s the guy, so we\u2019re gonna have to figure it out. Do we pick out spots with him? We tried to do that before, but with everybody going down it has been a little more difficult.\u201d<\/p>\n
Both teams stranded eight and the Reds were 0 for 5 with runners in scoring position. Kansas City also stranded eight and was 1 for 5 with runners in scoring position \u2014 Massey\u2019s tie-breaking ninth-inning single.<\/p>\n
After Kansas City scored three in the top of the ninth, Spencer Steer doubled to open the bottom of the ninth and continued his getting on base streak to 22 games.<\/p>\n
Will Benson struck out and Francona sent Edwin Arroyo up to pinch-hit for Tyler Stephenson. At that point, Arroyo was 1 for 6 with four strikeouts.<\/p>\n
He was called out on a full count and has struck out five times in seven at bats for his just-started MLB career.<\/p>\n
Francona then sent just-recalled Noelvi Marte to pinch-hit for Matt McLain (3-for-34). Marte was called up from Triple-A Louisville and TJ Friedl was optioned to the Bats.<\/p>\n
Marte also worked a full count, but he walked to put two on with two outs.<\/p>\n
Could Blake Dunn do it again, or a least tie it. His walk-of single in the 10th inning won Tuesday\u2019s game. A home runs would tie this game.<\/p>\n
Dunn flied meekly to center field to end it and the Reds continue to find themselves in last place in the National League Central<\/p>\n
They are seven games behind the division-leading Milwaukee Brewers and one game behind the fourth-place Chicago Cubs.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.daytondailynews.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Those were not the 2015 World Series champion Kansas City Royals on the Great American Ball Park playing field the last three days. The Cincinnati Reds just made them look like the 2015 World Series winners instead of a team 15 games under .500. The Reds wasted another top-shelf pitching performance from Chase Burns because […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2444434,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2444433","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-royalty"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/McCoy-Reds-waste-another-gem-from-Chase-Burns-in-series.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2444433","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2444433"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2444433\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2444435,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2444433\/revisions\/2444435"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2444434"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2444433"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2444433"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2444433"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}