{"id":2463158,"date":"2026-06-17T02:20:42","date_gmt":"2026-06-17T02:20:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2463158"},"modified":"2026-06-17T02:20:42","modified_gmt":"2026-06-17T02:20:42","slug":"kc-royals-bullpen-woes-continue-in-6-4-loss-to-nationals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/kc-royals-bullpen-woes-continue-in-6-4-loss-to-nationals\/","title":{"rendered":"KC Royals bullpen woes continue in 6-4 loss to Nationals"},"content":{"rendered":"

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<\/p>\nWASHINGTON<\/span><\/p>\n

Left-handed Kansas City Royals pitcher Daniel Lynch IV has been a breakout star this season.<\/p>\n

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Entering Tuesday\u2019s game against the Washington Nationals, he had an impressive 1.80 ERA in 30 relief appearances. He had limited opponents to a .167 batting average and just one hit in his last five outings.<\/p>\n

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In the seventh inning of Tuesday night\u2019s road game against the Washington Nationals, Lynch got the call out of the bullpen. With the game tied 3-3, he was tasked with throwing a scoreless inning.<\/p>\n

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He didn\u2019t get the job done this time. Washington rallied for three runs en route to a 6-4 win at Nationals Park.<\/p>\n

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Lynch didn\u2019t have his best command. He walked two batters before Nationals infielder Curtis Mead belted a three-run homer. Mead hit an 88 mph slider for his 11th home run of the year.<\/p>\n

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KC (29-45) dropped its 15th series this season. The Royals have lost six of their last seven games. The Nationals improved to 39-35.<\/p>\n

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The Royals will look to salvage a win in this series in Wednesday\u2019s afternoon matinee.<\/p>\n

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Royals face familiar foe<\/h2>\n

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Twelve years ago, the Royals selected left-handed pitcher Foster Griffin in the first round of the 2014 MLB Draft.<\/p>\n

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Griffin played two seasons with the Royals before heading to Japan. He honed his craft with the Yomiuri Giants in the Japan Central League and returned stateside this season with the Nationals.<\/p>\n

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Now 30 years old, Griffin faced his former team on Tuesday night. And he pitched a quality start, limiting the Royals to one run across six innings. He allowed six hits and two walks and struck out six.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The Nationals jumped to a two-run lead in the third inning. Catcher Drew Millas got aboard with a leadoff single and second baseman Nasim Nu\u00f1ez drove him home with an RBI triple.<\/p>\n

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Washington later doubled its lead when All-Star outfielder James Wood hit a sacrifice fly for his 47th RBI of the season.<\/p>\n

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Nu\u00f1ez was an offensive threat all night. In the fifth inning, belted a second triple off the outfield wall in right. Wood drove him home again, this time with a single off Royals starter Michael Wacha.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Wacha allowed three earned runs in six innings. He walked one batter and struck out three men in posting his first quality start since May 31. This season, 67% of his outings have been quality starts.<\/p>\n

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The Royals battled back in the seventh inning. Isaac Collins, who entered the game in place of third baseman Maikel Garcia, hit a two-run single<\/a> off Nationals left-handed reliever \u2014 and former Royal \u2014 Richard Lovelady.<\/p>\n

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Collins drove home Lane Thomas and Bobby Witt Jr. that inning. Both had reached o start the seventh-inning rally. KC also got a key at-bat from Jac Caglianone, who moved the runners into scoring position.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Wacha settled for a no-decision. The Royals\u2019 bullpen handled the late innings; Lynch IV was charged with three runs and the loss.<\/p>\n

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Maikel Garcia exits game<\/h2>\n

<\/p>\n

The Royals were hit with another injury when Garcia was removed with a sore left hand in the sixth inning.<\/p>\n

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Earlier, Garcia had appeared to take some uncomfortable swings. He has dealt with the left-hand pain for some time and continued to play through it.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Garcia finished 0-for-1 Tuesday. He drew a walk in the first inning and grounded into a double play in the fourth.<\/p>\n

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He has played in 67 games this year. He is batting .266 with three homers and 30 RBIs with a .704 OPS (on-base plus slugging).<\/p>\n

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What\u2019s next:<\/b> Royals right-hander Luinder Avila (1-3, 6.19 ERA) will start Wednesday\u2019s series finale against the Nationals. He will oppose right-hander Zack Littell (6-5, 5.32 ERA), with first pitch set for 12:05 p.m. Central Time.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

This story was originally published June 16, 2026 at 8:44 PM.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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Related Stories from Kansas City Star<\/h5>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\n <\/a>\n <\/div>\n
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Jaylon Thompson<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The Kansas City Star<\/span><\/p>\n

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<\/p><\/div>\n

Jaylon Thompson covers the Royals for The Kansas City Star. He previously covered the 2021 World Series and the 2016 Summer Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Jaylon is a proud alumnus of the University of Georgia.<\/span>\n <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/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.kansascity.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON Left-handed Kansas City Royals pitcher Daniel Lynch IV has been a breakout star this season. Entering Tuesday\u2019s game against the Washington Nationals, he had an impressive 1.80 ERA in 30 relief appearances. He had limited opponents to a .167 batting average and just one hit in his last five outings. In the seventh inning […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2448358,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":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-2463158","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\/Beck-Way-records-two-strikeouts-in-Royals-debut.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2463158","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=2463158"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2463158\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2463160,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2463158\/revisions\/2463160"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2448358"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2463158"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2463158"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2463158"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}