{"id":2486031,"date":"2026-07-03T04:47:01","date_gmt":"2026-07-03T04:47:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2486031"},"modified":"2026-07-03T04:47:01","modified_gmt":"2026-07-03T04:47:01","slug":"royals-fall-5-2-to-rays-as-injuries-continue-to-pile-up","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/royals-fall-5-2-to-rays-as-injuries-continue-to-pile-up\/","title":{"rendered":"Royals fall 5-2 to Rays as injuries continue to pile up"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The Kansas City Royals continue to be hamstrung untimely departures.<\/p>\n

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Royals star Salvador Perez missed Thursday\u2019s game<\/a> with soreness in his right elbow. And another early exit followed during the evening\u2019s series finale against visiting Tampa Bay.<\/p>\n

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KC starter Stephen Kolek \u2014 who was returning to action after the birth of his daughter<\/a> \u2014 lasted just two innings before coming out of what became a 5-2 loss to the Rays.<\/p>\n

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Kolek threw 51 pitches in the first and second innings but did not return to the field for a third \u2014 the Royals (35-53) said he was dealing with some general fatigue in the warm and humid weather.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI was obviously very tired, but I was like, \u2018I\u2019m still feeling OK,\u2019\u201d Kolek said. \u201cBut they want to play it safe, and 42 pitches in one inning is a lot. Definitely was feeling the fatigue and needed a minute. And I think they ultimately made the decision to play it safe and not push through something.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Royals starter Stephen Kolek pitches against the Tampa Bay Rays during KC\u2019s Armed Forces Night game at Kauffman Stadium in Kansas City on Thursday, July 2, 2026. The Rays beat the Royals 5-2. Sophia Buonpane sophiabuonpane@kcstar.com<\/span> <\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

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Kolek has dealt with a lot recently. He and his wife welcomed a daughter into the world seven weeks early and then he spent ample time with his family in the hospital. It\u2019s the reason he was initially placed on the family medical emergency list.<\/p>\n

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Kolek reported that both his daughter and wife are doing well now.<\/p>\n

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\u201cShe\u2019s doing good,\u201d Kolek said. \u201cShe\u2019s on a good progression getting back there. And we\u2019re just super thankful for all the doctors and nurses involved. The amount of respect I have for the NICU nurses, I mean, they\u2019re amazing. Hat\u2019s off to all those nurses and doctors there and I\u2019m just very thankful for them.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Kolek wasn\u2019t on a pitch count against the Rays. The Royals felt comfortable having him throw 65-75 pitches, but a prolonged second inning led to an early night for the bullpen.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWe didn\u2019t want to take a chance with him injuring himself after being gone that long,\u201d Quatraro said.<\/p>\n

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Kolek allowed three earned runs early in his start. The Rays recorded three consecutive two-out hits in the second inning. Shortstop Taylor Walls hit an RBI double,<\/a> second baseman Richie Palacios an RBI single.<\/p>\n

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\"Infielder
Royals baserunner Nick Loftin, left, tries to leg out a throw to first base during KC\u2019s Armed Forces Night game against the Tampa Bay Rays at Kauffman Stadium in Kansas City on Thursday, July 2, 2026. The Rays beat the Royals 5-2. Sophia Buonpane sophiabuonpane@kcstar.com<\/span> <\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

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Kolek almost kept the damage manageable. However, Royals right-fielder Kameron Misner misplayed a line drive<\/a> on the warning track \u2014 the baseball popped into and then out of his glove.<\/p>\n

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The gaffe allowed Rays catcher Hunter Feduccia to reach third with an RBI triple. And two innings later, Cedric Mullins belted a two-run homer.<\/p>\n

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In relief, the Royals turned to fellow right-hander Randy Dobnak, who made his debut with the team on Thursday.<\/p>\n

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The Rays sprayed 10 hits in all. Dobnak allowed six, and two runs, across four innings. John Schreiber, Daniel Lynch IV and Steven Cruz finished out the game with a scoreless inning apiece.<\/p>\n

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\u201cPretty efficient,\u201d Quatraro said of Dobnak. \u201cI thought with the off-day coming up, where we were with the bullpen rested, that was our best chance to keep them where they were instead of having him go through the lineup again on a day like today.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The Royals were frigid at the plate. Rookie catcher Carter Jensen provided a leadoff spark<\/a> with a first-inning homer off Rays starter Ian Seymour, but he proceeded to hold the Royals to just two more hits across six innings.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWe\u2019re just not getting the results that we want,\u201d Jensen said. \u201cEverybody in here, we\u2019re not OK with losing. We want to win just as much as everyone else in the league. So we\u2019ve just got to make adjustments.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Last week, Seymour held KC hitless through six innings in a game at Tampa Bay \u2014 a contest in which the Royals had one hit overall<\/a>, in the ninth inning. He struck out eight Royals Thursday.<\/p>\n

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So in his last two appearances against Kansas City, Seymour has allowed just one earned run and three hits with 15 strikeouts and one walk.<\/p>\n

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\"Infielder
Royals infielder Josh Rojas blows a bubble during KC\u2019s Armed Forces Night game against the Tampa Bay Rays at Kauffman Stadium in Kansas City on Thursday, July 2, 2026. The Rays beat the Royals 5-2. Sophia Buonpane sophiabuonpane@kcstar.com<\/span> <\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

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\u201cHe just mixed (his pitches) well,\u201d Royals outfielder Isaac Collins said of Seymour. \u201cAnd he threw any pitch in any count. I feel like he threw differently to every guy. So credit to their scouting report. But he had our number tonight and the last time we saw him.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The Rays (51-33) extended their winning streak to eight games. Seymour earned his fifth victory and now has a 4.02 ERA.<\/p>\n

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Collins belted a solo home run<\/a> in the seventh inning to cut into the Royals\u2019 four-run deficit. It was his first homer since May 5 against the Cleveland Guardians.<\/p>\n

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The Royals finished 0-for-2 with runners in scoring position (RISP) Thursday and left five men on base.<\/p>\n

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What\u2019s next:<\/b> The Royals are off Friday before beginning a three-game weekend series against the Philadelphia Phillies at Kauffman Stadium on Saturday, Independence Day.<\/p>\n

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This story was originally published July 2, 2026 at 9:19 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 \"Profile
\n <\/a>\n <\/div>\n
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Jaylon Thompson<\/a><\/p>\n

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

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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":"

The Kansas City Royals continue to be hamstrung untimely departures. Royals star Salvador Perez missed Thursday\u2019s game with soreness in his right elbow. And another early exit followed during the evening\u2019s series finale against visiting Tampa Bay. KC starter Stephen Kolek \u2014 who was returning to action after the birth of his daughter \u2014 lasted […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2486032,"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-2486031","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\/07\/Royals-fall-5-2-to-Rays-as-injuries-continue-to-pile.JPG","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2486031","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=2486031"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2486031\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2486033,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2486031\/revisions\/2486033"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2486032"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2486031"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2486031"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2486031"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}