Kansas City Royals battles past Texas Rangers – MLB Spring Training Recap
Kansas City Royals battled past Texas Rangers 7-6 in a Cactus League game at the Surprise Stadium here in Surprise, Arizona.
The match was played on an extremely competitive note as momentum shifted one way and the other but the Royals showed great composure and character under pressure, which proved to be the difference between two teams at the end. Kansas City Royals were unable to achieve their desired goals last season and they had made key changes to their squad in the offseason. The win will be very crucial to them as it will provide them with confidence and self belief for later stages of the competition.
However, the Royals will be disappointed at Bruce Chen’s first trip to the mound. The starter produced magical performances for the club over the last two seasons but he looked completely out of sorts on Monday. Allowing too many scoring opportunities to the Rangers’ hitters, he did not perform close to his best.
"It's not the way I wanted to start spring training," Chen said. "Giving up five runs is not what I wanted to do. I feel like I can only get better from here. I have to make better pitches. Everything I was throwing was hittable pitches. My pitches were up. I don't want that to happen my next outing even if it's spring training."
Adrian Beltre and Elvis Andrus were quite decent in batting department of the game as they both went 3 for 3 for Texas. Derek Holland pitched with great control and precision for the Rangers as he allowed only one run and three hits over two innings to keep his team in the hunt.
"It said I was inconsistent with my off-speed pitches that you could sit on one pitch. They were all good," Holland said. "I kept everything down. I also showed I could throw them all for strikes, which was a big thing."
Alex Gordon hit a crucial home run in third innings to reduce Texas’ lead to 6-3. Derrick Robinson and Kevin Kouzmanoff also made useful contributions to help the Royals secure an important win. It will be interesting to see if the Royals can continue their good form during the regular season.
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