Ned Yost’s strategy helps Kansas City Royals defeat Seattle Mariners 5-1 – MLB Update
The American League’s Kansas City Royals crushed league rivals the Seattle Mariners 5-1 on Thursday, April 14 in the rain-shortened first meeting of their four-game series at Kauffman Stadium in Kansas City.
Manager Ned Yost, knowing a heavy rainstorm must have created something for batters, employed a late game destructive approach in the third inning. Ned forced Chris Getz to sacrifice fly that worked as Alex Gordon touched a two-run led off double to right-field.
The Designated hitter Billy Butler hit a RBI single in the third and fourth inning, as Wilson Betemit lashed a huge 4-0 generating homer.
Talking about successful third inning strategy, Ned gave credit Alex Gordon saying, “That was a great at-bat by Alex. It got us on the board knowing that rain was coming somewhere in the night. We had reports it was going to start at eight, at 8:15 and 8:30,
a pretty good downpour. So we tried to get on the board early in case it came in the first four or five innings."
The rain was also on the minds of the Mariners as the manager Eric Wedge made it clear to reporters. "They said it was going to rain about 8 to 8:30 and it did," Seattle’s manager Eric Wedge said. "We were still able to get deep in the ballgame. We had our
opportunities; we just couldn't take advantage of them."
Bruce Chen, coming off a splendid win over Detroit Tigers last Saturday, made another fabulous outing of his career. The 33-year-old hurler tossed seven scoreless innings before allowing his first run in the eighth and improved to 4-0 against the Mariners.
The right-hand ball thrower consumed just six hits and one walk in his fourth career complete game, however could not gather more than one strike-out.
Doug Fister, lost again for the third time in this season, allowing five runs, eight hits and one walk over seven innings. The 27-year-old right-hand hurler also had seven runs in his last two outing and the Mariners did not cross two runs in each of these
games.
Seattle’s Ichiro Suzuki who has a .364 average, against the Royals, singled in the third and fifth to tie George Brett’s nine consecutive multi-hit games at Kauffman Stadium. Suzuki It tied at 15-straight safe-hit games.
It will be interesting to see how Kansas City carry their winning momentum forward to their next match-up. The Mariners put in a good performance, but it was not enough to contain the Royals’ offence.
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