Royals 4, White Sox 3: Tempting disaster until it arrived

You simply don't go 19 months without winning in Kansas City on accident.

For the first seven innings Tuesday night, the Royals' turbo-aggressive approach against Sean Burke didn't put the White Sox into the sort of deficit they've grown used to facing at Kauffman Stadium. No matter, as after a slapped Josh Rojas RBI single put the White Sox up 3-1 in the eighth, larger forces simply sucked both teams into their natural landing place like a tractor beam.

Instead of resigned to a rare 0-for-4 night, Bobby Witt Jr.'s based loaded fly ball to center capped a two-run Royals ninth against Cam Booser, who faced six hitters and got one out despite inducing a few more. With Drew Waters tagging at third, Witt's fly would have plated the winning run whether defensive replacement Luis Robert Jr. had snagged it, or chose to dispassionately let it drop to the grass as he did instead.

Witt's single was preceded by what was initially scored as two fielding errors, and neither of which were going to be assigned to Chase Meidorth never finding a high popup to second until it clanged off his head, before Michael A. Taylor airmailed the throw for a still-feasible forceout of lead runner Mark Canha at second. Jacob Amaya was going to be charged for the other despite an impressive full-body dive that kept the game from ending an at-bat earlier, because his desperate barehand flip to start a potential game-ending double play turn was well out of Meidroth's diving reach, if anyone could still suspend disbelief long enough that the Sox were about to pull that off regardless. In between these two plays, Freddy Fermin dropped a bunt down the third base line and reached first without a throw, which, sure, naturally that happened.

By that point the White Sox had been trying to light a cigarette mid-gasoline fight for the last three defensive innings. Protecting a threadbare 2-1 lead, Sean Burke opened the seventh at just 65 pitches, but issued two one-out walks to put it immediately under imminent threat. When Steven Wilson affirmed his status as the hottest Sox reliever going with two quick outs to end the threat, Will Venable went back to the well and returned him to face the top of the Royals order in the eighth.

It worked until it didn't, as it was Meidroth ironically making a fine over-the-shoulder catch on a Witt blooper for the second out of the eighth with no one on. Like someone checking out the noise in the basement in a slasher flick, Wilson tempted fate by walking Vinnie Pasquantino to bring up Salvador Perez as the tying run. And while there was nothing to regret on the location of his 1-1 sweeper, there was plenty of such material as the carry on Perez's drive to left surprised Brooks Baldwin and one-hopped the wall beyond his late one-legged lunge for an RBI double. Amaya sent the game to the ninth with a leaping catch on a Maikel García liner to give the Sox a chance to protect a 3-2 lead against the bottom of the Royals order, and maybe some traumatic memories wouldn't have been formed on this night if he hadn't.

If the Sox had made the 3-1 eighth inning lead they cobbled together stand up, perhaps their bats would have earned some more credit for troubling Royals starter Seth Lugo more than one earned run over 6 2/3 innings might indicate. Instead, this lineup put the leadoff man aboard in five consecutive innings at one point, and still largely demonstrated how difficult it is to manufacture runs entirely out of walks and singles. Their run-scoring breakthroughs were two opposite-field grounders bounced through the six hole (Baldwin, Rojas) and a chopped medium-speed grounder off the bat of Andrew Vaughn that wiggled through the wickets of a drawn-in third baseman for a run-scoring error.

Taylor led off the fifth by working a five-pitch walk to turn the lineup over, and the promise of good speed aboard was wiped away by Meidroth and Miguel Vargas both popping out in three pitches, before Taylor was picked off within moments of Matt Thaiss stepping in the box. Was it ultimately relevant to the game result? No. Was it more memorable than how similar innings fell apart? Unquestionably.

For the duration of the 19 outs he recorded, Burke made that meager offensive output look like a potentially winning one, which means he did his job pretty well. The Royals had determined they were going to be aggressive on Burke's fastball in the zone, but didn't convert it into very good contact, which led to the right-hander starting the sixth inning at 48 pitches. Kyle Isbel finally converted on the approach to open up that frame, whipping a solo shot just over the right field wall to shave the Royals deficit to 2-1. But despite losing his control for two one-out walks to end his night in the seventh, that still left him in line for the win...on some other planet, maybe.

Bullet points:

*White Sox hitters haven't homered in their last four games, which is not their longest homerless streak of the season (it's seven).

*Thaiss, Vaughn, Baldwin and Rojas all had multi-hit games. They were all singles. For Rojas they were his first two hits of the season, he reached base three times on the night and stole his first base.

*A postgame scoring change exonerated Amaya's noble efforts in defeat, and decided Meidorth was more deserving of an error than Taylor. Or maybe they just didn't want to hear "and he wasn't charged with an error!" as the video is looped on every MLB Network highlight show for the next 16 hours.

*Fermin's bunt single was his second of the night, the first coming in the bottom of the third. Baldwin recorded a bunt single of his own the following innings, and getting into a bunt duel with the Royals proved to be "land war in Asia" levels of treacherous.

*Baldwin raced to corral a Pasquantino liner down the left field line in time to gun the Royals first baseman out at second. It was a cool play that happened a long time ago.

*There was such a concentrated burst of chaos at the end, sound off in the comments if we missed something.

Record: 10-26 | Box score | Statcast