8:07 PM ET, October 22,2014
Kauffman Stadium, Kansas City, Missouri
Kauffman Stadium, Kansas City, Missouri
Associated Press
Royals Roar Past Giants To Even World Series
The one thing that was clear? The World Series suddenly had some life.
Perez broke open Game 2 with a two-run double in a five-run sixth, and the Royals' cast of clutch relievers kept the Giants in check for a 7-2 victory that evened the Series and spiced things up as it shifts to San Francisco for three games.
More from ESPN.com
The
World Series is tied at a game apiece after Ned Yost pulled all the
right strings and Bruce Bochy didn't, Jayson Stark writes. Story
Billy
Butler, who will sit on the bench in San Francisco, had two key RBI
singles in what could be his final home game at Kauffman Stadium, Jerry
Crasnick writes. Story
After
he blew up in the sixth inning in every way you can, the question is
whether Giants rookie Hunter Strickland is ready, Jim Caple writes. StoryJeremy Guthrie will be on the mound Friday night for the Royals, who had won eight straight playoff games before a 7-1 loss in the opener. Tim Hudson will start for San Francisco.
"With their pitching and our pitching, and the way both teams play, we're going to have a fight, I think, every game," Giants manager Bruce Bochy said.
So much talk of fighting after the two teams nearly came to blows Wednesday.
The Royals had surged ahead on Butler's single when Perez followed with a double off Strickland into the left-field gap. Omar Infante then scorched a pitch into the bullpen in left, the fifth homer Strickland had allowed to 23 postseason batters.
Boiling over with anger, Strickland yelled into his glove, then got into a shouting match with Perez as the big, burly catcher headed for home. Players spilled out of both dugouts, and several Royals streamed in from the outfield bullpen before the umpires finally restored order.
"He started to look at me, so I asked him like, 'Hey, why you look at me?'" Perez said. "So he was telling me, 'Get out of here, whatever.' So I don't know. You don't have to treat me like that. Look at Omar. Omar hit a bomb. I didn't hit a bomb. I hit a double."
Strickland said he simply let his frustration get to him.
"I let the team down," he said. "My emotions got to me."
With his 100 mph fastball singeing the Giants' batters, Royals flamethrower Yordano Ventura allowed two runs while pitching into the sixth inning. The 23-year-old protege of Pedro Martinez hardly looked like the first rookie to make a World Series start for the Royals, calmly handling a lineup that had ravaged staff ace James Shields.
The dynamic trio of Kelvin Herrera, Wade Davis and Greg Holland did the rest.
Herrera got the final two outs of the sixth to escape a jam, his first three pitches clocking at least 100 mph. He also survived a shaky seventh before Davis breezed through the eighth.
Holland, who saved each game in the Royals' sweep of Baltimore in the American League Championship Series, allowed a two-out single to Brandon Crawford before fanning Gregor Blanco to end the game.
The Giants' only runs came on a homer by Blanco and a double by Brandon Belt, their streak of seven straight World Series game wins ending on a crisp, breezy night.
"For us to leave here with a split, you like to get greedy," Bochy said, "but we know it's going to be a tough series."
Peavy's Postseason Pains
In
his eight career postseason starts, Jake Peavy has never made it
through six innings. That's the longest streak by any starter in
postseason history.| Jake Peavy | 8* |
| Bob Welch | 6 |
| 8 others | 5 |
| *Extended Wednesday | |
| -- ESPN Stats & Information | |
The fleet-footed Blanco silenced a rollicking sea of blue, becoming the 10th player to open a World Series game with a home run. He deposited Ventura's 98 mph fastball in the bullpen in right field, just his 17th home run in more than 2,300 at-bats.
The crowd, energized from the moment Hall of Famer George Brett delivered the ceremonial first pitch, was left waiting for something good to happen for the second straight night.
This time, the scrappy Royals gave it to them.
ALCS MVP Lorenzo Cain stretched a two-out double later in the first, and Eric Hosmer walked on four pitches. Butler, Giants starter Jake Peavy's longtime nemesis, then bounced a single past the outstretched glove of Crawford at shortstop to knot the game at 1-all.
The Royals kept the pressure on in second. Infante doubled over the head of Travis Ishikawa in left field, and Alcides Escobar sliced a two-out double down the right-field line to give Kansas City a 2-1 lead, its first in the World Series since Game 7 in 1985.
The Giants, so accustomed to October baseball, refused to back down.
Belt tied it in the fourth with a double that bounced off Nori Aoki's glove in right field.
The game was still knotted at 2 when the Royals got their first two batters aboard in the sixth. Bochy pulled the fiery Peavy. Butler promptly hit a go-ahead single off Jean Machi, and Strickland came in two batters later.
From there, well, the Royals showed they still had plenty of fight left.
PLENTY OF PITCHERS
The Giants matched a Series record by using five pitchers in one inning. The other teams to burn through as many pitchers did so in Game 7 losses: the Cardinals against the Royals in '85, and the Orioles against the Pirates in 1979, according to STATS.
UP NEXT
Giants: Hudson has appeared in 12 postseason games and started 11 of them, first with Oakland and then Atlanta. But he has never been on the mound in the World Series.
Royals: Guthrie, an 11-year veteran, did not pitch in the Royals' sweep of the Angels in the AL Division Series. He made his first career postseason start in the ALCS against the Orioles.
Copyright by STATS LLC and The Associated Press
Game Information
| Stadium | Kauffman Stadium, Kansas City, MO |
| Attendance | 40,446 (106.7% full) - % is based on regular season capacity |
| Game Time | 3:25 |
| Weather | 67 degrees, partly cloudy |
| Wind | 8 mph |
| Umpires | Home Plate - Eric Cooper, First Base - Jim Reynolds, Second Base - Ted Barrett, Third Base - Hunter Wendelstedt |
Research Notes
Jake Peavy
has never made it through six innings in all eight of his career
postseason starts. That's the longest streak by any starter in
postseason history.
[+] |
Hunter Strickland has now faced 23 batters this postseason and allowed 5 home runs.
He's only the second reliever in postseason history to allow 5 HR in a single postseason (Chris Narveson, 2011).
|
The Giants are the 1st team in postseason history to have all 9 starters with exactly 1 hit in a game.
|
From Elias: Billy Butler's
1st-inning RBI single was the Royals' first hit with a runner in
scoring position since Game 2 of the ALCS. They were hitless in their
previous 17 at-bats, the longest such streak in a single postseason
since the Phillies went 0-for-18 in 2010.
|
Gregor Blanco hit the frst leadoff HR in a World Series since Dustin Pedroia in 2007 Game 1. It was the third leadoff homer in Giants postseason history (any series); the others were both by Angel Pagan in the 2012 season.
|
From
Elias: The last team to use five different pitchers in the same inning
of a World Series game (as the Giants did in the 6th tonight) was the
Cardinals in Game 7 of the 1985 series... in Kansas City (that, of
course, was the Royals' last WS win).
|
Jake Peavy
allowed a .197 batting average against his curveball in the regular
season, below the league average among qualified starters. The Royals
have a .593 OPS in plate appearances ending with a curveball in the
postseason, and they had a .503 OPS against the pitch in the regular
season, lowest in the AL.
|
If
the Giants take a 2-0 lead over the Royals in the World Series, this
one could be over in a hurry. As a franchise, the Giants have been
impossible to beat with a 2-0 lead in the Fall Classic, with three
sweeps and two 4-1 wins in the five times they've gone up 2-0.
[+] |
Yordano Ventura
has averaged 96.8 MPH with his fastball this season (including the
playoffs), the highest among 90 qualified pitchers.
Bad news for the Royals - the Giants have a .284 BA vs pitches at least
95 MPH this season (including the playoffs), the best in MLB.
In the postseason, the Giants have a .377 BA against pitches at least 95
MPH, by far the best of any playoff team.
[+] |
Yordano Ventura's
fastball averaged 96.8 MPH in the regular season, highest among
qualified starters. The Giants had a .271 batting average against
fastballs with a velocity of at least 95 MPH this season, highest in the
NL. However, Brandon Crawford hit .189 against fastballs of at least 95 MPH in the regular season.
|
Jake Peavy
allowed a .231 batting average on pitches on the outer half of the
plate or further away in the regular season, below league average. Billy Butler is 3-of-16 with three strikeouts against pitches on the outer half of the plate this postseason. Lorenzo Cain
is 7-of-15 with two doubles against pitches on the outer half or
further away in the postseason, with only a 16.7 percent miss rate.
|
Between
the Giants' 7-1 win last night and the Royals' 7-2 win tonight, this is
just the second World Series where the first two games were both
decided by five runs or more. The other was in 1937 when the Yankees
beat the Giants by identical scores of 8-1 in Games 1 and 2.
|
Yordano Ventura
allowed a .389 slugging percentage in at-bats to end on a fastball
along the horizontal-middle-third of the zone, the fifth-lowest rate
among qualified AL pitchers this season. The Giants slugged just .360 in
at-bats ending in that zone on a pitch of at least 95 mph during the
regular season, the fourth-lowest rate in baseball.
|
From Elias: When the World Series is tied 1-1, the winner of Game 3 goes on to win the series 70 percent of the time (38-16).
|
In the regular season, Hunter Pence slugged .548 in at-bats to end in an offspeed pitch following another offspeed pitch, the fourth-best rate in baseball.
|
If
the Giants win tonight to take a 2-0 lead on the road, it doesn't
exactly bode well for their chances. Since 1975, only 4 teams have won
Games 1 and 2 of the World Series on the road, and 3 of them went on to
lose the series.
[+] |
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