Six Pack of Stats: Royals 4, White Sox 3

Jorge Soler and the Kansas City Royals take the first of a four-game series from Eloy Jiménez and the Chicago White Sox.

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The Starters

Dallas Keuchel had a mediocre night, and the home run ball was to his demise. Through six innings, he gave up three solo shots, four total runs, six hits, and one walk. He struck out three, but he did record eight ground outs to his three fly outs. An on-par night, minus the homers.

His 96 pitches can be summarized below:

Baseball Savant

Mike Minor notched a quality start, going six innings and giving up two runs. He gave up three hits and two walks, but his uncharacteristic seven strikeouts well offset his baserunners.

Minor’s 92 pitches break down like this:

Baseball Savant

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Pressure Play

Trailing 3-0, Andrew Vaughn tallied a two-RBI single in the sixth to trim the K.C. lead to one run. With Vaughn now on first and José Abreu at the dish, Minor was able to induce a 2.32 LI fly out for Abreu, followed by two strikeouts to escape the one and only time he was in trouble.

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Pressure Cooker

It just wasn’t Brian Goodwin’s night. Pinch-hitting for Billy Hamilton in the ninth and down by a run with Adam Engel on base, Goodwin lined out to second. However, Adam was running on the play, so it turned into a game-ending double play. Goodwin faced some insurmountable pressure at 3.93 pLI.

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Top Play

Andrew Benintendi’s solo shot in the sixth, making it a 4-2 game, created a .118 WPA.

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Top Performer

Jorge Soler’s two-homer night added up to .179 WPA, which just tops Minor’s .169.

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Smackdown

Hardest hit: Jorge Soler’s first home run of the night was demolished, at a 110.7 mph exit velocity; his second homer was only a mere 107.6 mph.

Weakest contact: Billy Hamilton recorded a 58.8 mph line out in the third, and Tim Anderson decided to top it with a 57.3 mph ground out in that same third inning, for tonight’s weakest contact play.

Luckiest hit: Andrew Vaughn’s .170 xBA single against Minor in the sixth blooped to right field and scored two runs to make it a 3-2 ballgame for the Royals.

Toughest out: Salvador Perez should have had a hit on his fourth inning fly out, but he was on the opposite side of the .690 xBA and up against an outfield with Billy Hamilton and Adam Engel patrolling two-thirds of it — Hamilton snagged this out.

Longest hit: In addition to his first home run being harder hit than the second, Soler’s first homer traveled farther than his second: 449 vs. 413 feet.

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Magic Number: 1

In his first game of 2021, Eloy Jiménez did go oh-fer, but it was nice to have No. 74 back!

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Glossary

Hard-hit is any ball off the bat at 95 mph or more
LI measures pressure per play
pLI measures total pressure faced in game
Whiff a swing-and-miss
WPA win probability added measures contributions to the win
xBA expected batting average

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South Side Sox Roll Call

With 182 comments for a Monday night game in Kansas City, we at SSS deserved better. But instead, we got K.C. dominating the game. Meanwhile, AnoHito dominated the comments.

RSWS pulls the only green tonight, earning four recs here: