Royals rally against Guardians bullpen to split two-game series at Progressive Field

CLEVELAND — Things couldn't have begun much more dubiously for the Guardians on Thursday at Progressive Field after second baseman Andres Gimenez and first baseman Josh Naylor committed errors in the opening inning. The ending wasn't much better, as Cleveland dropped the finale of a shortened two-game series against Kansas City, 4-3, in front of an impressive afternoon crowd of 26,344 fans hoping to celebrate a sweep. The Royals rallied against a Guardians bullpen that had been impenetrable as of late, scoring the go-ahead run off right-hander Hunter Gaddis in the eighth to end the relief corps' scoreless streak at 26 innings. "They've done everything we've asked of them and more," manager Stephen Vogt said of his relievers. "They continue to just be incredible. When they give up runs, we're all gonna wonder what happened, because that's the bar they've set for themselves. You have to credit (the Royals). They had good at-bats off our guys. They found a way to scrap across runs and we didn't, and that was the difference in the game." "They've saved us," said Guardians starter Tanner Bibee, who left in the sixth inning with Cleveland leading 3-1. "I just saw it was like 26 innings and not giving up a run. I mean, that's kind of unbelievable. It's a long stretch of innings, so it's been unbelievable. They've been able to keep us afloat and they're going to keep doing it." Second-place Kansas City left town after the teams' first meeting of the season trailing first-place Cleveland by four games in the Central Division standings. The Guardians got a brief outing from Bibee, who entered the day having allowed two runs or fewer in half of his 12 starts on the season. Bibee allowed three runs — two earned — on six hits while striking out seven. "Overall, I think it was a pretty good outing," he said. "The walk at the end (to MJ Melendez in the sixth) is kinda unacceptable, but other than that, I feel like I threw five-plus (innings) of some pretty good baseball. They got some weak hits here and there, but that's just kind of baseball. It's a really good team over there and they put some good swings on some good pitches." "I thought Tanner came out and he was attacking really well," Vogt said. "I thought he made pitches all day, wasn't really getting hit too hard. The (fourth) inning when (Hunter) Renfroe got the two-out hit, it kinda cost him 12 pitches right there. "And then moving forward in the sixth, the walk to Melendez kinda ended the outing for him, but I thought, overall, Tanner threw the ball well. They just did a good job of battling him and getting his pitch count up." Jose Ramirez led off the third inning with his team-leading 17th homer to break a 1-all tie, giving the All-Star third baseman his eighth homer in 24 games. It was career RBI No. 805 for Ramirez, moving him past Manny Ramirez for eighth place on Cleveland's all-time list. He added another RBI with a two-out single that scored Kwan to put the Guardians in front 3-1, chasing KC starter Brady Singer in the fourth. "He's unbelievable. He never ceases to amaze me. He's just fun to watch," Vogt said of the MLB leader in RBIs. "He gets better and better as the count goes on. He gets better and better as the game goes on. He's just an incredible player." "He's the man," Bibee said of Ramirez. "He just wakes up every day and he does what he does. He's our leader. That's why he's our guy and that's why he's going to keep doing what he's doing." Gimenez couldn't handle a sinking liner from leadoff hitter Maikel Garcia and Naylor dropped a pickoff throw from Bibee in the first. Garcia wound up scoring, but the Royals returned the favor in the bottom of the inning when Gimenez reached on an error by Garcia at third and Steven Kwan scored an unearned run to tie the game. Kwan extended his streak for reaching base safely to 15 games with a leadoff single. Naylor also made a bad throw to his brother Bo in the sixth that allowed the Royals to score the tying run. With the infield in, he fielded a grounder but threw off the mark to the plate. Bo Naylor was able to make the catch before colliding with Melendez in front of the plate and tagging him out, according to umpire Chris Conroy. KC challenged that Bo Naylor blocked the plate and during the review it was ruled Melendez beat the tag with his hand and the out call was overturned. "It was a tough play," Vogt said. "Nayls made a good stop. The throw was just a little bit to Bo's right, so Bo had kind of an awkward position to make the tag. It was just an unfortunate turn that didn't go our way." There were no late-game heroics for the Guardians, who went without a hit over the final five innings and failed to move a runner past first base on three walks. Cleveland, which entered the day ranked second to KC in batting average with runners in scoring position, went 1-for-8 in the situation. "We're gonna lose sometimes," Vogt said. "We're not always going to get the big hit. You go back and look at that game, we had pressure on Singer every single inning and just didn't quite get that big hit that we've typically gotten. It's OK. We're gonna have games like this but hopefully we learn from it and get better. More often than not our guys are coming through in those situations." Contact Chris Assenheimer at (440) 329-7136 or cassenheimer@chroniclet.com. Like him on Facebook and follow him @CAwesomeheimer on X.