Trio of homers lift Royals to 6-3 win over Red Sox

Opposing hitters have struggled with that pitch all season as they are only hitting.228 against it with an anemic.075 isolated power.

The hottest pitching staff in baseball slowed down the best offense in baseball Friday.The Kansas City Royals, who boast the best ERA in the majors in August, held the Boston Red Sox at bay, and the Kansas City bullpen extended its franchise-record scoreless-innings streak to 42 innings before a ninth-inning hiccup in a 6-3 win at Fenway Park.Starter Ian Kennedy (9-9) earned the win for the Royals (67-61), who have won 11 of their past 12 games and 16 of their past 19. It was a unusual line, to say the least, but Red Sox manager John Farrell isn’t too anxious yet. “And I’m confident that this will turn”. “There’s been times where maybe we’ve expanded the strike zone”.

Betts is making a strong case to be in the MVP discussion and Friday night is another example. Give credit where it’s due. “Kennedy challenged us. And we came up empty”.

Betts owns a.320/.360/.557 slash line to go with 28 home runs, 93 RBI’s, 99 runs scored and 21 steals. He finished with nine strikeouts.

Steven Wright’s return to the Red Sox rotation started about as ugly as possible.

“Everyone goes through this type of stuff personally”, Bogaerts said.

While those two might get all the attention from the voters, the race for team MVP will be much less exclusive. That’s all you can ask for.

“We continually do a great job of creating opportunities”, he said.

Here are some more notes from Friday’s loss.

Chris Young would work two innings out of the bullpen, flirting with a potential run before picking off Mookie Betts at first.

Wright has been on the disabled list since August 7 with shoulder inflammation suffered, not while pitching, but while diving into second base when he was serving as a pinch-runner. “So definitely the positive taken out of it for me was I felt good”. I definitely was antsy. “But I felt good”. He still leads the league in doubles with 41. The second baseman is hitting.315 with 30 doubles, one triple, and 12 home runs.

The Royals starter had surrendered only three runs over his previous five starts, and thanks to the Red Sox’ inability to hit with runners in scoring position, Kennedy’s roll continued. Hernandez (9-4) improved to 5-0 in eight starts since returning from the disabled list, throwing 7 1/3 innings of one-run ball.

– For what it’s worth, the Royals have been on fire this month. He earned his 10th straight win in Kansas City’s 2-1 win over Minnesota on Sunday, holding the Twins to one run and eight hits. Betts followed with a RBI single to end the Kansas City bullpen’s scoreless streak and cut the lead to 6-3.Hanley Ramirez followed with a single to set up runners on the corners before he took second on defensive indifference.