KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The Kansas City Royals needed to respond.
After a successful road trip, which included six wins against the Chicago White Sox and Detroit Tigers, the Royals eyed opportunity square in the face.
KC welcomed the Boston Red Sox for three games at Kauffman Stadium. Both teams were in playoff contention and separated by 2.5 games. It was an important series as the postseason chase hits high gear.
The Royals quickly realized that their American League foes presented a difficult challenge. Boston took the first two games of the series and the in-season tiebreaker.
And looked for the sweep on Wednesday night.
With their grasp on the final AL wild-card spot slipping away, the Royals relied on their MVP candidate superstar Bobby Witt Jr. The 2024 All-Star stepped up to lead the Royals to a 8-4 victory in a signature game.
Witt finished 3 for 4 with two home runs and four RBIs. He began his night with a solo homer off Red Sox starter Kutter Crawford. In the sixth inning, he drilled a 421-foot blast deep into the KC night while being serenaded by “MVP” chants.
The Royals added seven hits to punctuate Wednesday’s victory. The club improved to 64-52 and extended its wild-card lead to 1.5 games over the Red Sox. Boston dropped to 61-52.
“It’s huge,” Witt said. “The Red Sox are a hot team and they swing the bat well. So we were trying to put up runs and Cole (Ragans) did his thing and the bullpen came in and shut the door.”
The Red Sox attacked Royals starter Cole Ragans early behind second baseman Romy Gonzalez. In the third inning, Gonzalez hit a three-run homer to give the Red Sox a 3-2 lead.
It was his fourth home run this season and second in the series. But Ragans shook off the early mistakes. He powered through 6 1/3 innings, allowing four runs (one earned), two walks and striking out seven batters.
“I thought I made some good pitches and I thought I made a couple bad ones,” Ragans said. “Obviously, they made me pay with a couple of bad ones. But the offense picked me up big time there. Defense doing what they do.”
The Royals gave him enough run support. In the fourth inning, KC scored five runs to knock Crawford out of the game. The Red Sox starter suffered his ninth loss as he allowed six runs in 3 2/3 innings.
Here are more notables from Wednesday’s game:
Royals offense explodes in fourth inning
