Royals vs Astros Game 27 Gamethread

Fresh off a sweep of an inferior opponent, things get hard again.

The 12-14 Royals open a three-game weekend series against the 13-11 Houston Astros tonight. You can see the series preview here. Game starts at 6:40pm Kauffman time.

Seth Lugo takes the mound for the Royals. While his 3.90 ERA is respectable, his underlying peripherals this season have taken a nosedive. Fewer strikeouts, more walks, more dingers. He gave up four home runs against the Yankees back on the 14th, which is obviously having an outsized effect on a small sample size and is his worst game to date. If his “worst” game so far is going 6 ²⁄₃ innings with 4 runs allowed, I’ll take it.

27-year-old Hayden Wesneski takes the mound for the Astros. He has had a similar season to Lugo, with a good chunk of his home runs allowed coming in one game against the Angels, of all teams. However, he had 10 strikeouts and 0 walks in that game. His underlying peripherals are better than Lugo’s.

Should the Royals sweep the Astros (good luck...), they’ll be over .500. I’d settle for 2 of 3 to get them to 14-15 before opening a series against the Rays next week.

Lineups:

You can watch the game on FanDuel Sports Network Kansas City and listen on the Royals Radio Network.