KANSAS CITY — With two outs and no one in the bottom of the ninth, the Astros had a four-run lead over the Royals, ready to retreat to their clubhouse and celebrate what had been a Yordan Alvarez fireworks display.
But then the tone at Kauffman Stadium changed. After reliever Ryan Pressly threw two inside pitches to Michael A. Taylor, Pressly was issued a warning. And when Pressly strenuously objected, he was promptly ejected from the game.
A seemingly peaceful ending to a Sunday afternoon game suddenly turned a little wild.
The Astros ended up using two more relievers: Phil Maton and Rafael Montero. Before they knew it, Houston saw the tying run reach first base. Nicky Lopez grounded out against Montero to bring a collective sigh of relief from the Astros’ dugout as Houston stormed out of town with a 7-4 win.
Crew chief Jerry Meals explained the officiating thought process after the game.
“I’ll tell you short and sweet: He missed twice throwing to Michael A. Taylor,” Meals said. “After the second one, we got together, because that’s the way MLB wants us to handle it, and we decided to issue warnings. After the warnings were issued, Pressly argued the warnings and was expelled.”
Pressly adamantly denied that he was pitching to Taylor. In the top of the ninth, Álvarez was hit and set off a three-run rally.
“I guess we’re not allowed to pitch inside in the big leagues anymore,” Pressly said. “I would understand if I had gone up and entered it. If he had thrown a pitch at her head. But those two pitches were inside, moving their feet. I’m human. I will miss inside. But to warn me after something like that and then kick me out after asking him to warn me… I think you have to be better than that.”
Manager Dusty Baker couldn’t understand why the referees felt a warning to Pressly was warranted.
“So that?” Baker said. “No. We’re trying to get out of here. We’ve got one more out. You sure don’t want to start a rally at that point. It just doesn’t make any sense.
The Astros had enough to hang on and close out a 6-3 road trip. They reached the ceremonial one-third mark of their season at 35-19, putting them on pace to win 105 games.
In the finale of the three-city tour, Álvarez scalded the ball four times with a deep fly ball to center field, a line drive triple, a line drive single and a 456-foot home run to deep right field that gave Houston a lead. 4. -2 advantage in the eighth.
“He hit that [homer] a ton,” Baker said. “But I was more impressed by the other [line drives] that hit.”
Alvarez capped off a road trip in which he simply beat opposing pitching in Seattle, Oakland and Kansas City. The 24-year-old slugger hit four home runs with nine RBI in nine games during the streak.
“I felt good,” Alvarez said through an interpreter. “I felt like I was going to do some damage today.”
The fallout from Pressly’s ejection, which required impromptu appearances from Maton and Montero, means the Astros may not be fully loaded in the bullpen when they open a homestand against Seattle on Monday night.
But apart from what happened just before the start on Sunday the 27th, it was a road trip with many positives.
“I’m glad,” Baker said, “to get out of here 6-3.”
Reference-www.mlb.com