Kendrys Morales sets Royals record with 15 total bases in 10-3 victory over Tigers

DETROIT The big man watched the baseball land in the cavernous maw of right-center field at Comerica Park and he decided to rumble.

“He was determined because when he hit second, I went ‘Where are you going?’ ” manager Ned Yost said afterward.

The speed of Kendrys Morales departed after he fractured his leg five years ago, so he hits triples about once every presidential election cycle. In the sixth inning of a 10-3 thrashing of the Detroit Tigers on Sunday, Morales provided the Royals with a rarity to complement one of the most destructive offensive performances in franchise history in a game Morales called the best of his career.

Morales barreled into third base for his second triple of the season and his third since 2009. He scored soon after on a wild pitch. Two innings later, he delivered in a more conventional fashion, bashing his third home run of the day, which allowed him to set a team record with 15 total bases in one game.

“He’s had good games in his career,” said catching coach Pedro Grifol, who translated for Morales. “But this is No. 1.”

As Morales detonated balls to all fields, the Royals (87-62) breezed one step closer toward the American League Central title. The victory reduced their magic number to three games. With the Toronto Blue Jays losing to the Boston Red Sox earlier in the day, Kansas City expanded its lead for best record in the American League and home-field advantage in the postseason to two games.

“If somebody would have told me on Sept. 20 that you’d have an 11-game lead and two games up for home-field advantage, the best record, ‘Would you take it?’ ” Yost said. “I would jump up and down and say, ‘Heck yeah. Give it to me right now.’ ”

Morales became the first Royal to hit three homers in a game since Danny Tartabull on July 6, 1991. It was the first three-homer game of his career. Morales broke George Brett’s record of 14 total bases set in 1979. The only other player to net 15 bases in one game in 2015 is Yoenis Cespedes, who pummeled the Rockies at Coors Field for the Mets on Aug. 23.

All three of Morales’ homers came with the bases empty. He victimized Tigers starter Alfredo Simon in the third and the fourth. He blitzed reliever Jeff Ferrell in the eighth. Since 1900, only seven players have hit three homers and one triple in a game. The last was Milwaukee slugger Ryan Braun in 2012.

The one-man barrage reduced the sting of an unsuccessful road trip. The Royals dropped six of 10 games. They still have not won a series since the first week of September, but they continue to inch closer to a clinching a playoff berth.

Kris Medlen sweated through five innings. The Tigers mounted a three-run flurry in the third inning. Medlen kept them scoreless otherwise. All three runs were unearned, but Medlen still dealt with extended at-bats. He exited after 97 pitches. Danny Duffy handled the final four innings of the game and collected the first save of his career.

During the first two innings, the Royals scored twice but committed a pair of base-running gaffes. In the first, Ben Zobrist led off with a double and took third on a single by Lorenzo Cain. After Eric Hosmer stepped into the box, Tigers starter Alfredo Simon caught Cain napping and started a rundown that ended in an out. Hosmer soon plated Zobrist with a sacrifice fly.

Morales followed with a two-out walk. He barreled into third on a single by Mike Moustakas. Another single by Alex Rios, who extended his hitting streak to 10 games, brought Morales home.

An inning later, Hosmer singled with runners at first and second. Third-base coach Mike Jirschele stopped Christian Colon at third. The signal did not cross the radar of Zobrist, the trail runner. He drifted too far toward third base. With Zobrist caught in a rundown, Colon tried to sneak home. He was thrown out.

At last, in the third, the Royals devised a strategy that could offset the base-running blunders: Hit the baseball over the fence. Morales wrapped a solo shot around the right-field pole to start the inning.

“You can’t screw up too much on the bases when you’re hitting homers,” Yost said.

The homer was Morales’ 20th of the season. He joined Salvador Perez and Mike Moustakas, both of whom crossed the 20-homer threshold earlier on this trip. Kansas City has not employed a trio of 20-homer hitters in one season since 2002, when Carlos Beltran, Raul Ibanez and Mike Sweeney all made the grade.

The Royals were not done in the third. Rios roped another single two batters later. He set the table for Paulo Orlando. Across 10 years and 1,058 games in the minors, Orlando had hit only 66 home runs. He had not hit more than six in a season since 2010, when he played for Class AA Northwest Arkansas. Now, in his first big-league campaign, Orlando unloaded on a thigh-high curveball for his seventh homer of the year.

Even after the homers, the Royals managed to make another mistake with their legs. Simon picked off Colon for the inning’s second out.

“It was a bad day today,” Yost said. “One of those days. We just had a bad day with base-running.”

The troubles continued for Colon in the bottom of the frame. He fumbled a groundball that led to a trio of unearned runs.

The error occurred after Medlen walked leadoff hitter Anthony Gose. Soon after, Miguel Cabrera drove Gose home with a single. Victor Martinez and Nick Castellanos added RBI singles of their own to complete the rally.

“I don’t care what place they’re in, that’s a tough lineup,” Medlen said. “It was evident for me today. If I didn’t make a pitch, they were putting good swings on it.”

The lead fell to two. It would never be that close again. In the fourth, Morales attacked a 95-mph fastball and powered it to left for an opposite-field solo shot. He achieved his 14th multi-homer game in his career.

Colon atoned with his bat in the fifth. After Orlando doubled, Colon booted Simon from the game with an RBI double of his own. Colon was en route to the first four-hit game of his career. He scored two batters later on a single by Zobrist.

“I just want to contribute,” Colon said. “Any time I get in there to give Esky or anybody a day off, I just wanted to bring something, whether it’s defense or good at-bats or positive energy.”

From that point, the stage belonged to Morales. He already leads the club in RBIs, and he extended his total to 105 on Sunday. He helped Kansas City conclude this 10-game trip with a sense of optimism.

“He feels really happy with the way it ended up,” Grifol said of Morales, “but we’ve got a lot of work to do, and we’ve got to continue to get after it.”

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