Royals beat Mariners 4-3 on Lorenzo Cain’s 10th-inning single, cut magic number to 2

KANSAS CITY, Mo. Paulo Orlando streaked across the plate like an overgrown college kid on a Slip ‘N Slide, the momentum generated by his sprinter’s legs twisting his body 90 degrees after he scored the winning run in the Kansas City Royals’ 4-3 victory in 10 innings over the Seattle Mariners. Orlando scooped himself off the dirt and bolted toward a mob in right field.

In the center of the throng was Lorenzo Cain, who roped the walk-off hit off Seattle reliever Tony Zych. After hours marked by futility with runners in scoring position, the Royals moved to the edge of their first division title since 1985 after Cain’s single. As his teammates hammered him, Cain fell to the grass with Jarrod Dyson on top of him.

The victory trimmed Kansas City’s magic number to clinch the division to two games, and the Royals maintained a 11/2 -game lead over the Toronto Blue Jays for the league’s best record and home-field advantage throughout the postseason. The Royals would need a loss by the Minnesota Twins, but the team could clinch the division title on Thursday night at Kauffman Stadium.

“That would be nice,” Cain said afterward. “We’ll see. We don’t want to get ahead of ourselves, but Champagne tomorrow would be nice.”

Kansas City (88-63) gave itself that chance when it extended the game into extra innings with a ninth-inning rally against Seattle closer Tom Wilhemsen. Cain and Eric Hosmer each cracked one-out singles. A walk by Kendrys Morales loaded the bases. Inserted into the game as a pinch-runner in the previous inning, Dyson tied the game with a sacrifice fly to right.

“When we battled back in the ninth there and scored off of their closer, you could feel everything starting to come together a little bit,” manager Ned Yost said. “Guys are all in, doing whatever it takes to win a baseball game.”

The night appeared set for heartbreak heading into the final inning. The Royals left 16 men on base in all, 11 in the first eight innings. The team left the bases loaded in the fourth, stranded two in the sixth and two more in the eighth. In the middle of that, Kansas City saw a rally fizzle after, they believed, the umpires allowed Seattle reliever Joe Beimel to balk on a pickoff.

The team’s first hit with runners in scoring position occurred in the seventh. Eric Hosmer plated Cain with a single. Then he watched Beimel lurch forward toward the plate only to stop himself and throw to first. As a lefty, he caught Hosmer leaning. The Royals thought Beimel balked.

Hosmer lingered in the dirt near the bag. He waited for a reprieve from his dugout, video evidence perhaps of a blown call at the bag. None came. Hosmer loped to the dugout and shook his head.

“First of all, it looked like he crossed his knee,” Hosmer said. “Then it looked like he’s going home.”

But in the 10th, Gordon snapped an 0-for-22 streak with a single. It was his first hit since last Monday. Reliever David Rollins hit Ben Zobrist with a pinch. Yost sent Orlando to run for Gordon. The maneuver paid off.

Yost had already used Terrance Gore as a pinch runner in the ninth. Orlando was not a bad alternative. Though he initially broke back to second base on Cain’s hit, he still possessed enough speed to beat the throw from right fielder Seth Smith.

“His speed overcame it,” Yost said. “It was a bang-bang play at the plate, but it was because of Paulo’s speed that he scored that run.”

Yordano Ventura turned in six innings of three-run baseball. The Mariners plated all of their runs in the fifth.

In his previous three outings, Ventura was unable to complete the sixth inning. The Twins dinged him for four runs on Sept. 7. The Baltimore Orioles scored four against him on Sept. 12. The Cleveland Indians notched three across five laborious innings last week.

Ventura did not labor at the start on Wednesday. He breezed through the Mariners lineup through four innings. After a leadoff single by rookie shortstop Ketel Marte, Ventura retired the next eight batters.

Marte roped a two-out single in the third inning. Ventura responded with six outs in a row.

“All in all, he felt like he had a good outing,” said catching coach Pedro Grifol, who translated for Ventura. “He was able to locate his fastball in and out, and he felt strong.”

In the bottom of the fourth, the Royals scored the game’s first run. Kendrys Morales led off with a single against lefty Roenis Elias. Two batters later, Salvador Perez ambushed a first-pitch fastball and powered it off the center-field wall. Morales held at third base. He scored on a sacrifice fly by Alex Rios.

After the run, Elias lost his command. He issued a two-out walk to Alcides Escobar. Alex Gordon walked to load the bases. Up came Zobrist, who had doubled in his first at-bat and walked his next time up. On this occasion, he swung at the first pitch, a fastball down and away, and grounded out.

For Ventura, trouble arose in the fifth. Mark Trumbo became the first Mariner besides Marte to record a hit. Brad Miller chopped a grounder toward the mound. Ventura bobbled the ball in the grass, then made a throw that veered toward the dugout. Hosmer gloved the ball but could not corral it.

Miller received credit for a single. With two outs, Marte returned to the plate for his third at-bat. Ventura threw a 97-mph fastball at the shins. Marte treated his bat like a sand wedge. He dug the fastball out and ripped it in between Rios and Cain for a two-run triple.

“He hadn’t met him yet, but he knows him now,” Grifol said. “The next time he faces him, he’ll bear down a little bit.”

Ventura wobbled for a few more batters. He walked third baseman Kyle Seager and gave up an RBI single to designated hitter Nelson Cruz. But Ventura recovered to log six innings and provide a quality start.

Four innings later, the Royals picked up their sixth walk-off victory of the season. With eight wins and 13 losses, the team still owns a losing record in September, but perhaps Wednesday night opened the door for a revival.

“We played solid baseball all year long,” Cain said. “We’ve definitively had a rough September to this point, but getting a win tonight was huge. We’re definitely heading in the right direction.”

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