{"id":680129,"date":"2026-04-21T02:55:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-21T02:55:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/680129\/"},"modified":"2026-04-21T02:55:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-21T02:55:08","slug":"orioles-live-game-chat-april-20-vs-royals-740-eastern","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/680129\/","title":{"rendered":"Orioles live game chat: April 20 vs. Royals, 7:40 Eastern"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Orioles kick off a three-game series against a Royals team that brings the AL\u2019s worst record into the series. An early test for the O\u2019s as they try to avoid last year\u2019s fate is whether they can rally when facing a scuffling squad while dealing with their own problems. They were able to do this just a couple of weeks ago when they played well against the White Sox and Giants in succession. The same opportunity arrives this week with the Royals followed by the Red Sox.<\/p>\n

For more on this series, check out Paul Folkemer\u2019s preview on Camden Chat from earlier today.<\/a> There\u2019s a lot going on with Kansas City. They\u2019ve got some recent public drama between their manager and longtime stalwart Salvador Perez, who is putting up \u201cyoung Orioles hitter\u201d kinds of numbers at the plate early this season. They moved their fences in this season to try to spark some offense and, as of the last time I looked, had gotten exactly one extra home run from the new dimensions. A lot of their relievers have been bad, as have two of their starters; unfortunately for the Orioles, the bad starters aren\u2019t lined up for this set.<\/p>\n

Over at our sister site Royals Review<\/a>, they\u2019re calling this a must-win series, and no wonder. Kansas City is already 7-15. If they lose at least two games here to the Orioles, they\u2019re 8-17 at best. We know from the 2025 Orioles example that it\u2019s tough to come back from that even if you start playing better. The toughest thing is that, if you\u2019re bad enough to start 8-17, you\u2019re probably bad enough to just keep on being bad. We are well aware of the Orioles challenges. Perhaps this is a classic \u201cstoppable force vs. movable object\u201d situation.<\/p>\n

Kyle Bradish is on the mound for the Orioles. He will have three real outfielders in the outfield for this game, which is not something he had in his last start. Maybe that means it will go better for him. If you take away the egregiously-scored triple that should have been an error in that last game, his ERA drops to 4.58. That\u2019s still not great but we\u2019d feel better about it than something 5+.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not a very good-looking Orioles lineup, but then, it won\u2019t be for as long as so many of its parts are struggling. I feel the temptation to want Jackson and Taveras higher up in the order as long as they\u2019re hitting and other guys aren\u2019t. It probably doesn\u2019t matter all that much. Wherever they are, more players need to hit.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not going to be an easy one for the Orioles batters tonight, as they\u2019re going up against Seth Lugo. The Royals righty is bringing a 1.48 ERA into the game. I am expecting more of the continuing misery from the Guardians series, when the O\u2019s were also facing tough pitcher after tough pitcher.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Orioles kick off a three-game series against a Royals team that brings the AL\u2019s worst record into…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":680130,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2374],"tags":[143,47,76458,2538,5,4,125],"class_list":{"0":"post-680129","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-baltimore-orioles","8":"tag-baltimore","9":"tag-baltimore-orioles","10":"tag-baltimore-orioles-game-information","11":"tag-baltimoreorioles","12":"tag-baseball","13":"tag-mlb","14":"tag-orioles"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116440447316201627","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/680129","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=680129"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/680129\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/680130"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=680129"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=680129"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=680129"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}