{"id":758773,"date":"2026-07-22T21:00:22","date_gmt":"2026-07-22T21:00:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/758773\/"},"modified":"2026-07-22T21:00:22","modified_gmt":"2026-07-22T21:00:22","slug":"giants-blow-another-lead-vitello-ejected-as-royals-sweep-with-5-4-win","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/758773\/","title":{"rendered":"Giants blow another lead, Vitello ejected as Royals sweep with 5-4 win"},"content":{"rendered":"

KANSAS CITY\u00a0\u2014 Willy Adames<\/a> seemed right in the middle of several head-scratching calls at Kauffman Stadium the past two days. On Wednesday, the San Francisco Giants<\/a> shortstop was the key figure in a dreadful decision that cascaded into yet another loss.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Giants were up by three going into the bottom of the seventh inning and Landen Roupp<\/a> was throwing a shutout when Vinnie Pasquantino hit a drive to right and Jung Hoo Lee<\/a> fired to second, where Adames put a tag on the runner just as he appeared to come off the bag slightly. Adames was ruled to have pushed Pasquantino off the bag\u00a0\u2014 replays showed he clearly did not do so\u00a0\u2014 leaving Adames incensed, manager Tony Vitello ejected and the Royals with their first man in scoring position all day.<\/p>\n

There are few breaks for the Giants in this bleak season. Kansas City pounced. Salvador Perez immediately followed with a two-run homer off, ending Roupp\u2019s day. Reliever Sam Hentges\u2019 throwing error on a bunt resulted in another run, and the Royals ultimately scored five in the inning and went on to a 5-4 victory and a three-game sweep.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Giants\u2019 60 losses in their first 102 games are their most in a season since 2017. With the Rockies still playing Wednesday, San Francisco was in a tie for last place at the bottom of the NL West at 42-60.<\/p>\n

The previous night,\u00a0 Adames and the Giants\u2019 bench were upset at a check-swing strike in Adames\u2019 first at-bat, then Adames wasn\u2019t awarded a potential catcher\u2019s interference call in his third at-bat.<\/p>\n

Roupp and Seth Lugo were the starters and much of the game was an outright sprint, shades of those old lighting-fast duels between Oakland\u2019s Mark Mulder and White Sox starter Mark Buehrle. During a funk last month, Roupp said he felt as if he was working too slow with a delivery out of whack. He\u2019s always at his best when he gets the balls and goes, and Wednesday, that was revved up even more.<\/p>\n

With Luis Arraez<\/a> making several tricky plays behind him, Roupp got seven ground-ball outs and he also struck out seven.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The pitching hasn\u2019t really been an issue on this trip. It has been the lack of offense, with the team failing to score more than three runs four times during their five-game losing streak. Rafael Devers<\/a> got the team\u2019s only hit in the first six innings, a leadoff double in the second, but then Lee lined into an inning-ending double play.<\/p>\n

Before the game, Vitello pointed out that four of the team\u2019s homers on the trip were solo shots\u00a0\u2014 not a problem, he\u2019ll take them\u00a0\u2014 but a lot of the hits have been scattered across several innings, seldom in succession or even the same inning.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think it\u2019s anyone\u2019s fault or any particular approach, it just hasn\u2019t clicked,\u201d Vitello said. With those names in the lineup, you\u2019d like to think some things would pile up,and they have at time, but overall it\u2019s been a little bit feast-or-famine.\u201d<\/p>\n

Briefly: The Giants have not yet received MRI information for Trevor McDonald, who left Monday\u2019s game with elbow discomfort. The team is unlikely to announce any diagnosis until Friday. \u2026 Third baseman Matt Chapman<\/a> is getting close to returning from an abdominal strain, swinging a bat pain-free. He\u2019s unlikely to need a rehab assignment. \u2026 Perez\u2019s shot off Roupp gave him a tie with Hall of Famer George Brett as the team\u2019s all-time leading home-run hitter, with 317.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"KANSAS CITY\u00a0\u2014 Willy Adames seemed right in the middle of several head-scratching calls at Kauffman Stadium the past…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":758774,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2387],"tags":[5,162,936,2123,55,2596,2595,2005,4,252,185,1870,103],"class_list":["post-758773","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-kansas-city-royals","tag-baseball","tag-giants","tag-kansas","tag-kansas-city","tag-kansas-city-royals","tag-kansascity","tag-kansascityroyals","tag-landen-roupp","tag-mlb","tag-royals","tag-sports","tag-tony-vitello","tag-willy-adames"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116965646252345267","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/758773","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=758773"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/758773\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/758774"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=758773"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=758773"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=758773"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}