Scott Barlow delivers with no margin for error to lift Kansas City Royals to victory
Whit Merrifield was as straightforward as possible in his praise of Kansas City Royals relief pitcher Scott Barlow after Thursday night’s 3-2 series-opening win over the Minnesota Twins. Barlow partially put the club on his shoulders for the final inning and a half, including getting out of bases-loaded jam — not of his own doing — with no outs in a one-run game.
“He’s just a stud,” Merrifield said. “He’s a stud.”
Barlow’s work wasn’t even done after that semi-Herculean effort. He pitched a scoreless ninth inning in a pressure-packed situation to get the Royals their first win since the second game of their doubleheader on May 17. The bullpen had lost multiple leads during their six-game losing streak, which only added to the tension of the moment.
“Coming in there with bases loaded and no outs and doing what he did, that’s what fires you up. That’s what kind of changed,” rookie shortstop Bobby Witt Jr. said. “We had a little bit of the momentum. Then once that happened, that just flipped the switch for us. I think that’s something that maybe changed the whole entire season or something, just get us going.”
The right-hander tossed 41 pitches in two innings to get his club over the finish line.
“Any win can create that momentum,” Barlow said. “This one was a team effort, for sure, holding strong there at the end. But, yeah, I think you can find, definitely, in a game like this.”
Barlow entered the game in relief of Joel Payamps, who gave up an infield single followed by back-to-back base hits to load the bases in the bottom of the eighth right after the Royals scored their only three runs in the top half.
“Throwing strikes always helps, but quality strikes,” Barlow said of his approach. “In that situation, you try to make a guy chase. You know, if they’re chasing, that means they’re pretty aggressive. It’s pretty much situation to situation, but pretty much throwing strikes and kind of reading the hitter.”
Barlow, who scuffled in his last outing against this same Twins club on Sunday (one run, two hits and two walks in 2/3 of an inning), struck out the first two batters swinging on his slider and curveball.
He bounced at least four breaking balls with the tying run on third base but rookie catcher MJ Melendez blocked them.
“MJ did an amazing job blocking those,” Barlow said. “The first one, I was so worried about making sure it was down that it kind of was too down and bounced, I think, in front of the plate. He did an excellent job, and I had to gauge ‘OK, that was way too low.’”
Then Barlow induced the final batter, Max Kepler, to hit a soft ground ball to first base for the final out.
“To be able to get through that, Scotty’s got to make great pitches, but he’s also got to have a lot of faith in MJ,” Royals manager Mike Matheny said. “And MJ did a phenomenal job keeping the ball in front and giving Scott confidence because he has to be able to do that. One right after the other, tough blocks. … Then (Barlow) just relaxed and did what he does. And then to have enough to be able to come back do that for us in the ninth, that’s very rare. That’s just special, how Scott goes about it.”
In the ninth, the Twins got the leadoff man on via an infield single to apply immediate pressure to Barlow. But Barlow got back-to-back ground balls that were converted into outs to cut down the lead runners.
Twins catcher Gary Sanchez then lined a two-out single to right field that moved the tying run to third base and the winning run on first. But Barlow got Gio Urshela to hit a grounder that Witt snared and flipped to second base for the final out of the game.
“Scott just continues to do it,” Merrifield said. “We’ve pushed him to the max a lot. And hopefully we can try to get it to where he doesn’t have to go out there like it’s Game 5 of the World Series and throw 40 pitches like that, but he’s a warrior for us. That situation in the eighth was pretty incredible for him to get out of that jam. Then we rode him again in the ninth.”
Royals starting pitcher Daniel Lynch had exited the game in the sixth, but was watching intently and in awe of Barlow.
“Wow,” Lynch said of Barlow’s performance. “We were sitting in here. I want to say I’m not surprised. If you do something like that, you kind of have to be surprised. I mean bases-loaded, nobody out and then a two-inning save. That’s incredible.
“He’s so valuable. I think he doesn’t get enough credit for being one of the very best relievers in the entire game. He deserves a lot of credit for that, and he just did what he does tonight.”
This story was originally published May 26, 2022 at 11:48 PM with the headline "Scott Barlow delivers with no margin for error to lift Kansas City Royals to victory."
