Can The Boys beat The Evil Empire?
The Royals’ reward for sweeping out the Baltimore Orioles in two low-scoring games is a battle against the other AL East play hopeful, the New York Yankees. The Royals decided to bring the same 26 guys on the active roster for this series that they took to Baltimore and the lineup should look familiar as well.
We meet again. pic.twitter.com/4hOpEudvd7
— Kansas City Royals (@Royals) October 5, 2024
That is the same lineup the Royals used in Game 1 against the Orioles. They’ll be facing another ace in Gerrit Cole instead of Corbin Burnes, but the task is the same. Score more runs than the other guys.
Postseason Baseball on deck in the Bronx. #RepBX pic.twitter.com/d66wsjX49z
— New York Yankees (@Yankees) October 5, 2024
The Yankees populate their lineup with two MVP candidates in Aaron Judge and Juan Soto, but the lineup falls off dramatically after them. Beyond them, only Gleyber Torres accrued 70 or more at-bats while maintaining an above-average wRC+ in September. Austin Wells and Anthony Volpe both bottomed out at 22, Alex Verdugo was pretty bad in a smaller sample, and Oswaldo Cabrera had a 110 wRC+ but only 29 plate appearances for the entire month. Jasson Domínguez and Anthony Rizzo were about average but the latter is injured and the former still can’t earn enough trust from his manager to start over Verdugo.
The game will start at 5:38 PM CT. That’s also 17:38 if you’re into military time or memes.
