CLEVELAND, Ohio (92.3 The Fan) – Like the temperatures Monday afternoon, the Indians bats went ice cold in the blink of an eye.
Kansas City pitchers combined to hold Cleveland to just three hits as the Royals blanked the Indians 3-0 in the 2021 home opener in front of 8,914 fans at Progressive Field.
“It’s nice to have people in the stands, there’s no getting around it,” Indians manager Terry Francona said. “I’ll enjoy it more when we’re ahead on the scoreboard. The closer we get to normalcy, the happier everybody is. Not just in baseball, but everywhere.”
Logan Allen, the first left hander to start for the Indians since 2017, surrendered just two runs in five innings of work that saw him allow five hits, walk two and strike out three to suffer his first defeat of the season in his Cleveland debut.
“It was exciting, it was good to have fans in the seats,” Allen said. “I felt I did a pretty good job of controlling the emotions early.”
Kansas City cracked the scoreboard in the top of the second off Allen before he settled in and retired eight of the last nine batters he faced.
“I didn’t feel my job was done after five innings,” Allen said.
Royals shortstop Nicky Lopez benefitted from Francisco Lindor no longer being at short for Cleveland as he reached on an infield single behind second base before Whit Merrifield sent a rocket to the bleachers, his third home run of the season, to give the Royals a 2-0 advantage.
Merrifield drove in his third run of the afternoon on a sacrifice fly to center in the seventh inning, scoring DH Ryan McBroom, who led the inning off with a walk and went to third on a single from Lopez.
It would be all the visitors needed.
Allen retired the side in order twice – the third and fifth innings.
The Indians, who saw multiple runners reach base in the same inning just twice, were unable to do much against Royals starter Danny Duffy.
“We’re not stringing them together,” Francona said. “We did hit some balls hard. And I don’t ever want to talk down our offense, because that’s not what we’re here for, but we’re going to have to string some [hits] together.”
Duffy, who had lost to the Indians 12 times in his career, allowed just two hits and struck out five in six innings of work to pick up his first victory of the season.
“We were just hitting balls right at people,” Franmil Reyes, who collected a double in the fourth inning, said. “He got lucky.”
Scott Barlow pitched two perfect innings and Jesse Hahn collected his first save of 2021 for Kansas CIty.
Royals pitchers retired 13 straight before Indians second baseman Cesar Hernandez led off the bottom of the ninth with a leadoff walk.
Jose Ramirez followed by ripping a single to right, but Carlos Santana robbed Eddie Rosario’s grounder with a diving effort and turned it into a 3-6-1 double play and Franmil Reyes grounded out to end the game.