KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The Kansas City Royals are back in the postseason for the first time since winning the 2015 World Series, but who they play in the Wild Card series is still to be determined on the last day of the regular season.
The Royals clinched a Wild Card spot on Friday night after the Minnesota Twins lost their sixth-consecutive game, guaranteeing that Kansas City will play a best-of-three series against either the Baltimore Orioles or Houston Astros in an effort to reach the American League Division Series.
The Royals enter Sunday as the six seed, but hold the tiebreaker over the Detroit Tigers, and could jump them with a win against the Atlanta Braves and a Tigers loss against the Chicago White Sox.
If the current situation holds, the Royals would travel to Houston to play the American League West champion Astros, who are the three seed. The winner of that potential series would play the Cleveland Guardians in the ALDS, who are locked in to the two seed.
If Kansas City wins and Detroit loses, the Royals hop up to become the five seed and will travel to Baltimore, with the winner of that potential series facing the New York Yankees in the ALDS. New York has secured the top seed and home field throughout the American League playoffs.
No matter what happens on Sunday, the Royals will be the road team in the Wild Card series, with all games in either Houston or Baltimore. If they advance, they’ll start on the road against either New York or Cleveland, returning to Kansas City for game 3 of the ALDS on October 9.
The Wild Card series is scheduled next Tuesday through Thursday, times to be determined, all games on ABC/ESPN/MLB.tv.
Royals reporter Anne Rogers says Kansas City will go with Cole Ragans in Game 1, Seth Lugo in Game 2 and Michael Wacha if necessary in Game 3.
The ALDS begins on Saturday, October 5, with all games airing on TBS/MLB.tv, which also have the American League Championship Series. If the Royals go on runs like the 2014 and 2015 teams did, the World Series is on FOX4 beginning October 25.
Sunday will have no shortage of intrigue and scoreboard watching as the Royals and Tigers start within 10 minutes of one another, Kansas City getting the slight benefit of starting later at 2:20 p.m.
The Royals send Alec Marsh to the mound, who is 8-9 with a 4.65 earned run average, opposed by the Braves’ Charlie Morton, who is also 8-9 and has a 4.08 ERA.
The Tigers are starting Kenta Maeda, who is 3-6 with a 5.93 ERA, while the White Sox will send Jonathan Cannon to the mound, who is 4-10 with a 4.37 ERA.
Also happening Sunday, Bobby Witt Jr. should officially be crowned the AL batting champ, the first Royals player to win the batting title since George Brett in 1990. Witt enters Sunday with a .332 average, Vladimir Guerrero Jr. of the Toronto Blue Jays is second at .324.
