Musings from Roy F. Almania: Bleacher Bumblings, Billy Butler Blanked with Brimmed Bases, Boners of Papel Leave Boys in Blue Blue in Boston

This is "Musings From Roy F. Almania" where, from time to time, I loan my key to the House to my cousin from Joplin. He's a bit rough around the edges, but he can tear apart a John Deere engine and have it greased and back together 'fore supper's ready. And he knows a thing or two about Royals baseball. He begged me to let him post on last night's no-hitter tossed by Jon Lester of the Red Sox against Kansas City, but I convinced him otherwise, knowing that Seven would cover it. When he phoned at the conclusion of this evening's 2-1 loss, he was not to be denied again.

I ain't one to blame refs and umps and fans often. I don't much care for cursing, neither. I had cuss tonight's crew, though, when, on top of sleepy KC bats, the boys repeated history.

Like Seven said, Nolan Ryan last no-hitted the Royals. It was 1973, I'd just gotten out of the service, and, hell, cousin Banky wasn't even born yet. But that's another story.

Anyhow, the game after Ryan's no-hitter, the Royals managed but one lousy run, and lost 2-1. There was a couple instances to avoid such repetition tonight, and they was these: 1) Kansas City had a legitimate opportunity to score the game-tying run tonight, and they was forced to settle with a ground-rule double when Boston fans interfered with a ball in play in rightfield. I know we can't expect an ump to rule on it any different than they did, but it infuriated me. Like that Seven guy says, "Just sayin'."

The Royals also, like I mentioned, had one opportunity to zap this game alive, and that was young Billy Butler's at-bat in the eighth with the bases loaded. Now Billy came into the evening hitting .276 with 18 RBIs, and still that one lousy homerun. We know the kid can hit, but he's been cold, and so have the rest of the bats in blue. Something's got to change, and change quick-like.

That at-bat, though, is where I tip my hat to Red Sox skipper Terry Francona. Actually, I tip it to him for the entire half-inning. He handled the pitching situations with patience, and smarts, asking his closer to deliver four outs instead of three. Butler and Papelbon had never squared off, and the youngster got his spikes a bit stuck in the mud.

Kansas City has shown us that they can deliver pitching scenarios comparable to the one Francona and company put on display tonight. They have not shown us much of anything from the batter's box. I reckon it's time for Mr. Hillman to change something about the puny offensive outputs this club keeps offering before the decades of hitting droughts begin to wash away all the good we seen so far from this year's Royals. Detroit don't aim to stay in last, and the Twinkies, Tribe and Sox will eventually distance themselves from one another. It'd be nice to throw the Royals, with good pitching and better-than-average hitting, into that muck that is the Central.