After Stephen Kolek gave the Kansas City Royals’ bullpen a day off, Seth Lugo will try to help claim a series win against the visiting Seattle Mariners on Sunday afternoon.

Kolek delivered a complete-game, four-hit shutout in the Royals’ 5-0 victory on Saturday. He walked one, struck out two and needed 108 pitches to notch Kansas City’s first complete-game shutout since Sept. 13, 2020.

As the Royals’ scheduled starter on Sunday, Lugo (1-4, 3.68 ERA), will have a tough act to follow.

In his last start, Lugo gave up two runs on five hits with two walks and five strikeouts over six innings in a 3-1 home defeat to the Boston Red Sox on Monday. He has four career appearances (three starts) against the Mariners, going 1-1 with a 5.00 ERA.

On Saturday, Royals manager Matt Quatraro praised the ground balls Kolek induced, something he wants as part of the pitching staff’s game plan.

“I kept an unofficial tally; I think (he threw) 10 or 11 ground balls,” Quatraro said of Kolek. “That’s one thing we want: Attack, keep them on their heels and induce soft contact.”

Bobby Witt Jr. helped spark the offense Saturday with two hits, two runs and a stolen base. His first hit was an infield single, and he later scored on a sacrifice fly to shallow left field.

“He’s got game-changing speed; that’s why this game is unfair,” Quatraro said. “He can maximize the contact he makes.”

For Witt, who is batting .298 with seven home runs, 23 RBIs and 16 stolen bases this season, the approach starts with being ready for his preferred pitches.

“I want to attack in my zones,” he said. “I want to be ready for the fastball at all times and go from there.”

Witt said the Royals want aggressiveness on the basepaths to be part of their identity.

“That’s who we are,” he said. “We want to keep attacking and try to get that extra 90 (feet).”

The Royals on Sunday will face right-hander Bryan Woo (4-2, 3.51 ERA), who most recently led the Mariners to a 6-1 win over the Chicago White Sox on Monday.

The 26-year-old limited Chicago to three hits and two walks while striking out eight over six shutout innings. He said he’s better when sticking to the basics.

Monday marked Woo’s third consecutive quality start, third win in a row and third straight outing with eight or more strikeouts.

“The simpler I am, the simpler my thought process is, the better I am,” Woo said.

Woo is 1-0 with a 5.56 ERA in two career starts against the Royals. On May 1, he gave up six runs on seven hits and struck out two in a 7-6 home loss to Kansas City in which he didn’t factor into the decision.

Mariners manager Dan Wilson said his club needs to flush Saturday’s loss quickly. Luke Raley collected three of Seattle’s four hits and leads the team with 10 homers and 27 RBIs this season.

“It was a tough afternoon,” Wilson said, “… but we need to come back tomorrow and be ready to go and win the series.”

–Field Level Media

The reeling New York Mets will look to avoid being swept on Sunday afternoon when they visit the Miami Marlins in the finale of a three-game series between the National League East foes.

Christian Scott (0-0, 4.12 ERA) is slated to start for the Mets against fellow right-hander Tyler Phillips (0-0, 1.20), who will make his first start of the season for Miami.

The Marlins locked up the series win on Saturday when Max Meyer allowed only one hit over seven scoreless innings and improved to 5-0 as Miami beat the Mets 4-1.

The loss was the fourth in five games for the Mets, who will head home following this game in sole possession of last place in the NL East. The Marlins moved 1 1/2 games ahead of New York with their Saturday win.

The Mets didn’t score on Saturday until Mark Vientos’ two-out RBI single in the ninth and have been outscored 24-14 in the past five games.

The team-wide slump is reminiscent of the extended drought the Mets endured in April, when they lost 17 of their final 20 games of the month while averaging 2.7 runs per game. The slide started with a 12-game losing streak from April 8-21 — the longest skid for New York since 2002.

The Mets opened May by winning 11 of 16 games, a span in which they averaged 5.4 runs per contest.

“The past couple games, we’ve faced some good pitching,” Vientos said. “Obviously we haven’t done what we’ve wanted at the plate, but got to give credit where credit is due. The pitchers that we’ve faced, they’ve been doing their thing. And we’re just going to come (Sunday) and come back strong.”

Phillips, who has allowed more than one run just once in 15 relief appearances this season, will look to follow in the footsteps of Meyer and Eury Perez as the Marlins try to complete their first series sweep since March 27-29 against the Colorado Rockies.

Perez gave up one run on two hits — both to Juan Soto — over 6 1/3 innings in the series opener on Friday as he earned the 2-1 win for Miami.

Phillips, who has thrown three innings in relief four times this season, is taking the rotation spot of Braxton Garrett, who was demoted to Triple-A Jacksonville on Wednesday. The start against the Mets will be the first for Philips since last Sept. 7 and the ninth of his three-year big league career.

“We believe he has the pitches and the ability to start it,” Marlins manager Clayton McCullough said. “He’s done it in the past, something we had spoken with him about last year and had stretched him out some on the fly. As circumstances have happened in recent weeks, felt like he’s been throwing the ball terrifically.”

Scott didn’t factor into the decision in his most recent start last Monday, when he gave up three runs over four innings in New York’s 16-7, 12-inning win over the Nationals.

Phillips hasn’t pitched since Wednesday, when he allowed an unearned run over three innings in the Marlins’ 9-1 loss to the Atlanta Braves.

Scott is 0-2 with a 7.88 ERA in two career starts against the Marlins, and Phillips is 0-0 with an 0.00 ERA in five career relief appearances spanning 6 2/3 innings against the Mets.

–Field Level Media

Two sparkplug outfielders who have helped deliver wins in vastly different ways the last two days hope to continue to be a nuisance for opposing pitchers Sunday afternoon when Sam Antonacci and the Chicago White Sox face Harrison Bader and the host San Francisco Giants.

The teams have split the first two contests of a three-game set, each using a big inning to provide the difference in blowout wins.

Antonacci drew two hit-by-pitches and scored twice in a nine-run fourth inning in Friday’s series opener, which the White Sox won 9-4.

The 23-year-old leadoff batter has yet to get a hit in the series but has scored three times, which doesn’t surprise his Chicago teammates. He’s been hit by pitches 10 times this season, which is tied for the major league lead.

“Grinder. He’s our Cam Skattebo,” Davis Martin, Friday’s winning pitcher, assured reporters, making a comparison to the New York Giants’ running back. “Just any way imaginable to get the job done, he’s going to get the job done. And everybody knows it. To spearhead that lineup, I couldn’t think of anybody better.”

Giants fans are starting to see some of the same in Bader, who joined the club as a free agent over the winter, mostly as a defensive addition. But the veteran has been surprising offensively, hitting five home runs in 25 games in a season interrupted for a month by a hamstring injury.

Bader appeared to have disappointed the big crowd Saturday when, with the Giants leading 5-3, he popped up with the bases loaded and two outs in the fifth inning. But White Sox third baseman Miguel Vargas lost the foul ball in the sun, giving Bader new life, and the veteran responded with a grand slam to cap a six-run uprising.

Bader gladly accepted a Gatorade soaking from teammate Willy Adames during a postgame television interview on the field.

“Feels good,” Bader, 31, insisted. “Every single day since I was 5 years old, I dreamed about playing this game at a high level. I love what I do, so it feels real good to deliver for my team.”

The pitching matchup on Sunday will feature two left-handers: the White Sox’s Noah Schultz (2-3, 4.93 ERA) and the Giants’ Robbie Ray (3-6, 4.28).

Schultz will make the eighth start of his rookie season, his fifth on the West Coast. He already has beaten the Athletics and San Diego Padres on the road, and he has lost at the Los Angeles Angels and Seattle Mariners.

The 22-year-old has never faced the Giants, who hit three home runs in a game for just the fourth time all season Saturday. Schultz has served up just three homers in his seven starts this year, never more than one in a game.

Meanwhile, Ray is coming off his worst start of the season, roughed up for 10 runs (nine earned) in a 12-2 shellacking at Arizona last Monday.

Ray will face the White Sox for the sixth time in his career, having gone 1-2 with a 2.78 ERA against them.

– Field Level Media