Cleveland Indians at Kansas City Royals series preview

The Kansas City Royals have sustained their good baseball playing from 2014. They have led the division for the majority of the season. Only recently have the surprising Minnesota Twins edged them out of the top spot. The Royals had been on a roll, winning ten of thirteen until last week's road trip where they were swept in New York and split a rain shortened series at Wrigley Field.

• Tuesday's game is at 8:10 PM (Carrasco vs. Guthrie)
• Wednesday's game is at 8:10 PM (Kluber vs. Vargas)
• Thursday's game is at 8:10 PM (Bauer vs. Young)

The Tribe haven't seen the Royals in almost a month when they lost two of three in Kaufman Stadium. The Royals also took two of three in their visit to Progressive in April.   With this road trip finishing up Thursday night, the Tribe return home to take on the Orioles and Mariners in the next six game home stand.

Division Watch: Twins at Red Sox, A's at Tigers, White Sox at Rangers.

Team in a Box

The Royals hitting has tailed off a little bit since the last series. Bu they are still very good. They lead the league in average and are still second in slugging. That is in stark contrast to last season. But they are fourteenth in homers, basically doubling everyone to death with 95 and 14 triples. They take the fewest walks but also strike out the least, so that evens out. The pitching staff is why they are doing so well though. They have given up the fewest runs, hits, homers and are second in ERA. They do walk a few too many guys, but do not really strike anyone out either. Their defense is also elite with just 27 errors  and the third best fielding percentage.

-

Editor's Note: SB Nation's partner FanDuel is hosting a $100,000 one-day fantasy baseball league today. It's $3 to join and first place wins $8,000. Enter now!

-

Projected Roster

As you can see, there really is only one black hole in the lineup, and that is Infante, who leads Kipnis in All-Star voting by a large margin.  Rios may be a bit rusty as he was just recently activated off the DL after a six week stint. Perez is still getting abused by Yost. He has started 44 of 48 games and has just taken 4 walks all year. In a twist of irony, backup catcher Erik Kratz has stated in just one game and four overall, but landed on the DL. He should be activated this week sometime.

Gordon, Moustakas and Morales  (whose offseason signing has paid off handsomely so far) have powered the offense the past two weeks, each with an 800 OPS or better. The team overall though has just a 638 OPS in that span. In the six Tribe games, Hosmer has been an absolute monster. He has a 1364 OPS , three homers and 11 RBI. Gordon, Moustakas and Morales all surpassed 1000 OPS in those games.

Projected Staff

While this staff leads the AL in many categories, they still have two pretty horrendous starters in Vargas and Guthrie, both of whom the Tribe face in the first two games of this series. The rotation has been shuffled recently with Danny Duffy landing on the DL. Replacing him in the rotation is Chris Young, who has pitched very well this year.

Guthrie had a fairly decent May up until his last start when the Yankees tattooed him for eleven runs in just one inning. He got the win in the 11-5 April 28 game but did not pitch all that well, four runs in five innings. Vargas missed a few starts in May (necessitating Young to the rotation first) and didn't get out of the fifth in his first start back. The Tribe let him off easy in the April 27 game, scoring just two off eight baserunners in five innings. Vargas had his best start of the year on May 5, beating the Indians 5-3. Young has been excellent in his last four starts, 1.90 ERA in 23.2 innings. His last two relief appearances were both against the Tribe allowing just one hit in 3.1 innings.

On the Shelf

• RP Tim Collins [60 day DL], out for season
• SP Danny Duffy [15 day DL], no timetable for return
• P Brian Flynn [60 day DL], no timetable for return
• C Erik Kratz [15 day DL], on AAA rehab
• SP Kris Medlen [60 day DL], possible midseason return

Almanac

*Does not include 2015 stats

Prediction: The weekend in Seattle has me convinced that the Indians are back to playing competitive baseball, and somewhat consistently. The pitching matchups look very favorable, so I will go out on a limb and say they take two of three on the road again, bringing them within one game of the 0.500 mark.