The Kansas City Royals lost to the Atlanta Braves 3-0 on Friday night, but the game turned out to be irrelevant as the Royals clinched a Wild Card berth after the Minnesota Twins were eliminated following a 7-2 loss to the Baltimore Orioles.
The Royals completed one of baseball’s most incredible turnarounds after losing 106 games last season and will be heading to the postseason for the first time since winning the World Series in 2015.
During the postgame celebration, superstar shortstop Bobby Witt Jr. took a minute away from popping bottles to send Royals fans a message, saying “Kansas City, we’ll see you in October. We didn’t come this far to come this far. The best is yet to come, let’s go.”
Bobby Witt Jr. with a message to Royals fans 🗣
(via @MLB)pic.twitter.com/cyVaWfya9h
— B/R Walk-Off (@BRWalkoff) September 28, 2024
Kansas City was in danger of blowing it after recently going on a 7-game losing streak that left the door wide open for the competition, but the Royals were able to get back on track and win three in a row over the past few days prior to Friday’s loss, which put enough distance between them and the Twins to wrap it up.
Witt would likely be taking home an AL MVP award in any other year that didn’t consist of Aaron Judge putting forth a daily assault on the MLB record books, but he doesn’t seem too upset about it.
The focus now shifts toward October, and since the white-hot Detroit Tigers leapfrogged the Royals in the standings yesterday, the Royals would face off with the Houston Astros if the current standings were to hold.
If KC can get back above the Tigers, they’d face the Baltimore Orioles in the Wild Card round.
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