Early on, the Cleveland Guardians have had their way with the Kansas City Royals.
Looking for a fifth straight win overall and attempting to remain perfect at home, the Guardians will try to continue their 2025 success against the Royals on Saturday night.
Cleveland opened the season by taking two of three at Kansas City, then won 7-0 on Friday in the series opener. Gabriel Arias clubbed a three-run homer among his three hits for the Guardians, who have outscored the Royals 23-10 this season.
Arias boosted his numbers against Kansas City this season to 6-for-12 with two homers and five RBIs. In his other eight games, he went 4-for-27 (.148) with no extra-base hits and no RBIs.
“It’s really important, division rivals,” Arias told Guardians.TV of the games vs. the Royals. “… It’s important for us to go out there and compete.”
Cleveland has yielded just three runs during its four-game winning streak to open the home portion of the schedule. The Guardians have scored 13 runs in the past two wins.
However, Cleveland hopes its offense can to more productive against Kansas City’s scheduled Saturday starter, Michael Lorenzen (1-1, 3.18 ERA), than in the past.
Despite walking nine in 21 2/3 innings vs. Cleveland, the 33-year-old has allowed just one run while going 1-1 in four career starts against the Guardians — all since the start of the 2022 season. Overall against Cleveland, he is 2-2 with a 1.87 ERA in 12 career appearances.
After allowing four runs (three earned), five hits and three walks in 5 1/3 innings during a 5-0 loss at Milwaukee to open his 2025 campaign, Lorenzen was more effective Monday against the Minnesota Twins. He again yielded five hits but gave up just one run and one walk over six innings in a 4-2 victory.
That performance came one day before Lorenzen secured 10 years of major league service time.
“To be competing at the level he still continues to at 10 years,” Royals manager Matt Quatraro said, “it shows you the care that he takes with his body, the conditioning, his ability to adapt as a pitcher over the years and not continue to do the same thing.
“All those speak volumes of the competitor he is.”
Cleveland stars Carlos Santana and Jose Ramirez have hit three homers apiece vs. Lorenzen. Guardians leadoff man Steven Kwan is 7-for-17 against the Royals this year, but 1-for-4 with a double lifetime against Lorenzen.
Kansas City entered the Friday game coming off a 5-2 homestand. However, after the 7-0 loss, the Royals have totaled just five runs in the past four contests while getting shut out twice. The Royals managed just five hits on Friday, all singles, but Bobby Witt Jr. went 2-for-2 and walked twice.
Witt is batting .348 in his last 18 games vs. Cleveland, but he’s 1-for-5 lifetime against scheduled Guardians starter Luis L. Ortiz (0-2, 8.44 ERA), who came over from the Pittsburgh Pirates in an offseason trade.
The right-hander allowed seven runs, nine hits and four walks through 4 2/3 innings of a 7-2 loss at San Diego in his Cleveland debut, then yielded a pair of solo homers and one other run without a walk through six innings in a 6-2 defeat against the Los Angeles Angels on Sunday.
“I thought he made some great adjustments from the last outing,” Cleveland catcher Austin Hedges said, according to MLB.com. “I think he’s starting to understand who he is and what makes him good.”
Ortiz’s only start against the Royals came with Pittsburgh last September, when he allowed seven runs — four earned — in four innings. Salvador Perez and Kyle Isbel each homered off Ortiz in that contest and are a combined 4-for-5 against him.
