'Freak accident': Ragans slips on mound, ending scoreless streak?

TORONTO -- Every rise has its fall, but no one expected it to be this literal.

Cole Ragans had his scoreless streak end at 26 innings in the Royals’ 5-2 loss to the Blue Jays on Sunday afternoon at Rogers Centre. It happened in odd fashion, too, the product of three consecutive wild pitches in a game-tying two-run bottom of the sixth.

“Pretty aggravating,” said Ragans after the game that marked Kansas City’s 100th loss of the season. “We score two runs in the top [of the inning] and then I give them right back.”

The unfortunate sequence started with a stumble.

After 5 2/3 innings of one-hit ball against a resurgent Blue Jays lineup, Ragans walked Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Davis Schneider to put runners on first and second.

The next batter to step up was Alejandro Kirk, whom Ragans intended to start with a curveball. But his right cleat got caught on the mound, causing him to lose his grip on the pitch and land on his chest in the turf.

“I have no idea [how that happened],” said Ragans. “I’ve never had it happen to me. I don’t know, it was kind of a freak accident. … My spike just caught the mound, and I have to throw the ball or it’s a balk, so it’s just a tough spot.”

As Ragans picked himself up, manager Matt Quatraro motioned toward the mound with a trainer, but the pitcher waved them off. His next offering clocked in at 97 mph, but he airmailed it again, allowing Guerrero to dart home and score the first run against Ragans since the fourth inning of an Aug. 18 matchup against the Cubs.

Those 26 consecutive scoreless frames rank as the eighth-longest streak in Royals history, one inning short of Kevin Appier’s mark in 1996.

Not that Ragans was keeping tabs.

“I can guarantee Cole does not care one bit about the streak,” said Quatraro. “The first thing he said is he apologized for letting the team down after we scored two runs. That's the kind of person he is. He couldn’t have cared less about that streak.”

It seemed twisted enough that the scoreless span would end on a pair of wild pitches, but the oddities didn’t stop there. Ragans caught his spike again as he delivered his third pitch to Kirk, and the ball completely eluded catcher Salvador Perez to hit the backstop and allow Schneider to tie the game at 2.

Ragans walked Kirk with his next pitch, and that brought out Quatraro to end the young pitcher’s afternoon. His stat line looked almost as bizarre as that last plate appearance: Two runs, one hit, six strikeouts and a career-worst six walks on 105 pitches.

“Complete outlier,” said Quatraro of that bottom of the sixth. “I’ve never seen anything like it. It’s something we’re gonna move on from.”

A holistic look at what Ragans has done lately should make it fairly easy to turn the page. Going nearly a month without allowing a run as a Major League starting pitcher is nothing short of remarkable. Doing it as a 25-year-old in his second season is a promising bright spot for a Royals team that has now lost four in a row.

“I love when he’s on the mound,” said Bobby Witt Jr., who opened the scoring with an RBI double on Sunday. “He’s always competing and busting his tail every single day. He’s one of the hardest workers I’ve seen. … He loves the game and he wants to be the best when he’s on the mound.”

He’s achieved that way more often than not over the past couple of months.

Ragans has posted a 1.69 ERA in nine starts since joining the Royals, not once allowing more than three earned runs and reaching double-digit strikeouts twice.

“That's as good a pitcher as we've seen,” Blue Jays manager John Schneider said of Ragans. “Obviously, the last month has been really good for him.”

There are plenty of lessons to take away from an outing like this, especially against a postseason contender, and on a day when Ragans dominated until things got “a little bit peculiar to say the least,” as Schneider put it.

“We knew this would be a different challenge for him, with this lineup,” said Quatraro. “They're extremely good hitters and have been for a long time, and he did a great job of keeping them off-balance.”