This Date In Royals History--1985 Edition: June 14
The game was close...until Seattle scored seven runs in the fifth and cruised to a blowout win over the Royals.
An ugly fifth inning turned a close game into a blowout, as the Mariners scored seven times on their way to a 13-5 win over the Royals on Friday night at the Kingdome in Seattle.
With the score tied at 2-2 as the bottom of the fifth started, the Mariners began teeing off against Royals starter Danny Jackson and reliever Mike LaCoss. With one out, Phil Bradley singled, Ivan Calderon walked, and Gorman Thomas homered to give Seattle a 5-2 lead. An Alvin Davis single finished Jackson’s outing. But LaCoss fared no better. A walk and a single loaded the bases. Darnell Coles singled for two runs, and Bob Kearney tripled for two more. Although LaCoss retired the next two hitters, the damage was done. Seattle held a 9-2 lead.
Seattle scored the first run of the game, when Davis singled to score Bradley in the first inning. The Royals answered with a Pat Sheridan home run off Mariners starter Frank Wills in the second. That tied the score at 1-1. Kearney homered in the second to put Seattle back on top, 2-1. But the Royals again tied the score right away. Willie Wilson and Lonnie Smith each singled to start the third. Jorge Orta’s fly ball moved the runners up, and Steve Balboni’s fly ball scored Wilson to tie the game.
After the seven-run outburst, the Mariners tacked on one more run in the sixth as Calderon doubled and scored on Jim Presley’s single. The Royals responded with three runs in the seventh. With one out, Onix Concepcion walked. Wilson singled and Smith walked to load the bases. Orta singled to score two runs, cutting the Seattle lead to 10-4. Reliever Karl Best replaced Wills, but Balboni greeted him with another single to score Smith. That cut the Mariners’ lead to 10-5. But a strikeout and groundout ended the inning with no more scoring.
Then the Mariners put the game away in the bottom of the seventh. Reliever Mike Jones got two quick outs, but walked Calderon and Thomas. Davis followed with a home run, enlarging the lead to 13-5 and effectively ending the game.
The Royals fell to 30-28 with the loss. They were in third place in the AL West, two games behind Chicago.
Box score and play-by-play:
https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/SEA/SEA198506140.shtml
1985 sports news: Taiwanese golfer T.C. Chen maintained his lead through the second round of the U.S. Open, at Oakland Hills Country Club in Birmingham, Michigan. Chen finished the first round with a score of 65, five under par, with the first double eagle in Open history as the highlight. Chen shot a 70 in the second round, ending the day one stroke ahead of Jay Haas and Andy North. Kansas City’s Tom Watson failed to make the cut, finishing with a total of 147. Jack Nicklaus also missed the cut, the first time that had happened to him in a major since 1978 and the first time it happened to him at the Open since 1963.
1985 news: TWA Flight 847, which had been hijacked during a flight from Athens to Rome, headed back to Beirut as the hostage crisis continued. The hijackers, alleged to be members of Hezbollah, beat U.S. Navy diver Robert Stethem, then shot him, dumped his body on the runway, and shot him again. The plane would later take off for a return trip to Algeria. By the way, according to Wikipedia, two of these hijackers are still considered fugitives by the FBI, with $5 million rewards for information leading to arrests and convictions.
Today’s birthdays: Jerry Spradlin (1967), Bobby Witt Jr. (2000)