KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Drew Waters believes he’s found a new hitting approach in the Royals’ system — a worldview that immediately paid dividends in his first Major League game Monday.
Waters delivered the game-winning RBI in the eighth inning with a bases-loaded walk, helping to push the Royals to a 6-4 victory over the Chicago White Sox at Kauffman Stadium.
Before the game, Waters spoke to reporters about the changes he’d made hitting-wise since getting traded from the Atlanta Braves to the Royals’ organization last month. He gave credit to Royals’ minor-league coaches for helping him to focus on simply trying to do damage to vulnerable pitches.
When those didn’t come in the eighth, Waters simply took his base. He took a 3-1 curve from Joe Kelly just below the zone, forcing in Michael A. Taylor for the go-ahead run.
MJ Melendez added a sacrifice fly, and Scott Barlow closed out the ninth for the save.
Daniel Lynch had one of his least-effective outings Monday, going 4 2/3 innings while allowing three runs and walking four. It also was the first start all season that he failed to strike out a batter; his previous low in 2022 was two.
Waters went 0-for-3 with the walk in his debut. During his first at-bat in the first inning, he swung at the first pitch, grounding into a 4-6-3 double play with the bases loaded.
Monday’s low attendance of 8,471 was likely to be expected because of the circumstances: a makeup, afternoon game after school had started with the Royals as a non-contending team.
Still, according to Baseball Reference, it was the lowest Royals home attendance for a game (in non-pandemic seasons) since July 5, 1995.
