Kansas
Detroit Tigers outlast Kansas City Royals in extras, 3-1, to hold ground in playoff race
Can Detroit Tigers catch struggling Minnesota Twins?
Minnesota Star Tribune beat writer Bobby Nightengale joins Days of Roar to discuss how the struggling Minnesota Twins are helping the Detroit Tigers.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Detroit Tigers right-handed reliever Jason Foley jogged from the bullpen to the mound for the bottom of the 10th inning against the Kansas City Royals in search of his 25th save, with the free runner on second base.
Foley was tasked with protecting a two-run advantage, facing the best hitters in the Royals’ lineup.
“I just told myself to attack the zone,” Foley said.
A successful save from Foley, who pitched for the third game in a row, completed the Tigers’ 3-1 win over the Royals on Tuesday in the second of three games in the series at Kauffman Stadium.
The Tigers (79-73) extended their winning streak to three games and continued their winning ways in pursuit of the third and final spot in the American League wild card.
They’ve won 24 of their last 34 games.
“We’re just going to keep doing our thing and playing our game,” said Parker Meadows, who drove in the go-ahead run in the top of the 10th inning. “Show up every day, have fun, converse all day, play cards and just stay relaxed, be in the moment and keep up punching in big situations. This team is really good.”
With the win, the Tigers stayed 1½ games behind the Minnesota Twins in the wild-card race, which is actually 2½ games considering the tiebreaker, as the Twins beat the Cleveland Guardians in the second of four games in their series.
There are 10 games remaining in the regular season.
In the 10th inning, the Tigers grabbed a 2-1 lead on a one-out bloop single from Meadows, dropping a first-pitch changeup into shallow left field. The free runner in extra innings scored from third base, but the only reason the runner advanced to third base was because right-handed reliever Lucas Erceg balked.
“I’m going to start him tomorrow,” manager A.J. Hinch said in response to a reminder that the Tigers have a 42-23 record when Meadows starts. “It’s really remarkable. He’s been an impactful player on both sides, and he can still get a lot better. We’re excited that we feel like we can win with him.”
The Tigers padded their lead, 3-1, when Riley Greene hit a RBI single up the middle with two outs, scoring Meadows from second base. Meadows had moved up to second base because Erceg walked Matt Vierling on four pitches.
In the bottom of the 10th, Foley sent down Bobby Witt Jr. (groundout), Salvador Perez (flyout) and Michael Massey (flyout). His toughest assignment — that’s Witt — leads MLB with a .331 batting average in 152 games.
Foley needed just 11 pitches.
“He’s one of the best hitters in the league,” Foley said of the Witt matchup, “so just try to attack the zone and really focus on that first out and don’t be terribly concerned with the runner on second just because we had a little bit of a buffer. I just tried to get that first out.”
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Saving Casey Mize
Right-hander Casey Mize didn’t have his best command throughout his 20th start, but he particularly struggled in the fifth inning when he loaded the bases with one out, forcing an early exit.
The 27-year-old walked Witt and Perez, his final two batters. The Tigers then turned to right-handed reliever Shelby Miller, who induced an inning-ending double play on a first-pitch slider to Massey.
Thanks to Miller, Mize allowed just one run on six hits and four walks with three strikeouts across 4⅓ innings, throwing 89 pitches.
“We found a way,” Mize said. “I think that’s obviously the most important thing with what we’re trying to do right now. We won the game. It wasn’t pretty or perfect from my end, but I gave it everything I had with every pitch.”
There were some positive signs: His velocity was up on his four-seam fastball (plus-1.4 mph), slider (plus-2.8 mph) and splitter (plus-3 mph), and his slider generated four whiffs on nine swings. It was a step in the right direction, even though Mize had sub-par command.
In the third inning, Meadows completed an incredible running catch in center field to save Mize from another run. The running catch stranded two runners.
“It was a tough one,” said Meadows, who covered 75 feet with a sprint speed of 27.6 feet per second. “I got a pretty good jump. I didn’t think I got the best jump, but I was able to makeup for it. I kind of beat it to the spot, and I looked up at the last second, and I saw it was catchable.”
Mize has a 4.36 ERA in 20 starts.
Cooked by Cole Ragans
The Royals have the AL’s second-best left-handed starter in Cole Ragans, only because Tarik Skubal — the Tigers’ ace — is the undisputed best southpaw.
Facing the Tigers, Ragans allowed one run on four hits and four walks with six strikeouts across seven innings, throwing 105 pitches. The highlight of his 31st start was stranding two runners with back-to-back strikeouts of Trey Sweeney and Dillon Dingler in the fourth inning.
But the Tigers took a 1-0 lead within their first two batters, as Andy Ibáñez reached safely on a hit-by-pitch and Vierling followed by cranking a middle-middle cutter for an RBI double to left-center field.
After that, Ragans shut down the Tigers.
He has a 3.24 ERA in 31 starts.
Contact Evan Petzold at epetzold@freepress.com or follow him @EvanPetzold.
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The Detroit Tigers were beaten by the Kansas City Royals 5-1 on Saturday night.
Michael Wacha pitched seven scoreless innings, Bobby Witt Jr. hit an inside-the-park home run on a grounder and Michael Massey had a three-run homer for the Royals, who will go for the series sweep on Sunday night.
Witt hit the ball down the right-field line in the first inning that bounced off the wall and eluded right fielder Kerry Carpenter. Witt motored around the bases and beat the relay throw to the plate for a two-run homer.
It was the Royals’ first inside-the-park home run since Witt did it in August 2023.
Carpenter left the game later with left shoulder soreness.
Wacha (4-2) gave up two hits, walked two and struck out six. It was his longest scoreless outing since throwing eight scoreless innings against the Chicago White Sox on April 11.
Burch Smith (0-2) took the loss. He retired only one of the four batters he faced, allowing two runs on three hits in one-third of an inning.
Massey’s homer in the fourth inning came with runners on first and third with two outs. He lined the ball over the right-center field fence for his third homer of the season.
Wacha had at least one strikeout in each of his first four innings. The Tigers loaded the bases in the fifth on a double, a walk and a hit batter, but Wacha got Matt Vierling to ground out to end the inning.
The Tigers scored in the eighth on a two-out double by Riley Greene.
Up next
The teams conclude the three-game series Sunday. The Tigers have not announced a starter, though manager AJ Hinch said it will be a bullpen game. Kansas City will send LHP Noah Cameron (2-2, 5.40 ERA) to the mound.
Bullet point summary by AI
- The Chiefs are exploring long-term solutions at tight end beyond Travis Kelce’s expected 2026 retirement.
- One potential move involves targeting a veteran player from a team transitioning to a new starter at the position.
- The deal’s structure hinges on future playoff performance, creating a high-stakes incentive for both franchises.
While the 2026 draft is just in the books, it’s never too early to start thinking about the 2027 season — and if there’s one team that’s already looking that far ahead, it’s the Kansas City Chiefs.
Star tight end Travis Kelce is almost certainly retiring after the 2026 campaign despite an inflated new deal, and looking at the Chiefs’ depth chart, backup Noah Gray is not starting-caliber material. You could argue the team can scout for star talent in next year’s draft, but that would come with significant risk and opportunity cost if a prospect isn’t immediately NFL-ready.
Instead, there’s a potential solution general manager Brett Veach can utilize by acquiring an excess asset from another team.
This Chiefs-Bears trade solves Kansas City’s Travis Kelce problem
The Chicago Bears are clearly moving forward with 2025 first-round pick Colston Loveland as their TE1, in addition to taking blocking specialist Sam Roush out of Stanford in this year’s draft. All of which leaves backup — and previous starter — Cole Kmet on the outside looking in. The 27-year-old still has a lot of high-quality football left to play, and he’d certainly sign off on the opportunity to get starting snaps for a team with a championship window still wide open.
The problem is going to be convincing Chicago to pick up the phone in the first place. Kmet signed a restructured deal in April which disincentivizes the Bears from moving him until next year. A pre-June 1 deal would cost Chicago $4.1 million against the salary cap, while any swap after that date only saves the team $1.4 million.
So, with the present season not really an option, these two teams would need to be negotiating with next year in mind as Kmet is projected to cost the Bears $15.4 million against the cap in 2027. That’s the incentive Chicago needs to move him.
At the moment, Kmet is worth a conditional 2027 fifth-round pick — which may sound cheap, but the devil is in the details. Chicago will certainly dictate that an escalator be attached to the pick: For example, if Kansas City misses the playoffs in 2027, then it remains a fifth-rounder but may be deferred until 2028. If they qualify for the postseason then it could stay in 2027. A championship could push it up a round or two (though that would be a tough sell for the Chiefs).
Kmet has topped 500 receiving yards in three of his six seasons in Chicago, so there’s a good reason for Kansas City to inquire about his availability. The Bears, in turn, used a third-round pick to select Stanford’s Sam Roush – signaling they too are preparing for Kmet’s eventual departure.
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Stormont Vail Healthcare is in a legal battle with the state government, alleging the Medicaid program was wrong to refuse payment for the hospitalization of a pregnant patient with complications.
At issue is a disagreement between the Topeka hospital and the Kansas Department of Health and Environment over whether inpatient health care services were medically necessary for the Medicaid patient’s last two weeks of pregnancy.
The Kansas Court of Appeals did not resolve that dispute, but it did side with Stormont Vail in a May 8 decision. The unanimous three-judge panel reversed a decision by Shawnee County District Court Judge Thomas Luedke and vacated an order from KDHE’s State Appeals Committee. The matter now goes back to the appeals committee for reconsideration.
The appellate panel was comprised of Judges Jacy Hurst, Thomas Malone and Stephen Hill, which heard oral arguments on Aug. 5. Hurst wrote the court’s opinion.
The lawsuit stems from a 2018 case of a pregnant patient, who is not named in appellate court documents. She was 28 years old at the time and had an intellectual disability among other complications, including rapid weight loss caused by hyperemesis gravidarum.
The woman was originally admitted at Newman Regional Health in Emporia before she was transferred to Stormont Vail. Part of the hospitalization during her third trimester was covered.
But the final two weeks were not because Sunflower Health Plan, one of the managed care organizations in the state’s privatized Medicaid program known as KanCare, refused to reimburse for the patient’s continued hospitalization through the day the child was born via cesarean section.
“We are here because the Kansas Medicaid program has wrongfully refused to pay for some of an inpatient hospitalization while a Medicaid beneficiary was at Stormont Vail,” said Amanda Wilwert, an attorney for the hospital, during oral arguments. “Stormont believes the inpatient care was medically necessary as defined by the Kansas Medicaid regulations.”
Court records and oral arguments show the state expected Stormont Vail to look into having a home health agency care for the patient in Emporia instead of continued hospitalization — even though home health generally does not take care of pregnant patients and her doctors believed the expectant mother was not stable enough to discharge.
“The way it’s supposed to work,” said Darren Sharp, an attorney representing KDHE, “is the managed care organization, in this case Sunflower Health, on behalf of KDHE reviews the medical records, asks about the appropriate level of care and whether there’s any other interventions that would be more cost effective or appropriate depending on the level of or depending on the patient’s records and the patient’s status.”
Sharp argued medical records showed the patients was getting better because of total parenteral nutrition, or TPN.
“This is when a tube, a PICC, is inserted and your minerals and your electrolytes and all of your nutrition is then intravenously provided,” Sharp said.
He said the treatment “was eliminating her vomiting, her diarrhea, she had no fever, her glucose levels were stabilized.”
In their ruling, the judges indicated the KDHE appeals committee primarily cared about the cost saving of using home health versus hospitalization while disregarding the treating physician for insufficient reasons and ignoring evidence on potential benefits or harms to the patient.
But the judges declined to resolve the dispute. Rather, unless the decision is appealed to the Kansas Supreme Court, the matter goes back to the KDHE administrative process.
There, the agency’s appeals committee must reconsider the case consistent with the Court of Appeal’s ruling. The published decision sets new precedent interpreting state laws and regulations on the Medicaid program.
“While this court provides no opinion on whether the disputed inpatient healthcare services met the definition of medical necessity,” Hurst wrote, “the record shows that some of the (appeals committee’s) factual findings were not supported by the record as a whole and that the (appeals committee) inaccurately applied the law when it failed to consider (the patient’s) individual characteristics and assess the harms and benefits of the healthcare intervention.
“In making a medical necessity determination, the reviewing agency must make an individualized determination based on the record as a whole.”
Jason Alatidd is a Statehouse reporter for The Topeka Capital-Journal. He can be reached by email at jalatidd@usatodayco.com. Follow him on X @Jason_Alatidd.
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