BALTIMORE — It was just past 8:45 p.m. on Wednesday when the 2024 Royals assembled on the infield grass of Camden Yards for a class photo. Just one hour earlier, they had finished off the Baltimore Orioles 2-1, sweeping the brief Wild Card Series and advancing to play the New York Yankees in the ALDS. Next came the Champagne, then the cigars, and when the players’ families and children began parading through the hazy clubhouse at just past 8:30, out to the field they went.
In the dead center was the captain, Salvador Perez, the 34-year-old catcher who had not won a postseason series in 10 years. He kept yelling. A few feet to his right stood the valedictorian, Bobby Witt Jr., the precocious shortstop responsible for a game-winning RBI for a second straight night. He was smiling. On the other edge of the frame was the professor, Matt Quatraro, the second-year manager with a syllabus that amounts to one word: “Today.”
The group was around 100 deep in all. There was J.J. Picollo, the general manager who had rebuilt a 106-loss club into a contender. Scattered throughout was the once-suspect Kansas City bullpen, which had blanked the Orioles for a second straight night. They were all surrounded by friends and family and staff — soaked in Champagne, smelling of light beer and smoke — and when the photograph was finally captured, a portable speaker started blasting a song by Kendrick Lamar. Perez led the group in a cathartic singalong.
“They not like us! They not like us! They not like us!”
In this case, it’s not just a diss track. In the annals of baseball history, there has never been another team quite like the 2024 Royals. It may sound hyperbolic; it was just the wild-card round, after all. But on Wednesday, they became the second team ever to win a postseason series one year after losing at least 100 games. The other was the 2020 Marlins, which snuck into the playoffs in a 60-game season. Which means that Kansas City is the first team ever to lose 106 games one year, gain entry into the playoff field after 162 games the next, and then TKO another playoff team.
“You have to look at it a lot of different ways,” Quatraro said. “You get knocked down, you have two choices: you can get up or curl up in a ball. And there’s nobody in that room that does that. They live that way. When you get a whole group of guys together that live that way, it’s really special.”
Consider a Sunday afternoon 11 days ago: The Royals had just been swept by the San Francisco Giants, losing their seventh straight game. What had once felt like a dream season was falling apart. Their lead for the third wild-card spot was down to one game. The clubhouse felt like a morgue. And then reliever Will Smith stood up as the players prepared to file out. He wanted to remind them of the good news: They had an off day tomorrow.
“You guys are looking at this the wrong way,” Smith said. “Like, there’s no way we can lose tomorrow.”
The comment hung in the air for a moment. Then bench coach Paul Hoover piped up.
“Laugh,” he said.
They still had two choices.
Two days later, the Royals began a three-game sweep of the Nationals. By that Friday, they had clinched a wild-card spot. On Wednesday in Baltimore, the club’s special sauce — a steely resilience, a battle-tested starting rotation, a supporting cast of unlikely heroes, and a radiant star at shortstop — was on full display.
In the bottom of the fifth, there was reliever Angel Zerpa, who came on with one out, the scored tied 1-1, the bases loaded, and Camden Yards ready to unleash a fury of pent-up energy. Zerpa was recently on the roster at Triple-A Omaha, where he had returned to work on a breaking ball. On Wednesday, he got Baltimore’s Colton Cowser to swing at a 97 mph sinker that tailed inside and hit the batter on the hand. He then retired Adley Rutschman on a ground ball to Witt. In what Quatraro would call “the biggest spot of his life,” Zerpa had embodied the ethos of the 2024 Royals.
“He loves to pitch,” Quatraro said.
That was just the prelude to the top of the sixth. One night after driving in the only run in a 1-0 victory, Witt stepped to the plate with runners on the corners and two out against Orioles reliever Yennier Cano. When he slapped a hard grounder up the middle, pretty much everyone in the Royals dugout knew Witt would beat it out.
“It’s kind of embodiment of our entire season,” said starting pitcher Seth Lugo, who allowed a run in 4 ⅓ innings. “Hustle and heart.”
There are all kinds of October stories. There are the dynasties that show up year after year. There are the small-market spoilers who craft improbable tales. Yet nine years after winning their last World Series, the Royals are one of the strangest October specimens around. They don’t make the playoffs much — just four times since 1985. But when they do, they rarely lose. The last three times the Royals were in the postseason — 1985, 2014 and 2015 — they made the World Series. On Wednesday, they improved to 9-1 in their last 10 postseason rounds, the only loss coming in seven games to the Giants in the 2014 World Series.
Perhaps the experience of being around those runs a decade ago emboldened Picollo, the Royals GM, to focus on the possible. The club spent $110 million in free agency last winter, rebuilt their starting rotation, and internally, at least, they tried to talk themselves into contention. It wasn’t delusion; it was belief. And when the Royals got off to a good start in April and May, Picollo began to feel something real.
“When we got to about June 1,” Picollo says, “I was like: You know what? Why not?”
As the wins piled up, the Royals front office tried to stay in the moment. The roster stayed relatively healthy. They added talent at the deadline. The players, Picollo says, will show you who you are.
“They were the inspiration for us to keep pushing and keep pushing and keep pushing,” he said. “You’re just in the moment. We had a good team all year long. So you just keep thinking you’re a good team. Then they start believing. And we all believe. And next thing you know, here we are.”
On Wednesday, here was the infield of Camden Yards just before 9 p.m. On Saturday, it will be Yankee Stadium in Game 1 of the ALDS.
“Look at these professional Champagne poppers now,” said outfielder Tommy Pham, one of those late-season acquisitions.
As the party raged on Wednesday night, a 71-year-old in a soaked blue T-shirt and slides appeared in the clubhouse with a beer in his hand. It was George Brett, the Royals Hall of Famer who spent his career dueling with the Yankees. This time, he’s just along for the ride, a spectator watching a wild story unfold. The 2024 Royals are not the Royals of the 1970s, they are not the world champions from nine years ago, and they are not the team that lost 106 games last year.
They are a hungry group with two choices, Quatraro says, and they only know one way to live.
“As cliché as that sounds,” Witt said, “with this team, you could just feel it.”
(Top photo of the team photo: Icon Sportswire via AP Images)
