Game thread XLVI – Royals at Cardinals

Noah Cameron has done a lot of looking for answers this year | Brad Penner-Imagn Images

The Royals are now in the midst of their second losing streak of at least five games. They only have a single five-game winning streak to counter them. They could start another one of those today, but it’s hard to believe it while they’re losing.

Noah Cameron was surprisingly good for the Royals last year. While some thought there was room for him to be a worse pitcher in 2026, no one expected him to become this bad. Unfortunately, it appears he dropped his arm angle considerably in search of a better fastball shape that has wrecked his control and effectiveness with his other pitches. It’s led to Noah only making it as far as six innings once and giving up 3+ runs in each of his last five starts.

The Cardinals will send Kyle Leahy to the mound. He’s spent his entire four-year career in St. Louis, and he’s been kind of an unremarkable reliever. With the Cardinals leaning into their rebuild over the offseason, they moved him to the rotation, where he has been kind of an unremarkable starter. He throws six pitches at least 10% of the time. None of them grades poorly, but only the sweeper is remarkable. None of them are thrown in the zone particularly often, get very much chase, or generate whiffs. His season xWOBACon – a measure of how well he’s hit when batters do make contact – is also poor. In a way, it’s kind of remarkable that he’s been so unremarkable when he’s not able to do any of the things that generally make a pitcher good.

Lineups

The Royals’ lineup has done a lot of getting on base, but then not really getting guys home on this road trip. They loaded the bases with one out on two different occasions last night and only got one runner home each time. Bases-loaded situations have actually been awful for the team all year, with them slashing .220/.288/.317/.606 in such situations. During the hot stretch, they were getting hits with runners in scoring position, but those problems have reared their heads again on this trip. Hopefully, they can figure it out soon.