I've been very hard on both Jose Guillen and the Royals recently, thinking that they both needed to come together and provide balance.  Today, they did both........and how!!

Guillen hit a ninth inning home run off Yankee closer Mariano Rivera, his fourth in the last three games, and Joakim Soria slammed the door in the last of the ninth, leading the Royals to a 3-2 victory and a split of the four game series.

Guillen has been swinging the bat very well as of late, making me very sorry that I questioned the amount of money the Royals spent for him.  Trey Hillman once said that he had a passion for the game, and it has proven to be true.  By the way, through seven games against the Yanks, the Royals are 4-3, with one more series to go in mid-August.

I like my crow barbecued, please.

My title is very true - especially through Chicago and New York.....

Let's face it.  The White Sox swept the Royals in South Chicago last week, and our local nine, with the exception of the 15-inning marathon, were pathetic.  That's all I can really say about that trip, so on to New York.

Friday night, the Royals accomplished something that they haven't done a lot of lately - win in New York.  Behind Kyle Davies, our losing streak breaker from one week ago, the Royals won 2-1.  On this night, they had pitching but no offense.

Yesterday afternoon, both teams had offense but no pitching.  Joakim Soria blew his first save opportunity of the season and the Royals lost 12-11.  Today, the Royals didn't show us enough of either pitching or offense, as they bowed 6-3, despite Jose Guillen's third home run in two games.

Luckily, the team with the worst record in baseball doesn't reside here.  The way I see it, that's the only positive.  This team needs balance, and soon.

As much as the Royals had been losing recently, and given my past luck hoping for a winner in a game that I attended, I had a title ready for this entry, which was to be "My third, their thirteenth."  Thank you, Royals, for changing all of that.

The Royals snapped their 12 game losing streak last night, defeating Cleveland and C.C. Sabathia 4-2.  That, along with a John Mayberry bobblehead, made for a fantastic and enjoyable evening.  The game was exciting from start to finish, and had its good, bad and ugly.  Here's the list:

THE GOOD - David DeJesus had a magical night, hitting a third inning home run and scoring what proved to be the go-ahead run in the fifth.  Kyle Davies wobbled in his first start of the season, but pitched better than the last time I saw him versus Minnesota last year.  Even JOHN BUCK had a good night.  Finally, Joakim Soria, although he gave up an eighth inning run in his first two-inning save opportunity, pitched well enough to save it.  I LOVED "WELCOME TO THE JUNGLE!!"

THE BAD - Alex Gordon couldn't catch up to Sabathia all night and Jose Guillen was hitless as well.

THE UGLY - Joey Gathright lost a ball in the lights in the eighth, and Guillen and Tony Pena, Jr. couldn't get there either, setting up a "Bermuda Triangle" with possible problems.  Thankfully, nothing materialized.

The game was exciting from the start, and it felt so good to finally see a win.  Hopefully, with road games against the White Sox and Yankees coming up this week, the boys in blue could give us even more wins to write about.

THIS WAS FUN!!