Giants play spoiler with dominant three-game sweep vs. Royals

KANSAS CITY -- For the first time in nearly two months, the Giants managed to break out the brooms.

With a 2-0 win over the Royals in Sunday’s series finale at Kauffman Stadium, the Giants recorded their second consecutive shutout and finished off their first road sweep of the season, improving to 5-1 over the first two legs of their final 2024 jaunt.

Left-hander Blake Snell stayed hot by striking out nine over six scoreless innings, helping the Giants clinch only their third sweep in 12 opportunities this year, with their first two coming at home against the lowly Rockies from May 17-19 and July 26-28.

“It’s just nice to get a sweep against a good team,” manager Bob Melvin said. “We’re playing good right now.”

The Giants have gone only 36-42 away from home this year, compared to 41-37 at Oracle Park, but they’re finishing their road slate on a high note. They’ve now won three straight road series against a trio of playoff contenders -- the Padres, Orioles and Royals -- and will have a chance to continue to play spoiler when they head to Arizona to play their final three road games against the D-backs.

“Getting two in Baltimore and then sweeping the Royals -- playoff teams -- there’s nothing better,” Snell said. “It’s frustrating because we know how good we are. For us to not get it done the way we could, that’s frustrating, but it speaks a lot about how we want to win. We’re not just going to cave in. We want to play, we want to win. We want to make it hard on these teams to beat us. We’re doing a great job of that. We’re all playing for a lot right now.”

Giants starters Mason Black, Landen Roupp and Snell combined to work 16 2/3 scoreless innings against the slumping Royals, who have lost seven straight and mustered only one run over the three-game series.

Pitching through misty conditions, Snell extended his dominant second half by allowing only two hits and walking one in the efficient 88-pitch effort. He used his trusty curveball to induce seven of his nine punchouts, striking out five in a row between the second and third innings.

The Giants have now won 12 of the last 14 games started by Snell, who is 5-0 with a 1.23 ERA and 114 strikeouts over 80 1/3 innings since returning from a left groin strain on July 9. His ERA has dropped from 9.51 to 3.12 over that span and could sink even lower if he keeps shoving in his final start of the year against the Cardinals next weekend.

“I wish I could’ve done it sooner,” said Snell, who will have the ability to opt out of the final year of his two-year, $62 million deal at the end of the season. “I wish I was healthier. I wish I would’ve slowed down and listened to myself more. But it’s learning moments. Everything that happened, I’m happy about it. I learned a lot. I got better.”

The Giants scored the only two runs of the game in the second, when Grant McCray delivered an RBI triple against Royals All-Star Seth Lugo and scored on a two-out single by Brett Wisely.

McCray, 23, is batting .212 with a .678 OPS and 44 strikeouts over 104 at-bats since making his Major League debut on Aug. 14, but he’s flashed his tantalizing power potential, with 10 of his 22 hits going for extra bases.

“He’s had some swing-and-miss, but he always finds a way to do something to help you win, whether it’s his defense, whether it was a big hit today,” Melvin said. “That was a huge hit for us today because Lugo looked like he was on his game. Now, all of a sudden, we get a hit from Wisely and it’s 2-0. He can strike out three times, and his fourth at-bat is productive. It doesn’t look like he’s nervous at the big leagues. It looks like he’s very confident.”