KANSAS CITY -- Not often can one pitch tell the story of a pitcher’s night, but when Brady Singer dotted a 94 mph sinker on the inside part of the plate to Cubs left-handed first baseman Michael Busch in the top of the first inning Friday night, it seemed to foreshadow what was to come for the Royals' right-hander.

“That was kind of the pitch tonight,” Singer said after he threw seven scoreless innings with just two hits allowed against the Cubs, leading the Royals to a 6-0, series-opening win at Kauffman Stadium.

That’s now back-to-back starts of seven scoreless innings against teams from Chicago for Singer. It started first last weekend against the White Sox and continued Friday against the Cubs, but how he attacked each lineup was different. Against the South Siders, Singer worked in his four-seamer and sweeper, the two new pitches in his arsenal this year, to keep hitters off balance.

On Friday, it was all about his sinker command. Singer threw the pitch 59% of the time and got 12 called strikes on the pitch. Four of his five strikeouts came on the pitch -- all looking -- but Singer got the ground balls he needed for outs on it, too.

“Just trusting it,” Singer said. “Trusting it on the inner half. Not trying to yank it in there. This year, I’ve been trying to get in there, the thought process is there, but I haven’t been able to hit on it correctly. We worked on it a lot this week, and I was able to use it today.”

When the sinker is moving the way it did Friday, it’s hard for hitters to not only pick up but also square up. And now with his two new pitches, hitters have to respect Singer’s entire arsenal instead of waiting for the sinker to catch the middle of the plate.

That’s what has helped Singer be in such a groove for most of the year, with his ERA now at 2.82 across 21 starts. This is the second time in Singer's career he has thrown back-to-back scoreless outings of seven-plus innings, with the first occurring on May 17 and 22, 2022.

“I’ve seen him be a two-pitch pitcher in the past, and he’s no longer that,” first baseman Vinnie Pasquantino said. "The amount of growth he’s had and what he looks like now is incredible.”

By bouncing back after a disappointing 2023 season, in which he posted a 5.52 ERA, Singer’s growth has been a huge part of Kansas City's growth this year. He’s only 27 years old, but the righty is the longest-tenured Royals starter of the group they have now.

So perhaps it’s fitting that Singer was on the mound Friday night, helping the Royals’ to their 57th win of the season -- surpassing last year’s entire win total in front of 36,551 in attendance at The K, the second-largest crowd this year bested only by Opening Day (38,775, a sellout).

And by eclipsing last year’s win total, the Royals can officially move on from 2023.

“The book is closed,” Pasquantino said. “We have 57 wins, 2023 is no longer a thing in this clubhouse. We are onto 2024. We are here. We are 57 wins into it. And we’re excited to get to more.

“I think we’ve gotten to the point where every game is a big game now. We’ve talked about it all year: Where we want to be. We’re here. We’ve got 58 left. They’re all big now.”

Singer set the tone for win No. 57 by not allowing a hit until the fifth inning, when Dansby Swanson’s broken-bat single fell into left-center field. Singer navigated his way out of that inning with two on and one out thanks to a double play started by center fielder Kyle Isbel, who threw out Mike Tauchman trying to score from third on a shallow fly ball.

“That’s a gigantic swing in momentum right there, because you got the feeling it’s going to be a low-scoring game right there, the way things were going,” manager Matt Quatraro said.

The Royals immediately responded with a big fifth inning against veteran Kyle Hendricks, when six consecutive two-out hits created a six-run lead. Salvador Perez put an exclamation point on the inning when he sent a three-run, 429-foot blast out to deep left field for his team-leading 19th home run of the season.

“It felt like, not necessarily the nail in the coffin of that game, but definitely the momentum swung big time on that swing,” Pasquantino said.

And Singer made sure it stayed on the Royals’ side.

“He’s a bulldog,” designated hitter Adam Frazier said. “He’s not giving in. He's going to give you all he’s got every five days. He’s not backing down from anybody.”