KC Royals: Will The Real Johnny Cueto Please Stand Up

By Leigh Oleszczak | Oct 23, 2015

The KC Royals continue to battle the Toronto Blue Jays in the ALCS and currently have a 3-2 series lead.

With Yordano Ventura scheduled to take the mound in Game 6 on Friday, hopefully, the Kansas City Royals can get a W that night and clinch their second consecutive World Series berth. If the Royals lose on Friday, a Game 7 will be played on Saturday at the K, and that means Johnny Cueto would once again be slated to take the mound.

Cueto has been a question mark during his time in Kansas City. Dayton Moore went out and acquired Cueto from the Cincinnati Reds in late July for left-handed pitchers Brandon Finnegan, John Lamb, and Cody Reed. The trade was perceived differently by fans at the time.

Most were thrilled. Cueto coming to Kansas City gave the Royals rotation a real ace. Ventura had been struggling to fit that role in 2015, and now he wouldn’t have to feel like he was forced into that role.

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Other fans, however, were saddened by the loss of Finnegan, the Royals’ Wildcard hero last September. Was this trade hurting the Royals’ future?

The truth is that we won’t know the answer to that for awhile. Obviously Cueto was brought to Kansas City to help this team make it to and win the World Series. If the team falls short of that goal, this trade could be considered a bust, but you can’t fault Moore for making the move.

Cueto’s time as a Royal has been inconsistent. He started off going six innings against the Blue Jays in Toronto, giving up three earned runs. Not bad for his first stint despite the Royals losing that game. The next game he went seven innings, only giving up two runs to the Tigers.

It was his third start as a Royal, and his second against the Tigers, that would get everyone pumped about this trade. Cueto pitched a complete game shutout of the Tigers and only allowed four hits in the process. It was a game that set the pace for Johnny Cueto as a Royal, and he had one decent start right after that, but he didn’t live up to those starts again until Game 5 of the ALDS.

Everyone remembers the horrid stretch for Cueto stemming from August 21st through September 13th. During that span, Cueto went 26.1 innings in five games and saw his ERA balloon to a 5.43. Not good.

Obviously Cueto was brought to Kansas City to help this team make it to and win the World Series. If the team falls short of that goal, this trade could be considered a bust, but you can’t fault Moore for making the move.

Obviously Cueto was brought to Kansas City to help this team make it to and win the World Series. If the team falls short of that goal, this trade could be considered a bust, but you can’t fault Moore for making the move.

Cueto started looking a little bit better as the season went along, but fans were freaking out about which Cueto the Royals would see in the playoffs. Would they see the dominant complete game shutout Cueto or the one who gave up seven runs to the Boston Red Sox?

Game 2 of the ALDS was the latter. Johnny Cueto did not look good in his first appearance against the Houston Astros. He managed to go six innings but gave up four runs early on to force the KC Royals to have to come back once again.

The Royals won that game in spite of Cueto, not because of him. Game 5 was a different story, however, as Cueto pitched eight innings of two-run ball. The two runs he gave up really shouldn’t have happened, but the Royals still won 7-2 in a must win game.

That was the Johnny Cueto fans hoped to see all season long, and especially in Game 3 of the ALCS against the Blue Jays. That did not happen, though, as Cueto got lit up by Toronto’s high-powered offense and only lasted two innings.

I was watching that game with a friend of mine who doesn’t follow the Royals (she’s from St. Louis) and she asked, “Who is your pitcher? He sucks!” and when I told her about the big trade the Royals had made for him she goes, “Oh, yikes.”

Hopefully the Kansas City Royals win Game 6 so fans don’t have to go through another dreaded Cueto start in a high-pressure situation (well, that and I am getting more and more nervous the longer this series goes).

If the Royals do make it to the World Series, we can probably expect two starts from Johnny Cueto during that seven-game series (should seven games be necessary). Let’s hope neither of those starts is considered “Oh, yikes” starts for Cueto.

Come on Johnny. We’re all counting on you.

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