"The Royals saw their four-game winning streak come to abrupt end Saturday - along with any realistic hope of winning the Cactus League pennant - in a 3-1 loss to the San Francisco Giants in Scottsdale, Ariz. "We faced some pretty good pitching," manager Ned Yost said. "Some of that has to come into play a little bit. We had a chance with the bases loaded (in the third inning) and hit the ball on the ground for a double play." Melky Cabrera grounded into that double play, which enabled Giants starter Barry Zito to escape unharmed. Zito gave up just one run in six innings before Ramon Ramirez, Jeremy Affeldt, Sergio Romo and Santiago Casilla closed out the victory. The Royals, 14-7-1, managed just four hits after entering the game as the major-league leader in runs and ranked second in batting average. San Francisco, 18-6, scored all of its runs on bases-empty, one-out homers against Bruce Chen: Cody Ross in the second inning, Buster Posey in the fourth, and Aubrey Huff in the sixth. "I thought Bruce threw great," Yost said. "The three home runs he gave up, two were on change-ups and one on a cutter. One change-up was down, and the cutter was down. They weren't horribly bad pitches."" Read more: http://www.kansascity.com/2011/03/19/2738950/saturdays-day-in-camp-giants-3.html
