Ned Yost is just like the rest of us: susceptible to the occasional brain fart.
Kansas City Royals pitcher Jakob Junis flirted with a no-hitter Monday night against the Seattle Mariners, losing the bid with no outs in the seventh inning. But the fact that he was holding Seattle hitless didn’t register with his manager until the fifth inning, when Junis began to labor.
At one point in the inning, Yost turned to Royals bench coach Dale Sveum and said he’d yank Junis if he didn’t buckle down. When Sveum looked at Yost in surprise, it finally dawned on the Royals manager that Junis was throwing a no-no.
“Dale thought I was kidding,” Yost said, via ESPN.com, “but I honestly had no idea.”
Huh?
“I was paying attention to the score, but I wasn’t paying attention to how many hits they had,” he added. “I looked up and saw (Junis) had a no-hitter and I was completely oblivious to it.”
Before you crucify Yost, consider this: By the time he realized Junis was throwing a no-hitter, the 25-year-old right-hander already had hit three batters and walked two more. So, it’s not like Junis was carving up the Mariners.
When asked after the game what he would’ve done if Yost tried to pull him in the fifth, Junis was refreshingly honest.
“I would have had to tell him to go back,” he said.
The Royals went on to pound the Mariners 10-0. Junis surrendered just one hit while striking out three over seven innings.
