Brian Bannister was unable to make it out of the fourth inning.  He was charged with eight runs and the offense had no chance against Jeff Neimann as the Royals dropped their sixth in a row losing 9-0 to Tampa.

Down 3-0 in the fourth, the Rays had the bases loaded when Carlos Guillen hit a grounder to Billy Butler at first.  He double pumped and the Royals could only get one out on the play.  Then, Ben Zobrist ended Bannister’s night with a grand slam.

The Royals bats were dead again, but they ran into a 6’9 rookie in Neimann who had nasty stuff all night long.  He gave up just two hits and a walk while striking out nine.

The one issue with the Royals would be if they would have enough offense to produce on a consistent basis.  It appears again for this season, the answer is no.  This team is not built to run a five or six game winning streak of their own, but they’ve got to find ways to limit these long losing streaks.  In this current six game slide, the Royals have scored just 14 runs and are batting .203.