At this point Johnny Cueto can barely consider himself a .500 pitcher, let alone the ace of a staff. He fell to 9-9 as he labored through five innings, allowing 10 hits including three homers in the Royals 8-5 loss to the Orioles. This follows his career-high 13 hit loss in Boston.
Cueto is now 2-3 with the Royals and has given up 12 runs in his last two starts. Prior to that, he had allowed 12 earned runs in his previous nine starts dating back to July 2 when he was with the Reds. Cueto gave up a trio of two-run homers to Manny Machado in the third, Jonathon Shoop in the fourth and Chris Davis in the fifth.
“I’m not a robot,” he said. “Just have to keep working, get ready for the next one.”
Jeremy Guthrie, sent to the bullpen, didn’t fare too well either. Steve Pearce made it a 7-3 game with a solo shot in the eighth for Baltimore. Mike Moustakas hit a two-run homer off Brian Matusz in the bottom half of the inning, but Ryan Flaherty answered with the Orioles’ fifth homer of the game to lead off the ninth.