Lorenzo Cain's Mad Dash Home Was 90 Feet of Redemption for Royals

Lorenzo Cain scored the go-ahead run in the bottom of the eighth inning last night, racing home from first on a single by Eric Hosmer. The last 90 feet of his journey were paved in redemption for the Kansas City who rode the aggressive play into the World Series.

It’s fitting the Royals clinched their second consecutive American League pennant in this fashion. Taking the extra base and applying pressure on the defense is in the team’s blue blood. Cain’s mad sprint home also provided a mulligan for third base coach Mike Jirschele, who held Alex Gordon at third base in the bottom of the ninth of World Series Game 7 last year. Madison Bumgarner proceeded to get Salvador Perez to pop out to third for the game’s final out. The Royals have had to live with the what-if since then. What if Jirschele had sent Gordon and forced the San Francisco Giants to make a play at the plate? This nagging question persisted even as consensus said the stop sign was the right call.

Baseball is a funny game. The ball finds players who don’t want it. It bounces in ways that make you question whether it’s an inanimate object or Hollywood producer.

So as all eyes in misty Kauffman Stadium turned to the third base bag, there was Jirschele, furiously motioning Cain home. He was a man doing one of the game’s most thankless jobs — one where where your name is only known after a screw-up.

Cain said he was shocked to see Jirschele waving him in. Fans everywhere were equally surprised. But so often the observer only sees the arm signals, the iceberg’s tip often belying the giant hunk of decision-making material lurking under a protective helmet.

"Cain didn’t know what Jirschele knew, didn’t know about a specific tendency of Bautista’s that Jirschele had noticed earlier in the series. Third-base coaches look for clues in outfielders’ actions, indicators that can influence their split-second decisions. Jirschele had seen Bautista make the long throw to second under similar circumstances in Game 3. Alas, the slow-footed Kendrys Morales was running and Jirschele couldn’t send him. Cain, of course, is not slow-footed. But he scored only because he adhered to a philosophy that Jirschele drills into all of the Royals’ base-runners from day one of spring training. “He tells us before each and every game: ‘Come to third base running hard. You never know what’s going to happen,’” Cain said. “He’s always yelling at us about it: ‘Come in hot. Don’t slow down. I’ll let you know.’” "

It wasn’t the most dramatic way to win a game. But it was a Royals way — and perhaps the most meaningful way they could have have won — considering the disappointment of last season.