The Royals have been playing in a lot of close games:
↵↵↵The Royals have the most one-run decisions in the American League with 30, notching 13 victories and 17 losses. They also have 15 two-run games, going 8-7, meaning 53 percent of their first 84 games were decided by two runs or less.
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Now just think if a few more of those had been converted to wins, which would have been fairly easy (in theory).
↵Maybe the Royals win 17 of those one-run games and lose 13. That'd cut their chase to the division lead in half.
↵Those numbers above mean the Royals played in a one or two-run game 53 percent of the time in the first half of the season.