ARLINGTON, Texas _ If this was the final act of Edinson Volquez' Royals career, well, the finale was hardly fitting. If Volquez finds himself pitching elsewhere after Monday's trade nonwaiver deadline, that's probably the only reason history will remember this one.
On Friday night at Globe Life Park, Volquez allowed six runs in six innings against the Texas Rangers. Three of those runs came in the bottom of the first. The Royals suffered another loss in this lost July, falling 8-3 to the Rangers in the second game of a four-game series.
Volquez, a prime target of this July trade market, fell to 8-9 on the season as his ERA rose to 4.70. The Royals absorbed their eighth loss in 10 games and dropped to 7-17 in the month of July.
A season that began with dreams of a third straight American Pennant is now on life support. A clubhouse of players is still searching for an answer. The most pressing question at the moment is which Royals _ if any _ will be moved by 3 p.m. Central Monday, the official time of this season's trade deadline.
A player's stock cannot be determined by one night. But Volquez did little to increase his value on Friday, allowing three runs during an underwhelming first inning.
By the end of the night, Volquez had allowed homers to Rangers second baseman Rougned Odor and left fielder Jurickson Profar. The Texas offense raked him for nine hits and five earned runs before he exited after six innings.
Odor would add another homer _ his third in two days _ off reliever Brian Flynn in the bottom of the seventh. The pitching woes obscured what was another pedestrian night from the Royals' offense.
On the day outfielder Lorenzo Cain returned from the disabled list, the Royals were flummoxed by Texas right-hander A.J. Griffin for the second time in six days. Last Sunday, Griffin yielded just one run in five innings in a 2-1 victory over the Royals at Kauffman Stadium. On Friday, he worked into the sixth inning and surrendered just two runs on a homer from first baseman Eric Hosmer.
That, at least, was something. Hosmer broke out of a 2-for-33 slump, raking a two-run homer just left of center field. The blast traveled 420 feet and sliced the Rangers' lead to 5-2. It ended a 25-day power drought for Hosmer, who had not homered since July 4 at Toronto.
All month, Hosmer had been mired in what Royals manager Ned Yost termed a "nasty slump". He entered Friday batting just .202 during the month of July. He had gone 11 days without an extra-base hit. And his season average had fallen to .283, its lowest point since the opening week of the season.
The homer did not lead to bigger things.
On a Friday night in Texas, the Royals fell to 49-53, the first time Kansas City has been four games under .500 this late in the season since the 2012 season. On Saturday night, starter Ian Kennedy will take the mound, hoping to stop a July collapse.
