Baltimore Orioles Set To Face Kansas City Royals Ace With 223 Strikeouts in Game 1

The Baltimore Orioles will take on an elite arm in Game 1 of the Wild Card Series against the Kansas City Royals.

Sep 24, 2024; Washington, District of Columbia, USA; Kansas City Royals starting pitcher Cole Ragans (55) pitches against the Washington Nationals during the first inning at Nationals Park. / Geoff Burke-Imagn Images

The Baltimore Orioles will officially take on the Kansas City Royals in the Wild Card round.

This is a good chance for the Orioles to play a team that also doesn't have much experience in the postseason throughout the past few years.

The Royals have multiple veterans on their roster, just as Baltimore does, but for the most part, they're a young ball club filled with inexperienced players.

As the Orioles found out during the 2023 campaign, not having experience in the postseason makes things difficult. They don't have much more than they did a year ago, but some is better than none.

Simply put, playing Kansas City was likely the best outcome for them.

Still, things won't be easy in this Wild Card series. There's a reason why the Royals are in the postseason, and plenty of that is because of what they've done on the mound.

Baltimore will have their hands filled in Game 1, as they'll start Cole Ragans, according to Jaylon Thompson of The Kansas City Star.

“It’s awesome,” Ragans said. “You know, I don’t think you could go wrong with any of the guys. I’m pumped to get us started. It’s exciting for everybody and we are looking forward to it. (Just) bringing the playoffs back to KC.”

The left-hander has been as good as it gets throughout the year, posting a 3.14 ERA, 1.14 WHIP, and has struck out 223 hitters in 186 1/3 innings pitched.

For an Orioles lineup that's gone cold a bit over the past couple of months, they need to be ready to go offensively.

Winning Game 1 is arguably more important than any other contest in a series, so at the very least, they have to find a way to scrap together a couple of runs and give Corbin Burnes an opportunity to take an early series lead.