Jac Caglianone spent Saturday night doing damage in every direction, and the Royals rode it to a 6-3 win over the Cubs at Kauffman Stadium.
Kansas City’s first baseman finished 4-for-4 with two doubles, two home runs and four RBIs, giving the Royals a split of the series and setting up Sunday’s series and homestand finale. His two blasts covered a combined 868 feet, a number that fits the way he looked at the plate all night.
The first came in the opening inning, when Caglianone sent a Statcast-projected 448-footer to center field off Cubs starter Clay Holmes. His second homer, a 420-foot shot to the Fountain Deck in right field, was his 20th of the season.
Between the two long balls, Caglianone also stacked up a pair of doubles, making him the first MLB player this year to post two doubles and two homers in the same game. The last player to do it was Junior Caminero on May 31, 2025.
For the Royals, it was the first four-extra-base-hit game by one of their players since Kendrys Morales on Sept. 20, 2015.
Caglianone’s first homer helped Kansas City jump on Holmes early. Holmes was making his Cubs debut after being acquired from the Mets at the Trade Deadline and activated off the injured list before the game.
The Royals added two more runs in the second, and Caglianone’s first double drove in another. They had a chance for more in that inning, but he was held at third on Isaac Collins’ single and later thrown out at home when Michael Massey hit a grounder to first base.
Seth Lugo gave up three runs over six innings for Kansas City, which left John Schreiber protecting a one-run lead in the seventh. The inning got tense when Schreiber walked Tyrone Taylor and Pete Crow-Armstrong with two outs, but he ended it by getting Seiya Suzuki to strike out swinging on a fastball.
Schreiber was amped as he walked off the mound.
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For Royals fans, the larger takeaway was not that Witt was suddenly available, but the opposite. Kansas City has long operated as if its franchise centerpiece is off-limits, and the idea that a club like Boston would even circle his name only reinforced how valuable he has become. It also underscored a familiar deadline truth: teams can ask, but some players are simply too important to pry loose. [Read more 🡒]
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Royals Pipeline Looks Stronger As Long Term Core Questions Loom
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For a Royals team weighing the long-term shape of its core, that kind of prospect presence matters. The conversation around the roster will inevitably circle back to Bobby Witt Jr. and Maikel Garcia, whose contract situations loom over the bigger picture, and the front office would love to have internal options arriving at the right time. Lists like this do not guarantee anything, but they do show Kansas City has more than one path to keep the roster stocked if the next wave continues to develop. [Read more 🡒]