KANSAS CITY, Mo. — It wasn’t the last pitch he threw in the bottom of the ninth inning that irked Matt Brash the most Monday night.
It was one of the first.
Brash jumped ahead in the count, 0-2, on Kansas City’s best hitter, Bobby Witt Jr., to open the ninth inning. Right where he wanted him, right?
Not quite.
He couldn’t finish off the at-bat and couldn’t close out the Royals, who scored two runs in the ninth to hand the Mariners a gut-punch loss, 7-6, in the opener of their four-game series at Kauffman Stadium.
Dairon Blanco dropped down a successful squeeze bunt to score pinch-runner Samad Taylor, flipping what would have been the Mariners’ most riveting comeback of the season into one of their most irritating losses.
After Julio Rodriguez delivered — twice — in the final two innings to help the Mariners erase a 5-0 deficit, Brash was called out of the bullpen, trying for his second save since the trade of veteran closer Paul Sewald two weeks ago.
“That’s a spot I want to be in,” Brash said. “Frustrated that I didn’t execute like I should have.”
Ahead on Witt 0-2, Brash threw three successive sliders, all out of the zone. Witt didn’t chase any of them.
On 3-2, Witt hit Brash’s 99-mph fastball up the middle for a leadoff single. Witt came around to score the tying run two batters later on Salvador Perez’s sacrifice fly.
“It shouldn’t have been 3-2. I was up 0-2,” Brash said. “He laid off some good sliders where I wanted to throw it, and he put a good swing on it and the ball found a hole.”
Andres Munoz, the Mariners’ other young, high-leverage reliever, was unavailable Monday after a heavy workload over the weekend.
The Mariners had traded Sewald to Arizona in large part because of the strength and depth of their bullpen.
They had already asked a lot out of Munoz and Brash, and the challenge of taking on a shared ninth-inning role has had its growing pains. Against Baltimore on Sunday, Munoz was called for a ninth-inning balk that helped the Orioles score a go-ahead run.
“It’s hard, obviously. The team fought to come back and I didn’t do my job,” Brash said. “But tomorrow’s a new day and I’m going to be asked to do it again. So I’ll be ready.”
Blanco dropped down the squeeze bunt on the first pitch he saw from Brash.
Dylan Moore, taking over at first base after Ty France was lifted for a pinch-runner in the top half of the ninth, couldn’t field the bunt cleanly, and Taylor dived home head first for the winning run.
“We knew they like to do it,” Brash said. “He laid down a good bunt. It would have been a bang-bang play anyways. They’ve got a lot of speed, so it’s a tough play.”
Mariners manager Scott Servais said he’ll continue to lean on Brash and Munoz in the highest-leverage situations.
“It is a new experience for some of our young guys,” Servais said. “They certainly have the ‘stuff’ to do it, and they’ll continue to get opportunities to do it. They’re really good; they’re some of the best relievers in the league. Sometimes you have to give the other team credit.”
The Mariners (63-55) have lost three in a row since their eight-game winning streak was snapped Saturday.
Rodriguez, for a moment, looked like he’d be the hero Monday after driving in three runs with a bases-clearing double in the eighth.
He added a go-ahead RBI single with two outs in the ninth to give the Mariners a 6-5 lead.
It was the first go-ahead hit in the ninth inning (or later) of Rodriguez’s career.
The Mariners were down to their final strike when Josh Rojas drove in the tying run with a line drive up the middle, scoring Teoscar Hernandez from second base.
It was Rojas’ biggest moment with his new club, two weeks after the Mariners acquired him in that trade with Arizona for Sewald.
“Heck of a comeback by our guys,” Servais said. “We were down and out and didn’t have a whole lot going offensively. But our guys don’t quit.”
Royals right-hander Brady Singer had taken a no-hitter into the seventh inning to help Kansas City (39-81) build a 5-0 lead into the eighth.
Dominic Canzone’s sharp single broke up Singer’s no-hit bid with two outs in the seventh.
In the eighth, Mike Ford doubled off Singer, whose final pitch of the night was an inside fastball that plunked Moore.
The Royals brought in their closer, Carlos Hernandez, who allowed a sharp single to Rojas, loading the bases for Rodriguez.
Rodriguez then laced an 0-1 slider into the left-field corner.
Perez hit a three-run home run in the first inning off Logan Gilbert, who had his shortest outing in more than two months. Gilbert’s final line: 4 1/3 innings, seven hits, four runs, two walks and five strikeouts.
It was Perez’s 12th home run in 57 games against the Mariners.
“Just felt a little bit off (today),” Gilbert said. “Had some deep counts and not getting ahead, I think that’s the main thing. Usually good or bad, it all goes back to how well you do that.”
Witt was credited with an inside-the-park home run in the fifth inning. The Royals shortstop, one of the fastest players in MLB, made it around the bases in 14.3 seconds after Canzone lost his hard-hit line drive in the lights. Rodriguez also fumbled the ball on the warning track in right field, and Witt didn’t hesitate rounding third.
Mariners rookie reliever Isaiah Campbell, called on with the bases loaded and two outs in the sixth inning, walked in a run to extend the Royals’ lead to 5-0.
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