BOBBY WITT JR. AND MICHAEL WACHA VOTED ROYALS PLAYER/PITCHER OF THE MONTH FOR AUGUST

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The Kansas City Royals announced this morning that infielder Bobby Witt Jr. and right-handed pitcher Michael Wacha have been named the Royals Player and Pitcher of the Month for August, respectively. The awards are voted on by local media.

After being named the American League Player of the Month for July, Witt Jr. had another impressive August campaign, hitting .310/.378/.673 (35-for-113) in 28 games. Of his 35 hits, 20 were extra-base hits (57.1%), a mark that ranks him ahead of Jarren Duran’s 19 extra-base hits. Witt Jr.’s 20 extra-base hits were the most extra-base hits by a Royal in August, and the most extra-base hits by a Royal in a month since Mike Sweeney had 20 extra-base hits in May 2001. His 35 hits last month were tied for second in the American League behind Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (39); his 10 home runs were tied for third and he ranked fifth in the league with a 1.051 OPS. The shortstop hit 23 of 28 games (and the Royals went 15-8 in games in which he had a hit) and he had at least one RBI in 14 of 28 games. In the Royals’ 8-4 win over Boston on Aug. 7, he went 3-for-4 with 4 RBIs and 2 home runs, marking his 6th career multi-homer game and 4th of the season. By hitting his 20th home run of the season on Aug. 1 in Detroit, he became the first major leaguer to record 20 home runs and 20 stolen bases in each of his first three seasons. Yesterday in Houston, he opened September with his 30th home run of the year, becoming the first player in Royals history to record back-to-back 30-homer seasons. The unanimous selection marks Witt Jr.’s third monthly honor of the season (also in May and July) and the seventh of his career, which is already the 6th-most honors given to a Royals position player since the award’s inception in 1995.

Wacha went 3-0 in 5 starts in August and posted a 3.19 ERA (11 ERA in 31.0 innings). He was one of only three American League pitchers to record at least 3 wins and no losses last month, joining Houston’s Yusei Kikuchi and Baltimore’s Zach Eflin. Wacha began the month with 4 straight quality starts from Aug. 4-23, during which he posted a 2.16 ERA (6 ERA in 25.0 innings). During that span, he held his former Cardinals team to just 2 runs on 5 hits in 7.0 innings in an 8-3 Royals win on Aug. 10 at Kansas City, after which he recorded 6 scoreless innings in his next start on Aug. 17 at Cincinnati, where he held the Reds to just 4 hits and 1 walk, with a season-high 9 strikeouts. After recording 6.0 innings on Aug. 28 at Cleveland, he is at 139.0 innings for the season, which is already his most innings pitched in a single season since 2017, when he threw a career-high 165.2 innings for St. Louis. This is the first monthly honor of Wacha’s career as a Royal, having signed as a major league free agent with Kansas City last December.

-KANSAS CITY ROYALS-