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MINNEAPOLIS -- The Kansas City Royals have won the last six games started by James Shields, though its hard to tell by looking at his record. "I think my two-month anniversary was coming up of not getting a win," Shields said Friday night after throwing six solid innings in the Royals 9-3 victory over the Minnesota Twins. Shields (3-6) earned his 90th career win, although it was his first in 11 starts. Shields previous victory came April 30 in an 8-2 win over Tampa Bay. Since then, the Royals have failed to give Shields much run support. But it was a different story on Friday. Kansas City had a season-high four homers, two from Eric Hosmer, and one apiece from Billy Butler and Mike Moustakas. Butler started things off with a three-run shot in the first. "I cant remember the last time Shields has had a lead, I mean seriously, I cant remember," Royals manager Ned Yost said. In fact, Friday marked the first time since that April 30 win that Shields had a lead of more than one run. "Is that opening day?" Hosmer joked. "This is what our offence is capable of doing, and we feel confident that we can put up a lot of runs and then put up days like this." Clete Thomas homered for the Twins, who got another rough start from P.J. Walters (2-4). Walters allowed six runs in three innings, one start after giving up six in the first at Cleveland last Saturday. The Royals entered the game with the fewest home runs in the majors (43) -- two behind Miami -- and had given Shields some of the worst run support in the league. But the veteran right-hander had a three-run lead by the time he took the mound for the first time Friday, thanks to Butler. "I think after that first swing, it really opened us up as an offence and we just kept getting the big hit or the big swing with guys in scoring position," Hosmer said. "Hopefully we can put up more offensive outings like that for Shields." Shields never allowed Minnesota to get close the rest of the way. Walters, on the other hand, never found a rhythm. Down 4-0 in the third, he allowed a two-run homer to Moustakas and drew a chorus of boos from the home crowd. "Walters just couldnt make any pitches and couldnt get the ball where he wanted to," Twins manager Ron Gardenhire said. "Just a bad night for him." Walters has allowed 12 runs in his last 3 2-3 innings. "We all have games where we struggle," Walters said. "Everybody in the league has them. Ive just put two of them in a row together. In my eyes its unacceptable. To the team Im sure it is, too." Anthony Swarzak took over for Walters in the fourth and gave up a solo shot to Hosmer in the fifth. Hosmer got Swarzak again in the seventh, this time with Alcides Escobar on base, for the second multihomer game of his career. The offensive outburst was a welcome change for Shields, who had been stuck on 89 wins for his previous 10 starts despite putting up quality numbers. He entered Friday nights game with the eighth-best ERA in the AL (2.92), third in innings (111) and eighth in strikeouts (99). But his run support of 3.00 per nine innings pitched was second-lowest in the league. "This teams been grinding all season long," Shields said. "We won the last six of my games, and I have no doubt in my mind that were just going to keep going up from here." The Twins broke through against Shields in the fourth when Justin Morneau hit an RBI double. Morneau came around to score three batters later on a double by Brian Dozier. Thomas led off the fifth with a homer to right. Shields worked 6 1-3 innings before being pulled for Tim Collins. NOTES: Rain delayed the first pitch by 26 minutes. ... Hosmers last multihomer game came on Aug. 31, 2011, at Detroit. ... Ryan Doumit returned to Minnesotas lineup after missing a couple games with a sore ankle. .. Twins RHP Mike Pelfrey (back) is expected to begin a rehab assignment next week with Class-A Cedar Rapids. ... Yost said RHP Felipe Paulino has developed soreness in his throwing shoulder and will not pitch on Sunday as part of his rehab assignment at Double-A Northwest Arkansas. ... The Royals and Twins play the third of their four-game series on Saturday when Wade Davis takes his 4-5 record to the mound against Minnesotas Kyle Gibson, who makes his major league debut.Rob Gronkowski Youth Jersey . Only three players drafted by NHL clubs were included on the Czech selection camp roster on Wednesday. Those players were Dallas Stars 2012 first-rounder Radek Faksa, Winnipeg Jets 2013 fourth-rounder Jan Kostalek and Phoenix Coyotes 2012 seventh-rounder Marek Langhamer. Irving Fryar Youth Jersey . Fernandez, coached in Toronto by former two-time Olympic silver medallist Brian Orser, scored 267.11 points and is the first champion to successfully defend since Russias Evgeny Plushenko in 2005 and 2006. https://www.patriotssportsgoods.com/Womens-Stephon-Gilmore-Inverted-Jersey/ .C. -- Charlotte Bobcats coach Steve Clifford said after all of these years in the NBA hes still amazed at some of the things LeBron James does. Stephon Gilmore Jersey .H. -- Matt Kenseth made it 2 for 2 in the Chase, holding off teammate Kyle Busch to win Sunday at New Hampshire Motor Speedway. Tedy Bruschi Youth Jersey . -- Most satisfying to Russ Smith about No.One of the most compelling unanswered questions heading into the 2016 season involved the future of Washington quarterback Kirk Cousins. After initially failing to impress as the on-again, off-again replacement for Robert Griffin, Cousins cut out the interceptions and produced a magical run to lead Washington to the playoffs in 2015. The numbers were almost comically great: Over the final 10 games of 2015, Cousins threw 23 touchdowns against three picks and posted a 78.8 QBR, the second-best figure in football.Washington general manager Scot McCloughan chose to franchise Cousins over the offseason in lieu of allowing him to hit unrestricted free agency or locking him up with a long-term extension. The goal, naturally, was to keep Cousins on the roster while waiting to see whether the guy who blew up in 2015 was the real deal. Eight weeks into the season, as I discussed with Mina Kimes and Sheil Kapadia in our live podcast this week in Seattle, Im not really sure we know the answer.The Magic 8 Ball appears to be coming up with shake again for Cousins, but lets see if we can look a little deeper into Cousins run to figure out what Washington might do -- and should do -- this offseason.While Cousins played relatively well in all facets of the game during the 2015 season, his incredible 10-game run was built upon two fronts, both of which were going to be difficult to maintain. One was an oddly microscopic interception rate: a passer who had thrown picks on 4.3 percent of his pass attempts before the now-famous You Like That game versus the Buccaneers threw just three interceptions over his final 315 pass attempts in 2015, a 1.0 percent clip.Nobody sustains a 1.0 percent interception rate, not even your Tom Bradys and Alex Smiths of the world, so there was little reason to think Cousins would continue to post a rate in that ballpark. Cousins was always going to regress, but the question was whether it would be to the mean or to his former, borderline-unplayable self.The answer, at least thus far, is that Cousins has basically been about an average quarterback in terms of avoiding interceptions. His interception rate is 2.2 percent, roughly that of a league-average passer (2.0 percent), and its only above that league-average rate after throwing what amounted to an effective punt on third down against the Bengals in London last weekend. It has been only 321 pass attempts, so Cousins could still turn back into his old self, but we basically now have two full seasons of data to work with for Cousins.Up to that Bucs game, he threw 27 interceptions in 635 attempts. Since the Tampa victory, he has been picked just 10 times in 636 passes. We have as much data suggesting Cousins will be able to avoid having interceptions plague his career as we do saying hell be a mess.In looking at Cousins interceptions this season, its still clear that defenses can fool him.He has that Hail Mary pick, an interception that was tipped at the line against Pittsburgh, and a frantic throw under pressure that Malcolm Jenkins returned to the house.His other four interceptions have all been on throws where a defender was able to undercut a receiver who looked open to Cousins for an easy pick.Defenses still fool him with trap coverages from their cornerbacks and robber looks over the middle of the field, where defenders can either come off of their men or disguise their intentions before breaking on the football. Jamar Taylors interception in the Browns game and C.J. Mosleys near-pick-six are the exact sorts of interceptions Cousins gets in the habit of throwing.Cousins also has two interceptions in the red zone this year, which was his other point of emphasis in 2015. The former Michigan State star was a monster inside the 20 last year, throwing for 22 touchdowns without an interception while taking just one sack in 80 dropbacks. While he unquestionably got help from star tight end Jordan Reed, Cousins was at the focal point of an offense which was ninth in points per red zone trip.I wrote before the season about how red zone performance is wildly inconsistent from year to year, and indeed, Washington has been awful in the red zone this year. Cousins obviously has more interceptions to his name in the red zone than the zero he posted last season, and Washington is averaging a league-low 3.97 points per red zone trip this season. Cousins himself posted a 96.7 QBR on throws inside the red zone last season, the second-best figure in the league; this year, his 63.8 QBR is good for only 16th in the league.Given that Cousins was 10th in QBR outside the red zone in 2015 and is at the same spot again in 2016, the red zone decline explains why he has fallen from fourth in raw QBR a year ago to 13th this season. Cousins also falls one spot to 14th once you account for strength of schedule; he has the third-largest gap between his raw QBR and his opponent-adjusted QBR, with only Brian Hoyer and Ryan Tannehill facing easier schedules so far this season.And yet, having said all that: Theres nothing wrong with the 14th-best quarterback in football, or a passer in the range of league average. Cousins has had games where he has failed to impress -- he might have left three touchdowns on the field in Week 1 -- but the bottom has never fallen out completely, as he has posted adjusted QBR figures between 41.9 and 73.9 in each of his seven games this season. He has just one game with as many as two picks after posting four such games in the first six ccontests last year.dddddddddddd. Cousins hasnt hit the heights of the best parts of his 2015, but he also hasnt come close to sinking down to its lows, either.You can win a lot of games with a league-average quarterback.Alex Smith is 35-18 as one with the Chiefs. Joe Flacco?is?worse than league average, and he has gone 78-51 and won a Super Bowl with the Ravens. Ideally, you want your quarterback to be an undeniable superstar or a developing young passer on a rookie deal, but its usually better to have a reasonable quarterback locked down than it is to take a shot in the dark at the games most important position.The reason I inserted usually into that previous sentence, as you might already suspect, involves Brock Osweiler. We know more about Cousins than we did about Osweiler when the latter signal-caller hit free agency after seven career starts, but the idea here is roughly the same: Team develops quarterback into what looks to be something around a league-average passer and then has to decide whether hes worth keeping around if the cost is a little more than league average.The Broncos did their due diligence in evaluating Osweiler and decided, even if it meant leaving a viable Super Bowl contender with Trevor Siemian and Mark Sanchez at quarterback, that Osweiler wasnt worth what he was being offered on the free market. Osweiler then signed a four-year, $72 million deal that was really more like a two-year, $31 million contract with two team options tacked on the end. As it stands right now, Osweilers deal is already underwater. The Texans owe him $19 million in guaranteed money in 2017 when they probably would prefer to cut him and start anew again at quarterback.The simple argument Ive seen from people in and around the league when it comes to franchise quarterbacks is that if you have to ask whether you have one under center, you dont. Its also true that teams simply dont let franchise quarterbacks leave; the last one to hit the market while playing at a high level was Drew Brees in San Diego, and that was a decade ago.I think it was smart for McCloughan to franchise tag Cousins in 2015 given how little we knew on the outside about his improvement and how likely it was to stick. Its also true to say that if Washington had no doubts about Cousins ability to play at a high level, they would have used the leverage of the franchise tag to lock Cousins up to a long-term deal. Again, teams dont let franchise quarterbacks leave. Cousins cap hit of almost $20 million under last years franchise tag is the seventh largest in football; an extension likely would have cost less money on the cap this year.Instead, if the Cousins status quo continues, McCloughan will have to make an even tougher call. A second franchise tag for Cousins would cause his cap hit to rise to $23.9 million next season, which would make him the fourth-highest paid player in football behind Tony Romo, Flacco and Carson Palmer. At nearly $24 million, a league-average quarterback isnt delivering any surplus value. Washington wont want to pay Cousins that much on a short-term contract, and his representation will know as much.At the same time, its a sure thing that Cousins would get a massive deal in unrestricted free agency. The Texans gave Osweiler $31 million in guarantees, and while Cousins would be hitting the market at 29, he appears to be a significantly better quarterback with little injury history. If Osweiler got two guaranteed years, its not crazy to think a team might guarantee Cousins first two seasons at $18 million each and partially guarantee a third season at $9 million, putting a total of $45 million in guarantees on the table. In a draft with precious little in the way of quarterback prospects and no viable options in-house, teams like the Browns and Bears would have to seriously consider taking a run at Cousins and using their draft picks to try to grab help for their new starter.One case would say that if the market gives Cousins that sort of contract, Washington should be willing to give him the same sort of deal. And indeed, Washington is in transition and should want to secure Cousins future. This is a team that realistically could move on from DeSean Jackson and Pierre Garcon after the season and build its receiving corps around Reed, slot wideout Jamison Crowder?and first-round pick Josh Doctson.The flip side of that argument, again, is Osweiler.Just because one other organization thinks a quarterback is worth a ton of money doesnt mean it is right. Washington has an internal value of what it thinks Cousins is worth, and while it might want to stretch the numbers a bit for continuitys sake, it cant blow its budget on a quarterback. It might instead look to invest a midround pick on a rookie or go after a veteran in free agency who will come much cheaper than Cousins.Should McCloughan lock up Cousins? Thats the $45 million question, and to be honest, I dont think anybody involved knows the answer yet. Cousins has declined in predictable ways, but hes also still good enough to at least garner a big deal in free agency. Washington was hoping to get 16 games to see whether it should be handing out a big contract to its franchise passer. With eight games in the books, Washington is down to eight games before it has to make a decision that could define the franchise for years to come. ' ' '