Games » Seattle Mariners
Jul29End of the road
Lee Judge
The Kansas City Star
The Royals finished this road trip 1-7. Seattle hadn’t swept a four-game series at home in 11 years but managed to do it this weekend. The Royals offense, which is showing more heart than many Royals fans, battled back, tied the game in the late innings, and, after the pitching gave the lead back, had the tying run in scoring position when the game ended for the second straight game.
But, as manager Ned Yost said after the game, the Royals pitchers did not execute pitches when it mattered and the Royals lost 7-6.
First inning: Felix Hernandez, a former Cy Young winner and a current thorn in the Royals’ sides, strikes out the first three hitters he sees, Alex Gordon, Alcides Escobar and Lorenzo Cain.
With the Mariners at the plate and time called right before Royals starter Will Smith delivers a pitch, catcher Salvador Perez makes a veteran move. Perez was set up low and away when time was called but quickly moved back inside. This quick thinking didn’t allow the hitter to see where Sal was set up.
Second inning: Billy Butler walks, and Perez hits the ball off the fence. Billy is only able to advance to second base, and that keeps Perez at first and the double play in order. Eric Hosmer immediately hits into one, and the threat is ended.
In the Mariners’ half of the inning, Smith has Kyle Seager down 0-2, but, even though he’s ahead in the count, Smith puts a fastball down the middle of the plate. After the game, Yost says Smith has trouble finishing pitches to his glove side (low and away to lefties), and that cost him.
Seager then steals second when Smith uses a full leg kick (knee all the way up) to deliver a pitch. The stolen base costs Will when Seager scores on Mike Carp’s double. Smith once again has missed a spot to a left-handed hitter. (Fans watching on TV can focus on the catcher’s mitt to see how much it moves to receive the pitch. That gives fans an idea of the pitcher’s ability to locate that day.)
Third inning: Jarrod Dyson singles, advances on a wild pitch and is driven in by Alcides Escobar. The game is tied at 1.
(The Royals’ lineup has three left-handed hitters in a row: Getz hitting eighth, Dyson hitting ninth and Gordon in the leadoff spot. This is an obvious place for the opposing manager to bring in a left-handed reliever. So why set it up this way?
Jeff Francoeur—probably.
Seattle has two lefties in its pen, Oliver Perez and Lucas Luetge. Both appear to be available for this game. If, when Felix Hernandez is done, Seattle manager Eric Wedge brings in one of his left-handed relievers to face Getz, Dyson and Cain, Yost can pinch-hit Francoeur for Dyson. Frenchy isn’t hitting anybody well right now, but he has hit lefties better in the past.
Wedge then gets a choice: He can let one of his lefties face Francoeur — and Ned gets a better matchup — or the Seattle manager can use three pitchers — lefty, righty, lefty — in order to get three hitters. In that case, Ned has cleared the Seattle pen of lefthanders for the rest of the game.
What we don’t know at this point — and this was being written an hour before game time — is whether the score will be close enough in the later innings for any of this to matter.)
Fourth inning:On 3-2 count, Eric Hosmer — who hit the ball hard in every at-bat Saturday — smokes an 82 mph curveball back through the box and drills Hernandez on the wrist. Pitchers who don’t finish in good fielding position — squared up to the plate with their glove up and ready to catch the ball — have a greater risk of being hit by line drives. Hernandez guts it out and stays on the mound.
In the bottom half of the fourth, Smith gives up another 0-2 hit to Seager. Will’s inability to finish off Seager once he’s ahead in the count will cost him another run. Oddly enough, 0-2 counts can present a danger to some pitchers. If they mentally ease up, thinking they’ve got the situation under control, they can get burned just when they should be in total control.
This time, with Seager on first base, Smith is paying more attention to the runner. He’s mixing in slide steps and pickoffs, but now the danger is not paying enough attention to the hitter. This is the quandary a pitcher faces whenever a base-stealer demands attention.
Smith slide steps in order to get the ball to the plate more quickly, but, possibly because of that slide step, the curve he throws doesn’t have good bite. Mike Carp hits the ball foul, but has home run distance.
The mental trick a pitcher needs to pull off with a base runner on is to have 100 percent of his attention on whatever course he chooses. If he throws to first, he needs to have his entire mind on that. If he delivers home, he needs to do so with full concentration … but throwing a pitch to the batter with 30 percent of his mind on the runner is a recipe for disaster.
No telling what percentage of his mind gave up Carp’s single to right, but with two runners now on, Smith gives up a double and a sacrifice fly. Mariner back in front 3-1.
Fifth inning: Getz singles, and another distracted pitcher makes a mistake, walking Jarrod Dyson. The walk moves Getz to second and Gordon has an eight-pitch at-bat, flies out to center, but moves both runners up. Dyson’s walk and Gordon’s fly ball pay off when Escobar hits a weak grounder and Getz scores. The Royals are now down by only one run.
Sixth inning: Billy Butler leads off an inning for the third time, not an ideal situation. Hernandez strikes out Butler, and then, with the count 2-0 to Salvador Perez, throws a curveball for a strike. I’ve told fans to watch for pitchers who throw fastballs in fastball counts (it’s a good way to get hammered), but the reverse is also worth noting.
A pitcher who throws his secondary pitches for strikes when he’s behind in the count keeps hitters from loading up on fastballs. Then, if the pitcher does throw a fastball in a fastball count, the hitter will not get the same quality hack because the hitter is not sure he’s getting a fastball.
Smith finishes the bottom of the inning 1-2-3 and qualifies for a quality start. He has issued no walks and has given his team a chance to win.
Seventh inning: The Royals’ bullpen gives it right back. Kelvin Herrera gives up two singles, fields a bunt and gets the lead runner out at third, but Yuniesky Betancourt, filling in for Mike Moustakas, can’t complete the double play. His throw to first base is wide and requires Getz to perform some acrobatics just to keep the ball on the infield.
Tim Collins replaces Herrera, gets a strikeout, but throws a wild pitch to advance the runners to second and third. Because the runners advanced, Kyle Seager’s single scores two runs, not one. The Mariners now lead 5-2.
Eighth inning: Hernandez is out of the game, replaced by, Lucas Luetge, one of Seattle’s left-handed relievers. Luetge takes off his hat and briefly stares at it before throwing his first pitch. Ballplayers often write messages to themselves — reminders of what they want to do in big situation — on the undersides of the bills of their caps. Either that or Luetge is just weird. Whichever, it works. Luetge gets leadoff batter Alex Gordon.
Wedge then shows no reluctance to use one pitcher to get one batter and pulls Luetge in order to bring in his set-up man, Brandon League. The Royals will not have another lefty come to the plate until they get to Hosmer, five hitters away from Gordon. If it gets that far, Wedge still has another lefty, Oliver Perez, to face Hosmer.
League promptly makes a mess of things. Escobar singles, then guesses right and steals second when League throws Lorenzo Cain a splitter. The splitter dives in the dirt and gives Seattle’s catcher, Miguel Olivo, no chance of throwing out Esky. Olivo tries anyway and chucks the ball into center field. Butler singles, driving in Escobar. Perez also singles. Suddenly, the tying runs are on, Hosmer is at the plate and Seattle’s last lefty, Oliver Perez, gets the call.
Perez and Olivo combine on a wild pitch, and both runners are now in scoring position. Hosmer comes through with an opposite-field single and the game is tied. The inning ends with the Royals and Mariners tied at 5. The Royals’ hitters got Hernandez out of the game and successfully attacked the Seattle bullpen.
In the bottom of the eighth, with the left-handed Mike Carp due to lead off for Seattle, Yost brings in Jose Mijares. Jose struggles to locate his pitches, falls behind 3-1 and throws one of those fastballs in a fastball count we’ve been talking about. Carp leans on it and doubles. Trayvon Robinson lays down a bunt to move the go-ahead run to third, and, once again, Mijares has trouble with a bunt, throwing the ball down the right-field line.
Carp scores, Robinson moves to second on the error, then he eventually scores and, despite battling back for one more run in the ninth, the Royals lose 7-6.
Swiss baseball coach Chris Byrnes visits Kauffman Stadium
Chris Byrnes, a baseball coach from Switzerland visited Kauffman Stadium and Lee Judge to pick up tips to take back home. 7/23/12 (Video by John Sleezer/The Kansas City Star)
Escobar
Smith
Hosmer
Daniel Wesley
9 months, 4 weeks agoI understand Dayton Moore had almost nothing to work with when he was first hired, but he’s had six full years now and this is his per-season win total:
2007 - 69 Wins 2008 - 75 Wins 2009 - 65 Wins 2010 - 67 Wins 2011 - 71 Wins 2012 - On pace for 66 Wins
In 2012 we’re playing two of the 5 worst players every single day in Yuni Betancourt and Jeff Francoeur. That would perhaps be justifiable in the first or second year of his tenure when we were looking for warm bodies to fill positions, but when you sign a player as bad as Yuni not once, but twice it reflects a pattern of not being able to recognize and build around existing major league talent. You can not build a major league team entirely of home grown players, and when it comes to moves other than the farm system, Dayton’s record is not good… I’d argue it’s approaching terrible.
If it were up to me, I’d currently be shopping for his replacement.
Sam Miles
9 months, 4 weeks agoDaniel, I agree that even considering the lack of talent the Royals had when Moore arrived, more progress should be expected.
That said, 2012 has been the target year for a bit now, and injuries have made a below average team into a laughingstock.
I’ve been ok with Frenchy playing, given that he was good last year, but Yuni is symptomatic of Moore’s odd inability to sort major league talent.
That said, I think Dayton deserves one more year and, unfortunately for him, he’ll begin it without Paulino or Duffy. I’d think he’d need to pull a few quality starting pitchers out of his hat in the offseason if he hopes to pilot the ship in 2014, but Glass might just let him keep on.
Never say it can’t get worse.
Thayne Griffin
9 months, 4 weeks agoMaybe Smith turned a corner after getting sent back down..
Charles Purvis
9 months, 4 weeks agoThe team as it exists today belongs to Dayton Moore and, if you ask me, isn’t that bad. In fact, it’s quite good, talent-wise.
Look around the infield. Perez, Hosmer, Moose Tacos (can’t spell it), Escobar and Getz. I really don’t see what needs to be done there except maybe get Hosmer and Getz some hitting instruction.
The outfield: Every one of them is at least journeyman quality. Last year, I believe they led the league in assists. What needs to be done with them defensively? Nothing that I can see, except maybe send Francoeur to the same hitting class as Hosmer and Getz. I mean, Boston tolerated Manny Ramirez doing stiff-legged cartwheels in the outfield because of his bat. Ability with a bat makes up for defensive shortcomings and the Royals don’t really have any defensive shortcomings.
Pitching is an entirely different matter. Good pitchers command ridiculously high salaries. The Royals have tried that before (Meche) and it’s still a pig in a poke as to whether you get what you paid for. What’s the answer? I honestly don’t know but I think getting the hitters to swing at GOOD pitches and the pitchers to throw strikes and let the defense do their job would help. A lot.
All of the above is nothing more than my opinion, worth exactly what you paid for it.
Daniel Wesley
9 months, 4 weeks agoSam, the 2012 target was basically the invention of Mellinger… he was the one who coined ‘Mission 2012’. Dayton was just recently on record saying we shouldn’t expect anything for another two years. Awesome. Not.
Daniel Wesley
9 months, 4 weeks agoCharles, calling Francoeur ‘journeyman’ is completely inaccurate. By fWAR, he just crossed the threshold as the worst every day player in major league baseball.
Charles Purvis
9 months, 4 weeks agoDan—What are the criteria by which that is determined?
Daniel Wesley
9 months, 4 weeks agoCharles, go to FanGraphs.com… go to Leaders, select 2012, and look at the far right column labeled WAR. Click twice to sort it ascending and you’ll see Frenchy with an fWAR of -1.5, worst in all of major league baseball.
Daniel Wesley
9 months, 4 weeks agohttp://www.fangraphs.com/library/index.php/misc/war/
Jeff Frost
9 months, 4 weeks agoWhen I read “end of the road” I was hoping Lee knew something we didn’t- that Ned was let go. I have read through all these and have a few thoughts. First, on any given night your offense, defense, or pitching will ultimately win or lose a specific game. For the DURATION of a season, it all comes down to starting pitching. We have NONE! Our #1 would be a 4 or 5 on most teams. We will never win consistently until our starters develop and step up. Not sure what has happened, but the Royals use to be THE team in pitcher development. Think Busby, Leonard, Gale, Saberhagen, Gubicza, Danny Jackson, and Appier. ALL were studs before they were 24. (Sabes won a Cy Young at 20!!!) Now we don’t have our great draft choices develop, or they get injured and need TJ surgery! In regards to Meche- Hilleman destroyed his arm with CRAZY pitch counts.
We have a CORE that should not be traded: Moose Hos Escobar Perez Myers Starling Zimmer
We have two that COULD be traded if we got AMAZING offers: Gordon Butler * This would have to be major one-sided deals for legit #1 or a few #2s for each.
The rest- “Rent-a-players” and expandable!
Moore has made portions of this team better, but I have no doubt if given the money, Allard could have done this too. Dayton was just the “Golden Boy” from our last connection to greatness- Schuerholz. Not panning out. I say he gets 2013 or he needs to go.
Ned- make the change now! Put Sisson in the rest of the year and be smart and hire a young manager that can connect with the players, was a strong player to earn respect, and bilingual. HEY- Omar Vizquel is retiring this year!!
Reality-wise, we all drank the kool-aid after last year’s late August and September. Can’t happen again We had rookies and young players that hadn’t thrown in the towel, while playing teams that were veteran-laden and when you are out of it, who cares!
I think we need to do a Billy Beane, and break this team down. He will trade away a stud or two for a risk. Look at them now! Pittsburgh did the same thing.
All I can say this is the most-frustrating year I have had since we lost to the Yankees in 1977.
Glass must sell. Dayton has one year. Ned must go.
Peace out Royals fans and God Speed for the future!
Phil Schreck
9 months, 4 weeks agoLee, I’m not sure what you mean by “showing more heart than many Royals fans.” We’ve been putting up with this stuff for almost three decades! I can’t think of any other team whose fans have shown more heart than we have. But there is a breaking point and it’s here for many of us.
Charles Purvis
9 months, 4 weeks agoI have to confess, I see your point.
I’m more accustomed to baseball-reference.com and from there, it shows that Jeff’s 2012 season consists of:
1 error, a .994 fielding pct (.986 is league average), 12 assists, 3 DP’s turned. That seems pretty good. But then he is -20 in the Defensive Runs saved category, which I admit I don’t fully understand. If one has a high fielding percentage, few errors, and quite a few assists, how does this number manifest itself?
Sam Miles
9 months, 4 weeks agoThe offense is showing more heart than some fans, huh? If averaging 2.75 runs per game this series is a faint pulse, they’d best call the coroner for the rest of us.
I love the Royals, but they’re lucky anyone has stuck around the past two decades.
Daniel -
I might have to disagree with you a bit, if only in part. While I know that Mellinger circled 2012 on his calendar while perhaps Dayton did not, the consensus was that with the giant influx from the minors in 2011, 2012 would be the year the Royals start turning a corner.
For his part, Yost said this is the year we’d start worrying more about wins and losses than development. And, injuries or not, it’s been a disaster.
As for Moore, I don’t think there’s a quote of him saying “we shouldn’t expect anything for another two years,” but that that’s how long it can take for a team to make that actual turn. Not sure I agree with the guy, but who can fault him for wanting to stave off the villagers?
Sam Miles
9 months, 4 weeks ago…Sorry about the bold. I don’t even know how to do that.
Aaron Cooper
9 months, 4 weeks agoAtta boy Lee. Good job. Take a shot at Royals fans for not being supportive enough. Yeah, I guess we just don’t understand. I mean, literally every other team in the league can put forth competitive teams from time-to-time, but the Royals somehow can’t and it’s our fault for not understanding. I mean, you don’t dare say one word about your bosses Dayton or Yost (wouldn’t want to get those press passes revoked!) despite historical ineptitude…but yeah, Royals fans, you have no problem criticizing us. Whatever guy, I’ll just go back to eating my pop-tarts in my mom’s basement I guess. I mean, I’m just not smart enough to figure out that it takes six, no seven, no eight, no ten, no twelve years to win 81 games in this league. Yup, it’s our fault.
Dan Holmes
9 months, 4 weeks agoYes, I’m curious what you mean by “showing more heart than fans”. Any of us who are still watching at this point have shown plenty of heart - it’s far easier to be a fan of the Rangers or the Yankees than the Royals here. Let’s not mistake disagreement with how things are going (and let’s be honest, things aren’t working out too well right now) with a lack of heart.
Dan Holmes
9 months, 4 weeks agoTo be fair to Lee, he could be talking about some of those fans who have vowed they’re giving up on watching the Royals this year, which we’ve heard some of us so far. But are these really fans?
Mark Bettes
9 months, 4 weeks agoBy showing more heart, are you referring to the opposing team ripping the Royals guts out on a daily basis? A carnie could run this team better than the Moore/Yost combination. Picture throwing darts at balloons to make a lineup. Let’s see if any of the Royals pitchers can knock down all the milk bottles. whoever does is tonight’s starter. Either way there won’t be anyone left to buy a ticket for this tilt-a-whirl. It doesn’t take a genius to sit the statistically worst player in MLB. But it does take a fool to keep running him out on the field day after day. I was 12 in 1985 when the Royals won it all. I’ll have grandchildren long before we make the postseason again. KANSAS CITY DESERVES BETTER, AND YOU KNOW IT.
Daniel Wesley
9 months, 4 weeks agoCharles, the solution to your riddle is a simple one - range. For starters, fielding percentage is not a good indicator of defensive ability because it does not factor in range… Frenchy has little range at this point in his career. No amount of assists and lack of errors can make up for that.
Aaron Cooper
9 months, 4 weeks agoDan, I am still watching and will never stop watching, but I can’t blame anyone who does stop watching. This organization has been laying turds for about twenty seasons now….yet WE need to be more patient and show more “heart”!?!?! WOW.
…but hey, let’s talk about bunting some more. Or maybe that dreamy Jeff Francoeur’s great smile and dynamite arm! I mean, nevermind being the worst team in the AL, HAVE YOU SEEN FRENCHY THROW!?!?
Brendan Woodbury
9 months, 4 weeks agoThere’s plenty of room to disagree on how to analyze baseball. I obviously prefer more advanced metrics, but I see why some people like Polk Points or the old-time measures like AVG, Errors and the rest.
However, I don’t think reasonable people can differ on Lee’s opening point. It’s indefensible.
If McDonald’s introduces a new menu and the customers complain that the food tastes bad, nobody says that the CEO is trying really hard and the customers should be more patient. If a friend tells you his stockbroker keeps putting him into crappy securities that goes bust, there’s not a person on earth who praises the stockbroker’s effort for continuing to pitch new investments.
There’s something unique about sports that makes people lose their minds, and say the equivalent of those things. I won’t speculate on Lee’s motivation for saying that the players are showing more heart than the fans, but I feel confident that there’s no other context in the world where’s he’d claim make a claim like this. We have multimillionaire failing terribly at their jobs, and we’re supposed to give them more praise for effort while simultaneously passing harsher judgment on the regular joes who pay their salaries and complain about the failure? What a farce.
The only thing more pathetic than the Royals record is a pity party that they’re not getting more credit for doing more than just going through the motions.
Matthew Sanders
9 months, 3 weeks agoHow dare you say this team is showing more heart than the fans?
The fans are the ones struggling with a horrid economy, a drought, and on top of that, a listless team.
The fans are the ones that showed up all throughout all star festivities. The fans are the ones who’ve stuck with this team through multiple decades of cynical crap.
This team, and this owner, have quit on the fans, not the other way around. See…us fans don’t have the option of keeping our jobs if we have two bad months in a row, let alone two decades. We fans forfeit a significant portion of our earnings to cheer on this team…not that any of those feckless millionaire ballplayers would understand.
We fans have more heart than any of the Royals organization, but when a heart is broken again and again, day after day, year after year, it’s hard to keep beating as strongly as it once did. So how dare you challenge the heart of the fans.
Brian Grant
9 months, 3 weeks ago“leave the baseball talk to us big boys”.
Big boys are able to make their points without childish insults.
Joel Kallem
9 months, 3 weeks agoLee, this site has become hijacked so it is the same as many other sites - a place for fans of various stages of knowledge to vent and make suggestions based on limited knowledge which may or may not lead to improvement in the team. Perhaps the time has come to remove the comment section until they find another place to “bitch and moan”. This is not what you were trying to accomplish on the site or why many of us read it. Perhaps later we can go back to commenting about the plays as was once the case.
Chris Campbell
9 months, 3 weeks agoCalling out the fans by saying that the players have more heart than some of the fans isn’t the smartest thing you have ever writter Lee. I seriously doubt that was your intent, but that’s how most fans are reading it (myself included).
After all, a lot of us have been putting up with the incompetence and losing for 20 years now, and anyone that has been pushed beyond their breaking point deserves a free pass.
If anyone needs to be called out, it’s the Royals for once again assembling a stinker of a team. While most of us will agree that the overall talent looks better than it did a few years ago, the end result is the same; once again the Royals are flirting with a 100 loss season.
The Royals are lucky that they still have ANY fans at all. Lord knows that they sure as hell don’t DESERVE any fans.
Phil Schreck
9 months, 3 weeks agoJoel, Lee is the one who wrote “showing more heart than many Royals fans”. He’s the one who started this whole firestorm. To challenge the heart of the fans? Ridiculous. I went to my first Royals game in 1970 with my dad on a boy scout trip to the old Municipal Stadium. Sure, the Royals weren’t very good then. They were a team that was just a little over a year old. I still remember that they won that game against the Baltimore Orioles 10-9. I was hooked. Since then, in a span of over 40 years, I’ve closely followed practically every game. My dad was in the Army and we moved around the country. Kansas, Oklahoma, Alabama, even Korea. I would spend almost every night meticulously tuning the dial on my radio in the hopes of finding the games. When we lived in Korea from 1977-1979 and were lucky enough to see a tape-delayed game on the Armed Forces Network, we celebrated! If the game wasn’t on TV (and 99% weren’t), we had to wait until two days later to read about the games in the “Pacific Stars and Stripes” paper. When we came back to the States and I went to college, I was the biggest Royals fan at Iowa State University. As we all know, the Royals were good to very good from the mid-70s to the late 80s. We all know what the Royals can do. That’s why we’re mad as hell to see what’s become of this franchise. We deserve the right to bitch and moan and complain. But to say that this team “shows more heart than many Royals fans” is a dagger to Royals fans everywhere. But you know what? I’m still planning on taking my three sons to see the Royals and Rangers this weekend. It’s a 6 hour drive from where I live. It’s not an easy trip and it’s not cheap. It’ll be my 18 year old son’s 9th trip to Kauffman Stadium and my 6-year old twin boys’ first time there. I’ll probably even buy them some Royals gear (in the hopes they won’t get laughed at when they get back home. We live in MN Twins territory for goodness sake. Can you imaging what it’s like to be laughed at by Twins’ fans?). But unless something changes soon, my 6 year olds will probably be asking me the same question my 18 year old posed to me this summer: “Why did you make me a Royals fan?”
Don DeCelles
9 months, 3 weeks agoWow. I have not stopped by lately for a variety of reasons, but I am shocked at the tone of the comments since the last time I visited. This was once a place to get away from the vitriol on the other KC Star sports stories and read intelligent banter with Lee about baseball fundamentals and the like. I am disappointed to now read all the Lee-bashing that is going on here.
For those of you who have just recently started following Lee here, he is most definitely NOT an idiot. He does not report to Ned or Dayton or the Glass family. He has a unique opportunity to get behind the scenes and report inside information to which most of us have never had access. It must be awful to be painted with the same broad brush people are using to paint the Royals organization (rightfully so) for its ineptitude these days. Lee is in a tough spot - and I hope the team turns around someday soon so that those of us that read Lee’s insider notes can once again enjoy the peace and quiet that his followers once offered in these comments.
Matthew Sanders
9 months, 3 weeks agoIf Lee hadn’t insulted the fans, perhaps he wouldn’t be getting bashed, neh?
Kyle Taggart
9 months, 3 weeks agoLee, I have to credit you for inspiring me to make a comment on your blog/Royals website. Are you really saying that the Royals fans who had the nerve/heart on a national stage to stand behind one of their players in the largest display of “stop trying to screw us over” I’ve ever seen have now quit on the Royals? You know what you sound like? Someone with Stockholm syndrome. Face it, you are too close to these players to be an objective journalist anymore. I’m all for more pieces about what Alex Gordon is doing to get his power stroke back or what Hosmer is doing to not lean into and move his head around for every single swing he takes (I mean really he expects to hit the ball like that?). However these game pieces with Polk Points that have Francoeur with a positive number (!!! - he should be negative based on horrific base running decisions and first pitch free swinging alone but I digress) are nothing more than propoganda for your captor.
Loose Seal
9 months, 3 weeks agoEt tu, Lee?
Sean Fite
9 months, 3 weeks agoLee’s comment was spot on, especially based on the junior high level comments that have been posted here. many of the “fans” gave up long ago, demanding that Yost be fired, insisting that Moore knows nothing about baseball. Our offense, in THIS game, battled back to tie the game at 5, and 6 runs should be enough to win. Our offense in THIS game did show more heart than many Royals’ fans. For many of you to take this line and apply it to the last 20 years is asinine.
I do not understand why Yuni is still playing, and I don’t have any defense for Francoeur either. But I also don’t agree with us promoting our young players “just because”. They aren’t going to help us at this point, and their development in the minors is more important than their potential/perceived success in the majors for the remainder of this year.
The Royals have improved dramatically in talent, and if 6 runs isn’t enough to win, then we’re screwed anyway. Pitching has been the most frustrating aspect of this team, and while 3 TJ surgeries don’t help, I didn’t expect the ineptness of those who are still healthy.
Thanks, Lee, for continuing this blog. I haven’t missed one since you began this, and I still learn new things with each post.
Jim Fetterolf
9 months, 3 weeks agoFor our readers, this thread is being driven by one of the posters at the other site, which is why we have a couple of “screen names” show up here to rant. I’m sure the Star’s marketing guys appreciate the hits and eyeballs, but for the rest of us this is just a periodic love-bomb we endure from the gamers and fantasy players far from the dirt who, like lemmings, are following the latest children’s crusade.
“I’ll be frank with you: I’ve pretty much checked out of 2012.”
Unfortunately, ballplayers, coaches, and managers lack that luxury. I believe our very own Brendan anticipated that thought last week.
For our visitors, always nice to see you folks. Tell Craig “Hey!” for me and congratulate him on the improved quality of content on the site.
John Wilson
9 months, 3 weeks agoI am somewhat surprised at the number of relatively new names posting and taking personal offense to Lee’s comment regarding fair weather Royals fans. I know I am not one of those fair weather fans, so it doesn’t offend me.
I’m not happy about how the season has turned out but I am not going to take it out on Lee. He reports. He doesn’t own the team, he doesn’t make trades, and he doesn’t manage the team.
Adrian Stryker
9 months, 3 weeks agoWow, Jim. I’m surprised you can call anyone “far from the dirt” from that high horse.
Dom Weber
9 months, 3 weeks agoLee, I am a longggggggggggg time Royals fan, or long suffering from the above thoughts. My question is that with the injuries and the losses has the team psychologically given up and what has to happen to get them back into a more positive frame of mind?
Daniel Wesley
9 months, 3 weeks agoSean, the choice isn’t between thinking Dayton Moore is above reproach and ‘knows nothing about baseball’. Are you arguing that Dayton is above criticism? I don’t see how you can do that.
If we’re so much better in talent, why are we within striking distance of the worst record in Dayton’s six full seasons? If that’s not an indictment, I don’t know what is.
Oh, and I’m not from the other site, in case someone wants to lump me in with them.
Carla Schomaker
9 months, 3 weeks agoI hope for the sake of the state of civilized dialogue that Jon Sofen work up this morning after his post-1am comments with a blinding hangover and some regret for what he wrote. That was an example of the kind of behavior humans should have evolved from decades if not centuries ago. That was shocking.
Some criticism of the organization for the current team’s record is certainly warranted. I think we can all do that without the lowest two forms of arguing: dripping sarcasm and name-calling.
If I had to guess, I’d say Lee spends a lot of time out at the ballpark talking to these players and coaches, and he wouldn’t be human if that didn’t give him a rooting interest and a certain bias. Everyone here should know and accept that and still see this site for what it is, a very good place to come for some insight by someone who knows a lot about baseball (more than probably 95% of us who read the blog) and has access to the team.
Maybe his remark about the heart of the fans was unwarranted, but Jon Sofen went so over the line that it’s pointless to argue Lee’s comment now. The lesson here is, next time you’re seething with rage and come here to vent, sleep on it first.
John Wilson
9 months, 3 weeks agoWell said Carla.
Jim Fetterolf
9 months, 3 weeks agoDaniel, those are valid points and deserve consideration.
My opinion is that the Royals looked poised to step up by about ten games over last year, based on the offensive RPG of last year, the bullpen, and having a fairly much solidified rotation without Jeff Francis, Kyle Davies, and Sean O’Sullivan. I had predicted 85 wins before the injuries to Perez, Cain, Paulino, and Duffy and still think that a valid number at the time I suggested it.
Master Chen had put up a consistent couple of years, Hochevar had looked to turn the corner, Paulino was showing “ace” potential, Danny Duffy seemed to have “gotten it”, Luis Mendoza was PCL pitcher of the year, and Jon Sanchez with his elite K/9 numbers coming off an injury-filled off-season looked to at least be an upgrade over Jeff Francis, for instance, and if he duplicated his ‘10 performance could have been a frontline starter. Then there was Mike Montgomery in Omaha and JaKKKe Odorizzi in Springdale.
Of that group, the top two arms, Paulino and Duffy, went under the knife. Chen and Hoch underachieved. Mendoza was a pleasant surprise. Sanchez never got healthy and Montgomery is in Springdale while JaKKKe struggles with pitch count. The loss of Paulino and Duffy probably cost five or six or more wins.
On offense and defense, the injuries to Perez and Cain and, to a lesser extent Getz, took out two good bats and a situational producer as well as three of the four key defensive positions. Add to that that Hosmer and Frenchy haven’t produced and that Gordon took awhile to get started and the result was a significant drop in RPG, which is at least slightly improving, but mainly from scoring six runs in losses rather the five runs when the starter gives a chance to win.
As for Lee’s remark, “many” may have been a bit much, but probably excusable given comments on other Star columns, talk radio, or other sites which bleed over into our comment section. Based on the media, including some Star writers who used to be journalists, I might have used “a noisy niche of Negative Nancys” instead of “many”, but I don’t have an editor:)
I think most fans with a little life experience and experience in trying to put an organization together appreciate the exceptional challenges that Dayton Moore has faced through his six years. I think he’s handled them well, although not perfectly, but “perfect GM” is an oxymoron”. This year could have been “our time”, but even injuries regress to the mean and even budding super stars have bad years as part of the learning curve.
As for knocks on Lee’s “bias”, I think he’s the last legitimate journalist in the major section of a market dominated by op-ed writers and talk-show broadcasters. He’s the only one who can be bothered to actually report what happened in the game. Yeah, that’s Old School. But so are a lot of folks in this community. And this site is probably the last refuge for us in a tweetie world.
Lee Judge
9 months, 3 weeks agoWow, y’all been busy while I was doing my day job.
OK, let’s go back to what I said: “the Royals showed more heart than many Royals fans.”
An increasing number of fans have announced they’re through with the Royals and will no longer watch their games. If you’re not one of those fans, then I wasn’t talking about you.
If you are one of those fans, first, be grateful you don’t follow the Cubs, and second, I stand by my statement.
Ballplayers don’t give up because they don’t like the score or where they are in the standings. They continue to play.
After the Royals got down to Felix Hernandez on Sunday, they could have started mailing in their at-bats or going through the motions. They didn’t.
Someone asked if the Royals have given up—I thought their efforts yesterday show they haven’t. They know they’re not going to the playoffs and that this year has been a big disappointment…but they play on. Bottom of the division and they’re still playing hard.
It’s one thing to say you think they’re bad or Ned should be fired or Dayton doesn’t know what he’s doing, but it’s another to say I’ve given up, I won’t watch them anymore.
Like I said, if you haven’t given up on what is supposed to be your team, then I wasn’t talking about you.
If you have given up, then I don’t know what you’re arguing about.
P.S. After some of the more juvenile outbursts posted this morning, my editor was in my office telling me who she was planning on blocking from commenting in the future.
Let’s be clear—you do not have to agree with a single word I’ve written. You can disagree with anybody over anything.
But…
If you can’t comment without insults, rage and name-calling, don’t be surprised if you can’t comment at all. This site is monitored by editors and the Star has generally been pleased with the level of conversation, even when it’s an argument, that goes on here.
I’m pretty sure they don’t care what someone says about me (I’ve been drawing political cartoons for three decades—I’m used to it), but they want to make sure others do not feel intimidated by those who use the internet to get out some pretty negative emotions.
Brad Jenkins
9 months, 3 weeks agoLee,
I respect your column, and your methodology, even though I don’t entirely agree with it.
But it’s a terribly misguided, if not flat nonsensical, comment to to suggest that the Royals offense is showing heart than many of their fans.
You don’t go 6-21 in the last month and expect any fan to be full of “heart”…much less a group that has endured the nearly unprecedented level of futility we’ve seen in the last 20+ years.
The All-Star attendance is one hint of how loyal K.C. Royal fans are, and can be, regardless of how “many” you’ve come across anecdotally to the contrary.
Stick to analysis, sir, and avoid editorial comments, as you don’t appear to be suited toward making wise ones.
Aaron Cooper
9 months, 3 weeks agoLee, I think you are misinterpreting what “give up” means. When some say they are giving up on this year’s team, that doesn’t mean they don’t care about the Royals anymore and are going to start rooting for the Yankees. It means they are give up on having any hope that this team can win anything and giving up on having any hope of Dayton’s “process” ever working. Nobody is abandoning the Royals altogether. We’re abandoning the Process. We’re abandoning the excuse making (which is why you get so much hate…b/c you make excuse after excuse after excuse for DM when it’s unwarranted). We’re abandoning the premise that it takes a full decade to become competitive, because we have watched literally every other team in the league be competitive either in the present or the recent past.
The entire pro-DM argument is based on the premise that Kansas City is the lone, singular exception in Major League Baseball. The premise is that in KC, and ONLY in KC, it takes much, much longer to build a team than anywhere else in the league. It’s a false premise and more and more are rejecting it, as they should be. KC should be held to the exact same standard as every other team outside of New York and Boston.
We need a GM who uses both sabermetrics and scouting principles together to build a team. You know, one of those nerd, pop tart-eating, mother’s basement-dwelling, calculator geeks who just so happen to be getting more and more jobs around the league.
Sam Miles
9 months, 3 weeks agoWe may be discussing semantics at this point, but I don’t think your ballplayer-to-fan comparison holds water.
“Ballplayers don’t give up because they don’t like the score or where they are in the standings. They continue to play.”
First of all, ballplayers get paid, and it’s their job. I may not be totally enjoying what I’m doing at work, but I do it because I have to. That’s the case for most people. Fans, however, have to pay to come watch, and when the product is terrible, who can blame them for not being glued to their seats?
Secondly, that ballplayers don’t quit just isn’t true. Most don’t (like “many” fans), but off the top of my head: Derek Bell and “Operation Shutdown,” Zack Greinke sure seemed to lose interest at the end of 2010, Josh Beckett caused something of a stir last year, Jeff King quit in the middle of a season and Joe Posnanski wrote this:
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/writers/joe_posnanski/08/11/quitting.royals/index.html
Which has this awesome quote:
Reporter: “Well, at least you have to be proud that your team didn’t quit.”
Kansas State coach Bill Snyder: “They don’t let you quit.”
Matthew Sanders
9 months, 3 weeks agoI appreciate you coming on here to talk about your comments, Lee.
I believe you are far too good and experienced a writer to leave such a vague statement and not expect reaction. Had you spared a few more words to properly “aim” your commentary, then I would have had no problem with the article. Even now, with your explanation, it still reads as overtly combative when the text in question is examined. Perhaps next time, you could consider clarifying the target of your snark.
Brendan Woodbury
9 months, 3 weeks agoThe players receive gobs of money to show up every day. The fans have to shell out their own money to show up every day. That’s a pretty important factor that appears to be completely absent from the analysis of “heart.”
For any of the people who get paid to be at the games (and that includes you, Lee) to criticize the “heart” of people who are paying to be at the games is disgusting.
Jim Fetterolf
9 months, 3 weeks agoAaron, I would suggest a visit to B-R to take a look at what Dayton Moore inherited compared to what other new GMs, like the one in Tampa had, then look at Baseball America’s listing of farm system strengths over the previous six years leading up to his hiring. It’s possible to suggest Moore could have done better, all of us can at most endeavors, but at least some recognition of his starting point would be helpful:
http://www.baseballamerica.com/today/prospects/rankings/organization-talent-rankings/2006/26854.html
Just as example of a team some try to compare the Royals to, Minnesota had six straight years of top 15 farm clubs with 5 of the 6 top 6. Cleveland had four straight top 9. Dayton Moore started in a deep hole and didn’t have enough major-league talent to trade for prospects and enough minor-league talent on hand to build a winner.
Jay Hall
9 months, 3 weeks agoI am frustrated with this team and frustrated with the direction we are headed in.
For years we were told to be patient, to “Trust the Process” and just give it time. We were told to just wait, because Moustakas and Hosmer and Montgomery and Myers and Crow and all of these other great young players were coming and they were going to change the fortunes of this team.
We were patient. We waited. We were assured that everything was being done and that it would take 6-8 years to start seeing the fruits of that patience start to bloom.
Well, this is year 6. Moustakas is here. So is Hosmer. Crow, too. Montgomery is struggling in AA, though he pitched well last night. Myers is having a strong year in AAA, though he has slumped a bit since the break.
But here we are 41-60. Worst record in the AL. In the offseason we were told we had “enough starting pitching.” Now they say injuries to the rotation have held us down. We’ve only had 2 starters get hurt. The rest of the rotation has been either inconsistent or consistently ineffective. Of course, looking at the numbers of our starters it was pretty clear that we only had two potentially above average starters in the rotation.
Then the cry, “but pitching costs money.” Indeed it does. So why spend $13.5M over 2 years on a RF who can’t take a walk, has very little outfield range and has historically struggled to hit RHP? Wouldn’t that $13.5M be better spent on pitching if it’s so expensive? Why spend $2M this year on an infielder with almost no defensive range, little plate discipline and below average contact skills and then say “he’s only going to be a backup?” Why spend that kind of money on a backup when pitching is the need and it’s expensive? Why ship off a pair of prospects for a below average backup quality catcher and an OF that is basically the RH hitting version of Jarrod Dyson or Derrick Robinson?
Why spend $4M on a closer when we have more cheap, quality, in house bullpen options than most any team in baseball and a healthy Soria, at least at the time of the signing.
None of these moves was necessarily terrible on its own. However, between the money (around $12M) spent on players we had adequate in house options to replace (Lough, Myers, for Francoeur, Seratelli, Falu for Betancourt, too many to name for Broxton) and the prospects the Royals could have easily signed a free agent and traded for another (with other prospects or players involved in the deal) and actual would have had enough pitching.
Jim Fetterolf
9 months, 3 weeks agoJay, it’s actually been four injured starters, plus the swing-man, but some of the rest of the points are valid enough, aside from the idea of “easily signed a free agent”. CJ Wilson showed no desire to come to KC, Roy Oswalt wanted only Texas and St. Louis, and Edwin Jackson, passed over for a long-term deal by 30 GMs, stayed in the NL to enhance his chances for a big contract in ‘13.
A point that could be made is that the Royals’ collapse this year will make it extremely difficult to get an FA any better than a Gil Meche this winter and might cause the FO to question the value of spending $30 million to win 80 games next year instead of 60 or 70.
As for trading prospects, maybe we could have traded Perez for Pineda:)
Aaron Cooper
9 months, 3 weeks agoJeff, I have acknowledged that DM didn’t start with much. That’s why I said I know it’s unrealistic to expect a WS appearance by now. What I don’t acknowledge is the premise invented by DM and lapped up by his lackeys that it takes a decade to become competitive.
I know exactly what DM started with. I have been following the team extremely closely since about 2000. I also follow a lot of other teams around the league (not as closely of course, but close enough). I have seen teams win, rebuild, and now win again in the time it has taken DM to advance from winning 60 games to winning 66 games (our current pace).
I understand DM didn’t start with much. Nobody is mad that DM hasn’t made the playoffs twice by now. We’re mad because he inherited a 100 loss team and is now trying to pass off a 95 loss team as “progress” after six years…and in two seasons from now when this team is still losing 90+ games (assuming DM is still in charge), I guarantee that you will be making the exact same excuses by promoting DM’s “well, it actually takes 14 years to build a winner” premise.
Carla Schomaker
9 months, 3 weeks agoJon, this post is much better than your first two.
I don’t think the point of this column is to opine upon whatever organizational missteps or errors have led to the royals current record. I don’t think it is his job to fix whatever problems there may be by enlightening the readers of this column. He’s a baseball guy giving us some insight as to what is happening on the field. I know enough to say that he knows a lot about that.
Jeff Werr
9 months, 3 weeks agoI’m not a Royals fan but I enjoy reading this from time to time. Was fairly shocked to read Lee taking a shot at any Royals fans. I would think Royals fans who are still interested enough to read this sort of blog are surely showing plenty of heart. And not sure why anybody would want to take shots at fans of this team. Talk about kicking a guy while he’s down…..
Regarding Lee’s comment: “…..be grateful you don’t follow the Cubs…”, I guess I’d have a bit of problem with that as far as the last quarter century or so goes too, not that I’m used to defending the Cubs.
I think if you check the records since 1986, you’ll find the Cubs have won more games. They’ve been in the postseason 4 or 5 times since then including winning their division as recently as 2007 and 2008.
This season, the Cubs have openly begun a major rebuilding campaign while the Royals have entered “Our Time”. Results to date: Cubs 42 wins, Royals 41.
The Cubs have an ownership that seems willing to spend money and a GM who has proven track record of building a winning at the MLB level.
Not sure the future in KC is that much brighter than in Wrigleyville???
Sam Miles
9 months, 3 weeks ago“Jay, it’s actually been four injured starters, plus the swing-man…”
I’m not sure it’s important to pick nits. Hochevar and Sanchez missing starts isn’t particularly important, given their respective performances. Their replacements gave us comparable efforts.
The fact of the matter is that KC said it was full-up in the rotation and, even barring injury, it was not. Until the starting pitching improves - and not just by some - we’re a long way off.
Jim Fetterolf
9 months, 3 weeks agoOn a thread where the word “many” is being picked to shreds, having a total of five of our top six rotation guys hurt, including the top two based on WAR when they went down, is a little more than a nit. I thought at the time, if they stayed healthy, a caveat I always used, that the rotation would be fine within the context of the projected offense and defense. “Fine”, in my mind, was 85 wins, putting the team a good FA SP and Monty or JaKKKe making it up away from the WS.
As for Hochevar’s performance, he’s the best and worst that we have. Getting smacked in the ankles screwed him up for a month, now he’s back to about an average #3 or 4 starter. Sanchez was never right from the beginning.
Agree that pitching needs upgrading, as does hitting. In the AL you have to score runs and Zack losing a 2-1 game isn’t any better than Sanchez losing a 6-1 game. Having Perez and Cain back shows what we’ve missed, just as Gordon heating up would have been real handy in April.
Jay Hall
9 months, 3 weeks agoJim,
I know Sanchez and Hochevar missed starts. Sanchez missing starts was probably a benefit given that he was the worst starting pitcher in baseball this year. Hochevar is what he has always been - inconsistent. We have gotten performances from Teaford, Smith, Mendoza, Adcock, Chen, etc. similar to his.
And that’s actually my point. The rotation, aside from Duffy and Paulino, was pretty pedestrian last year and was not really improved in the offseason.
The only potential improvement made in the rotation was to trade for Sanchez, and that move didn’t work out at all. Other than that, GMDM stood pat on what was CLEARLY the biggest weakness on this ballclub.
You cite three players that didn’t come to KC. Did GMDM check on the availability of Gio Gonzalez before he was dealt to Washington? Were there other players that may have been available for trade? Did GMDM contact every potential starter that was better than a #3 on the FA market?
Pittsburgh was able to strengthen their rotation this offseason and their budget isn’t any more robust than ours.
Brendan Woodbury
9 months, 3 weeks agoI posted this a couple days ago.
If we lower the innings minimum to the point that we 150 qualifying starting pitchers, here is how the Royals starting rotation ranked by defense-independent pitching last year:
44.Paulino … 56.Francis … 107.Hochevar. … 109.Sanchez(SF) … 112.Chen … 137.Duffy (with a special nod to 120.Guthrie)
These rankings aren’t everything, but they’re one of many indications that, injuries or not, the Royals were destined to have among the worst starting rotations in baseball this year.
Brendan Woodbury
9 months, 3 weeks agoEven though I could do without all of this condescension (going both ways) in the comments, it somehow seems appropriate given how Lee started the entry today.
I hope tomorrow’s entry and tomorrow’s comments are less offensive.
Jim Fetterolf
9 months, 3 weeks agoOne thing I would note, Brendan, is that the offended folks weren’t even the target of “many”, as I think we’ll agree that “many” of the offended folks haven’t been on the bandwagon since I’ve known them.
I gave a quote that was an example of the “many” and it had nothing to do with the site that has blessed us with their attention today. I guess I could have quoted you from last week, then our own community would be up in arms over Lee’s attack on one of our own. Jumping off the bandwagon is the current fad:)
” How many times do you think a quality start by Paulino would go to waste because of lousy hitting or a blown lead by the bullpen?”
Quite often. The problem is much deeper than the rotation, even with the injuries.
“This is something you’re not understanding.’
I understand it quite well, I have people complaining that I’ve said earlier that pitching isn’t the biggest problem, that, at the time, scoring over half a run per game less had a lot to do with it, as well as having out starting C and CF gone half the season and our starting 2B injured back when his glove would have won some games. As I noted above, little difference between Zack losing 2-1 and Sanchez losing 6-1.
” He’s terrible in the other 4 starts. He’s not an average #3 or #5.”
I go by Martin Manley’s rendition of Bill James’ Games Scores, as charts give a better idea of what to expect than average or aggregate statistics. Just a personal preference.
“Injuries have nothing to do with it.”
Opinions vary.
” We’ve sucked for 27 years.”
We haven’t won a WS in 27 years and the first 21 years has nothing to do with Dayton Moore while the first 8 years had an owner who very much cared and the first 5 years with a GM with a high skill set. Funny thing is the downfall of the organization began with an owner trading the farm and paying a record FA contract going all-in for a championship.
Daniel Wesley
9 months, 3 weeks agoJim, at what point can we rightly criticize Dayton? After 7 years? 8 years?
It doesn’t matter how deep of a hole you started in if you continually make bad decisions that keep you in that hole. Jose Guillen. Yuniesky Betancourt Part I. Yuniesky Betancourt Part II. Mike Jacobs. Jonathan Sanchez. Sean O’Sullivan. Kyle Davies. Needlessly burying Johnny Giavotella. I could go on, but you get the drift. He’s made more bad decisions than good ones. To boot, we’re still way behind the sabermetrics curve, demonstrated by our apparent lack of valuing OBP.
The buck has to stop somewhere. I’m to the point where I think the Royals will not win anything meaningful with Dayton Moore as general manager. I hope I’m wrong.
Brendan Woodbury
9 months, 3 weeks agoJim -
I can’t tell what comment of mine you keep referencing, and I don’t know why you don’t actually instead of repeatedly referencing it.
However, it does sound like you believe my comment (whatever it was) is emblematic of Royals fans who don’t show any heart.
Instead of responding in kind, I’ll just ask the editors to explain the policy for removing comments on this page because this seems like the sort of thing that warrants deletion.
Thayne Griffin
9 months, 3 weeks agoSo back to my comment from the very top, anyone know the secret to Will Smith’s success in his last two starts since he came back?
Jeff Frost
9 months, 3 weeks agoFirst Lee, I think you are a class guy. You explained what you meant and I can accept that. I think truly the expectations for this season were too high. We played very well in late August and all of September last year, which set us up for “This is our time” in 2012.
You can not expect to have Soria, Duffy, and Paulino out with torn ulnar tendons. (High expectations for Duffy may have been too high). I did not expect Hosmer to have such a bad sophomore slump. With that said, we have poor starting pitching, we don’t hit in the clutch, and our pen has been over-used. We are still the youngest team in the majors, but I worry about all our talent and how they are not developing and taking the next step. I think until we get a true #1 and #2, and nobody on this staff is that caliber, we are in trouble. I just wonder what happened to the days when the Royals were the epitome of younger player development. Saberhagen won a Cy Young at 20, Brett a batting title at 23. Leonard 20 games at 24. Wilson had an amazing year in 1979 at 23. Gubicza, Danny Jackson, and Appier were dominant. Even under Baird, Damon, Sweeney, and Beltran were producing better than our current crop of “future” stars. A year ago I felt we were on the cusp of a potential 4-6 year run of greatness. Now, I’m really worried if any of this group will pan out and if we will even make the playoffs in the next five years until they all sign as free agents somewhere else.
Lee- I think we are all just frustrated. I will continue to bleed blue and watch every game, it just is after 27 years of no playoffs, it is frustrating! When the Pirates make it this year, we will have the longest streak in MLB without having made the playoffs. You can say what you want about being a Cubs fan, but I will take their 4 playoff appearances since we last appeared in a playoff game. This year is totally a Karma year! We need to rectify the bad karma hanging over this team- 1) Bring back Frank White. 2) Bring back the turf- we kicked it when we played on that!
Peace out!
Jesse Stark
9 months, 3 weeks agoLee, I’ve given up on the Royals for quite a while. I followed the 1984 and 85 teams on an almost daily basis and followed them for a long time when they were still winning. But we’ve been told over and over again for the last 12-15 years that the Royals were doing a youth movement and that given a few years, they would turn the corner. And on top of that, I could come up with an all-star lineup of players who the Royals have traded.
Lee, your column is (and still will be) one of my daily reads because of the insights into how a major league team works and operates behind the scene. You have to do whatever it takes to earn the trust of the players and manager and coaches and brass so you can deliver us these insights.
As a fan, my problem with the organization is that we’ve heard this sort of thing from management (“Our Time,” etc.) over and over again during the last 15+ years. My request is, in regards to your comment, just understand where we’re coming from. People who get told things over and over again only to be disappointed tend to be cynical and skeptical. The Royals have a lot to do in order to earn back the fans respect.
This is my suggested read — “Quiet Strength” by Tony Dungy. In it, he recounts how he turned around the Tampa Bay Buccaneers from the outhouse to Super Bowl contenders. But one thing he said hits close to home as far as this organization is concerned. The problem is that the Royals have a losing culture — in other words, losing has become such a habit that it is very difficult for anyone to break. That was the problem with the Bucs before Dungy took over there.
Now, Dayton Moore has done some good things — he is good at building a strong farm system. And Ned Yost has done a good job in creating a positive environment in which the players can compete in, similar to what Dick Howser did back in the 1980’s. But neither one of them has shaken the losing culture that has gripped this team for the last 18 years or so. What the Royals need is someone like a Mark Cuban (Dallas Mavericks) or a Tony Dungy (Bucs) that can come in and do a systems change. I don’t know who that might be; I don’t have all the answers. It might be a player, it might be a manager, it might be an owner, it might be anyone; I don’t know. But what I do know is that the Royals are never going to be able to return to their fan base of previous times (1970’s and 1980’s) until they can break the losing culture that currently infects their organization.
Jim Fetterolf
9 months, 3 weeks agoDaniel, you can criticize Dayton Moore anytime you wish, I do at my own discretion, it just makes the criticism more substantive when actual events, like injuries and slumps, are taken into account.
I do agree with most of your listed criticisms. I didn’t care for Guillen or Meche or Mike Jacobs, but recognized that the organization felt the need to “step up” with signings, just as that demand continues to this day. I personally would have ignored the demands, realizing that a good FA wouldn’t be willing to come to the KC teams of the time, just as they likely won’t be willing to come this winter. The team had no talent to trade and could only build through the draft. The FAs were a matter of putting lipstick on a pig. Now we have at least six positions filled, so no longer have the need to try to get lucky with FAs anywhere besides pitching. At the time I though Jon Sanchez was the best we could do, an elite K/9 coming off injuries in exchange for a player that “many” thought would regress to his mean while also opening a spot for Lorenzo Cain. In hindsight it didn’t work. That happens sometimes. I don’t remember anyone predicting Melky’s year or Cain’s injury, although Sanchez’ performance was within the range of possibility.
Johnny Giavotella seems to have reclaimed his mantle of “Savior of the day” after his recent hot streak, mirroring last year’s about this time. Unfortunately, what buries him is his glove. I expect him to get another chance and hope he can hit enough to compensate for the weak defense. I wouldn’t blame hisd weak stick and iron glove at the major-league level on Dayton Moore.
“To boot, we’re still way behind the sabermetrics curve, demonstrated by our apparent lack of valuing OBP.”
A valid point. Not sure a few extra walks would close the gap on RPG. I looked at a few teams the other day and HRs had the highest explanatory percentage out of several factors, including OBP and base running. I guess an argument could be made that we should have kept Matt Treanor and his high OBP over Sal Perez. I think OBP is contextual and just one factor among many.
Thayne, Smith said that he is trying to make sharper pitchers on the black rather than in the “third” of the plate. Like “many” young pitchers he realized that a AAA curve doesn’t work in the bigs, so he went back down and concentrated on making major-league pitches rather than just pitches good enough to get PCL hitters out. Tim Collins went through that last year. Just part of the learning curve.
Brendan Woodbury
9 months, 3 weeks agoJim -
Can you please post a link to your study on the explanatory percentage of HRs and OBP on run scoring?
Jim Eicher
9 months, 3 weeks agoThe Royals had a bad April, a good May and June and a bad July. I’ll raise my glass hoping for a good August and September, although I realize it’s probably pie in the sky. Stranger things have happened. There will be no playoffs this year, and .500 is looking unreachable, but we could still finish on a positive note. The biggest debacle of the season is still the marketing campaign. I can at least stay excited about Cain and Perez. They are fun to watch and have brought some excitement to a lousy month. Go Royals!
Jim Eicher
9 months, 3 weeks agoBTW, Lee. I didn’t mind your comment about the fans. I guess I’ve been married long enough to have thick skin. Keep up the good work.
Jim Fetterolf
9 months, 3 weeks agoJesse, good points, but the major difference between the Bucs and the Royals is revenue sharing. Another is the impact of draftees. In baseball it is seldom that a 1st round pitcher becomes the staff ace his first or second year or an offensive player contends for MVP and leads the league in a bunch of categories. Even the fact that guaranteed football contracts aren’t really guaranteed has something to do with it. I would say that both pro-football and basketball are much easier to turn around due to the impact of the draft and revenue sharing than baseball is. Can’t think of any baseball drafts where the first 30 players were on the team the first year and many of them starters. Most years no baseball 1st rounders make the parent squad and many take two, three, four years to make the bigs if they even do.
Brendon, you participated in the discussion where I tried to find the reason for the differences in rpg between Texas and Toronto compared to the Royals. You even asked why I chose Texas, the Jays, and the Pads for comparison.
Assuming that all walks scored and that all outs on the bases scored, the differences in HRs explained more of the run differential than walks, which explained some, and base running, which explained somewhat less. I didn’t look at successful base running, as Martin did some good work on that, just took the walk, POs, and HR differences and divided by run differential. I’ld hardly call it a study but it did suggest that extra HRs accounted for more of the run differential than the other two and HRs needed no assumptions, as they score at least one run. Intuitively I’ld also say that the extra homers also accounted for some of the differences in walks. I’ld also suggest that the above are three factors but probably not the only factors, but speed is hard to quantify.
Don McCall
9 months, 3 weeks agoWow-how thin skinned are you Lee and your editor(s). You started it by calling fans who have rooted for a loser for 30 years now-that we have no heart. Give me a break–Now you say you may stop taking comments. That’s great—stick your head in the sand and no longer listen to your ‘customers’–sounds like a good and mature business decision to me.
Brendan Woodbury
9 months, 3 weeks agoJimm -
When you said you’d done an analysis comparing HR and OBP, which wasn’t included in your post on 7/24, I figured that you’d actually done a study.
I guess not.
I just pulled the year-to-date data from baseball-reference, and OBP has a stronger correlation (explains a higher percentage of the variation) to runs/game than HRs.
Don’t worry about misrepresenting your analysis (or misrepresenting my words earlier). Lee’s ethos gives extra value to people who show up and fail, so you’re probably in line for a nice big compliment any day now.
Jim Fetterolf
9 months, 3 weeks agoI didn’t use the word analysis and I don’t do studies. These are my actual words from above:
“I looked at a few teams the other day and HRs had the highest explanatory percentage out of several factors, including OBP and base running.”
I even explained my methodology. For a quick, back of the envelope cipherin’ I thought it interesting. Maybe in the grand scheme of things the results aren’t compelling, but the HR difference did explain over half the rpg difference between the Royals and the two high scoring teams mentioned. Given that Melky is gone and Alex isn’t clearing walls, that made some sense. Billy and Moose have made up some of the difference. The nine highest scoring teams are over 100 homers, nine of the lowest eleven are under 100 homers, and the highest scoring team, Toronto, has a .320 OBP, one point ahead of the Royals, and is second only to the Yankees in homers.
Brendan Woodbury
9 months, 3 weeks agoJust so I’m clear on what’s happening here, did you just read my post where I ran the actual correlations between OBP and HR for the league (I did AL and MLB), and then, despite that knowledge, continue a piecemeal analysis making a claim you now know to be false?
You can go to B-R, get the stats in csv format, put them in Excel and run the correlation yourself. You’ll find just as I did that, among basic hitting stats, OPS has the highest correlation, then SLG, then OBP, then HR.
Or you can stick with an approach that you know doesn’t work. Just like the Royals’ commitment to wasting outs on the base paths.
Of course, given that the Royals continuing commitment to their failing ways just got a big thumbs up from Lee, I can see how sticking with a flawed approach might have its appeal. Maybe Lee will praise your heart next!
William Wolfe
9 months, 3 weeks agoBrendan—amen brother. I just ran a quick linear regression in the last 5 minutes. Here are the R squareds, which for those who haven’t been to stats class in a while is essentially the percentage of Runs per game that can be explained by a given stat (vs. random chance).
HR - .5, BB -.04 (interesting, but stay tuned), K - .03 (explains why our lack of strikeouts doesn’t matter), AVG - .5, OBP - .57, SLG - .77, OPS - .83.
Seems pretty clear to me and I think this backs up your earlier post which i forgot about before i read your latest post. Homers explain half of RPG, but OPS does the trick and you can’t have OPS without getting on base!
Aaron Cooper
9 months, 3 weeks agoSo, so many excuses. It truly boggles the mind. I’ll leave now so I can go back to watching the Rays-A’s game. You know, a game between two contending teams both with equal or lesser resources than the Royals and both of whom have experienced significantly more success than the Royals. You’d really have to be blind to not acknowledge it.
Daniel Wesley
9 months, 3 weeks agoThe correlation between OBP, SLG, and runs created is incredibly simple to explain: A batter has two jobs, 1) do not make an out, and 2) while not making an out, attempt to advance as many bases as possible.
That’s it… that’s how offenses score runs. 1) is OBP, and 2) is SLG%. It’s something I’ve taught to my 6 year old who started playing baseball last year and he took to it immediately. I think sometimes we make things far too complicated in the name of ‘professionalism’.
Jim Fetterolf
9 months, 3 weeks agoThe SLG at .77 is about what Thayne came up with the other day. The top three runs teams are in the top six of SLG. OPS has an advantage in combining two stats.
Do the numbers work as well for wOBA?
Brendan, may have missed it, may have just forgot.
Jim Fetterolf
9 months, 3 weeks agoYou forgot to call me an idiot, John, and point out that I’m condescending. But I always appreciate the personal touch you folks bring. Thanks for dropping by.
“Still don’t think this staff needs new starters?”
Don’t know if you follow the scores, but the offense has been pretty much AWOL this year. Don’t see any advantage to Zack losing 2-1 over Guthrie losing 6-1 at this point. That 4.06 ERA would have been adequate for a .500 team had the offense carried their RPG over from last year. As it was, the offense at that time was chugging along at about 3.9 and the defense wasn’t real good with Cain, Perez, and Getz out. New starters, had quality ones been available at the time for less than a package of Odorizzi, Myers, and Ventura, wouldn’t have made a great deal of difference.
“I don’t know who you are”
Of course you do, my name gets mentioned often.
Jim Fetterolf
9 months, 3 weeks agoWilliam, gave OPS a little more thought.
Toronto’s OBP is .320, same as the Royals. Their SLG is .438, the Royals .405. Their HRs are 145, the Royals 82. That extra 63 homers, assuming the Royals had 63 doubles instead in a bigger park and with weaker hitters, would translate to 126 extra bases, divided by 3843 PA would add .033 to their SLG. The Yankees pick up 40 extra points from HRs figured that way.
The top 14 teams in SLG have over 100 homers, the three teams with fewer homers than the Royals have also scored fewer runs. Every team that has scored more runs has more homers, although seven have lower SLG and six have lower OBP. Six of the teams with less runs also have more homers, but all also have less OBP and all but the Pirates have lower SLG.
Also looked at pitching. The eleven best staffs by ERA have won between 53 and 61 games. Three or four of those teams have similar offensive numbers to the Royals, so a great staff looks worth 12 to 20 wins over the Royals at this point, although all also have better defense. Injuries and Hoch and Crow looking like at least marginal busts with Montgomery being a big question mark are having an impact.
Not sure if there is enough talent in the system to be able to trade for a staff like the Reds and I’m not optimistic that any young aces will be interested in coming to KC this winter no matter how much money they’re offered. The Process may be forced to continue and wait for three TJS to heal and hope JaKKKe can get his pitch count down and hope a starter like Marcum might want to come back home.
Jim Fetterolf
9 months, 3 weeks agoBrendan:
“I have been defending Moore and arguing for more time, but I think I’m done. Every other franchise in baseball has made a run at the playoffs in the time he’s been in charge, and this season makes clear that we’re still a long way away.”
I assumed it was just frustration and it is understandable, but that is a not uncommon thought on the blogs. I offered this quote above, which yours at least predated:
“I’ll be frank with you: I’ve pretty much checked out of 2012.”
I see the same attitude in a lot of places, often on Star comments for other stories as well as the few other sites I still patronize. Didn’t mean to offend you about this. Sorry if I did.
Ed Connealy
9 months, 3 weeks agoMoore:
Lack of Pitching is the smoking gun for this poor season. That is on Moore. Not one major league starter developed by him yet. He’s shown a wonderful eye for young talent in the minors and has flopped hard w/ pro free agents. Looks like he has it his ceiling but considering the a fine core line up, I think he deserves one more year to see if he has learned from his mistakes in free agency. ( unless someone real good becomes available)
Yost:
We are dead last in walks and have given away the most outs on the base paths. These are facts. Yost teams are reckless…not aggressive. Yost also insists on playing a right fielder and second baseman that are the worst in the league, when there are younger options available that:
A. Can’t possibly play this bad right now
B. May fit into our future and we may as well find out now, being we are bottom dwellers.
Maybe these points add up to 10 more wins despite the pitching…not a big deal this year because there still would be no chance for the post season. BUT, I like to think 10 swing games will be a big deal next year w/ very optimistic hopes that
our pitching health improves. Moore signs a qua lit starter via free agency we get a full year of Cain, Sal and an improved Hosmer.
Yost is a crusty, classic “baseball guy”. His teams play dumb, impatient baseball and he seems to revel i it. He is a horrible modern day manager and needs to be replaced.
William Wolfe
9 months, 3 weeks agoOur team ERA is 26th in the MLB. I can’t believe anyone would continue to argue that our pitching hasn’t been a serious problem. They were pitching over their heads when the ERA sat at 4.06, and the truth has been coming out lately. Plus, our awesome bullpen helps that ERA come down, thanks to the fact that we pitch 4 innings out of the pen every damn night. We need to acquire 3 new starters next year—maybe the Bedard types with injury history, maybe the Edwin Jackson types on the cusp of making a move, maybe the Greinke/Anibal types to solidify the front end. Did you notice that the first two were available last year? At least we signed Frenchy instead.
Jim Fetterolf
9 months, 3 weeks agoDon’t think that anyone considers the post-injury staff not a problem, but not sure anyone thinks it’s the only problem or even has been the major problem the first half of the year. Had we added three 3.0 WAR pitchers we’ld be at about 47 wins at the moment, 7.5 games back.
As for who is available, as I recall, 30 GMs passed on giving Jackson more than one year, so apparently there were some questions on him, but he’s pitching well in the NL last I saw, so is worthy of consideration. Any idea what he would cost and for how long? Looked at fangraphs and they have him a low #2 starter, a touch over six innings, 6.73 K/9, low walks, the fips have him around 4.00 average, projects at about 2.5 WAR, $12.5 million or so?
Eric Bedard looks similar, 4’ish fips, couple more Ks, couple more walks, 4mph slower on FB, 33 years old, projects around 2.0 WAR. Given the age and walks, maybe $8 mil?
What I hear on Greinke is 5/125 and I doubt he’ll return to KC after this year. Had we won 85 and Paulino and Duffy stayed healthy so that Zack didn’t gave to carry the staff, he might have.
What do you think about Shaun Marcum? has some injuries, but an 8.42 K/9 with a better net than Bedard, 6.1 innings per start, would project at about 2.5 WAR over 30 starts, probably and injury discount, local boy. Have heard him suggested quite a bit, another $12 mil or so? that puts us in the $30-$35 mil range for the three of them, which isn’t a prohibitive number.
Sanchez looks the best pitcher of the bunch, projected 3.3 WAR, $15, $16 mil? Also about the youngest of the bunch, so an age premium might be in play.
As for availability, are we sure that any would be willing to sign? We may be back in a Gil Meche situation. Had we signed Jackson we’ld be at about 43 wins now, so $11 million wouldn’t have gotten us close to a championship.
Brendan Woodbury
9 months, 3 weeks agoJim -
You think concluding (after more than six years) that Moore is a failure as GM is a sign of a lack of heart? People fail. Anybody who’s been cheering for the Royals for the last twenty years ought to be acutely aware of that fact.
Asking fans to pretend that the team is succeeding when it’s actually failing is a ridiculous. I don’t know if Lee’s intention with that comment was to enforce this sort of loyalty oath (the comment was so stupid on its face that there’s no point in going into motivation), but you evidently believe it, and you’re wrong.
Actually, come to think of it, you’ve already declared Giavotella a failure (after less than half a season’s worth of time). Maybe Comrade Judge will be purging you next.
Jesse Stark
9 months, 3 weeks agoJim — it’s true that there is a lot more parity in the NFL and NBA than there is in Major League Baseball and I agree that it’s more difficult to turn around a team in MLB. But it can be done. The 1969 Mets, the Royals teams of the 70’s, and the Braves teams of the 1990’s, and the Twins of 1987 all have one thing in common — they turned things around with pitching and defense. The Mets, in particular, developed some of the best starting pitchers in baseball and they had little else to go with, yet between 1969 and 1976, they won two pennants and a world series.
The reason is simple — when you have a strong starting pitcher out there, the rest of the players are a completely different team; for instance, Paul Byrd won 17 games on a Royals team that won 62 games in 2002.
Even the Yankees teams won with pitching and defense. For instance, from 1929-1931, the Yankees had some of their most productive offensive years in the history of the franchise, yet they lost out to the A’s every single time because they did not have the pitching to back it up.
Brendan Woodbury
9 months, 3 weeks agoThe Royals have among the worst pitching rotations in MLB. By ERA, they’re the 3rd worst in MLB.
Some of that may be because the Royals defense is so bad. The Royals defense allows a higher percentage of balls in play to go for hits than all but one other defense in baseball. Part of that may be because Kauffman’s outfield is so big, but the Royals defense allows a higher percentage of ground balls to go for hits than any other infield in MLB.
Of course, if we just look at the outcomes defense doesn’t affect (Ks, BBs, HRs), the Royals starters have been the 4th worst in baseball so there’s plenty of failure to go around.
Jim Fetterolf
9 months, 3 weeks ago“Actually, come to think of it, you’ve already declared Giavotella a failure (after less than half a season’s worth of time).”
At the moment, Gio is a major-league failure based on his performance. He couldn’t hit and couldn’t play defense in the bigs, which is why he is in Omaha after having the job pretty much given to him twice. That doesn’t mean that he can’t become a success. You should know me well enough by now to know that I think players, and people, can make substantive changes and change their career arcs. Christian Colon is starting to get a few reps at 2nd.
“the Royals teams of the 70’s”
Remember how they were built? The expansion draft, which provided both immediate major-league talent and the warm bodies to make trades to acquire a number of future stars, and extra draft picks. The Braves of the ‘90s had Ted Turner’s millions. Neither are analogous to the recent Royals. Best analogy might be the ‘85 Royals, a meh team with very good pitching, four of the top six by WAR signed as amateurs, two, Leibrandt and Black, acquired through trades. Fortunately for them, Leibrant and Saberhagen didn’t blow up their elbows, nor did Quisenberry, in spite of his 129 innings. Of the + position players, the youngest was Pat Sheridan at 27, the oldest five were 32 and older.
The Twins of ‘87 are interesting, two exceptional pitchers, Viola and Blyleven; Straker, a 2.0 bWAR pitcher, with Kirby Puckett, Kent Hrbek, Greg Gagne, Tom Brunansky, and Gary Gaetti 2.1 and above position players. They allowed 20 more runs than scored and won 85 games. The youngest of their + bWAR position players was 25. The youngest of the + bWAR pitchers was 27, the oldest 36. There were only five + pitchers on the staff. The ‘86 Twins won 71 games with basically the same top players.
I don’t deny that the current staff needs upgrades, I’m less certain that signing Jackson and Bedard would have won a championship this year. I looked at some off-season FA possibilities above and guessed some prices, do you have any thoughts on which of the FAs, if any, could be signed? Or which pitchers we should trade how much for to get at the moment? I figure that GMDM could have as much as $30-$35 million available for FAs if he thinks that will get them deep into the playoffs.
Brendan Woodbury
9 months, 3 weeks agoAh yes, Dayton Moore would have been able to get us out of last place more quickly if only he’d had some warm bodies to trade when he got here.
That seems like a clear-eyed perspective on the last six years.
Also, teams in the 1969 expansion got fewer draft picks, not more, than the established MLB clubs. One less excuse for Moore.
Jim Wilson
9 months, 3 weeks agoThe arguments have become circular. Many have argued we should have picked up starting pitching in the offseason. No, Jim F. says, we still would have lost it just would have been closer. Many have argued that DM has failed but Jim F. says the DM started with less than any other GM in history, the Royals are now better than they were and he should get more time.
I agree with Jim F. on both points. It wouldn’t have helped to pick up a starter or two because the Royals are just plain bad. We’re not a player or two away. We’re last in the AL in runs scored and we’re 12th in ERA. Not surprisingly, we have the worst record in the AL. Two FA starting pitchers are not going to change that enough to matter. When Jim F. makes the argument above, in effect that’s what he’s saying — we’re bad!
I also agree with Jim F. that six years is not long enough considering the state of affairs when DM arrived. However, after six years we’re last in the AL in runs scored, 12th in ERA and have the worst record in the AL. After six years we don’t look like a team that’s going to be good in 2014 either (8 years out for GMDM). All but one of our celebrated prospects are up and we’re still not scoring runs. Hosmer now has 968 plate appearances and a career WAR of 0.8 and an OPS of .742. We don’t have a second baseman or a RF. We have a highly regarded prospect for RF but he’s just that — a prospect. We no longer have much organizational depth at several positions so we are vulnerable to injuries.
Yes, our starting pitching is a mess. But our pitching is “better” than our offense. And that ain’t saying much.
Spring training for the 2014 season starts in 18 months — DM needs a miracle. If the Royals don’t make a real run at the playoffs that year, I think Glass will have to fire DM. And then the next process will begin. Jim F., please don’t argue that the next GM started with less than any other GM in history.
I do have “heart” — I continue to expect miracles from the Royals. I have been a loyal fan from the beginning — I sat in the wooden outfield bleachers at Municipal Stadium through many games as a kid. And I will still be a loyal fan the day before I die (which hopefully will be a long time from now!).
Jay Hall
9 months, 3 weeks agoThe flaw with the way the Royals have proceeded at the major league level is simply this. Rather than evaluating each player based on how they fit into a championship caliber roster, they evaluate each player based on what they currently have.
That’s how you end up trading for guys like Mike Jacobs and Yuniesky Betancourt, and extending guys like Jeff Francoeur and bidding against yourself to sign Willie Bloomquist or Bruce Chen.
The Royals weakest link last year was pitching. Rather than going out and getting 2 or 3 new pitchers, the Royals re-signed Bruce Chen and traded for Jonathan Sanchez. That was the entirety of the work done in the offseason to bolster a weak rotation.
Looking at each move individually, trading for Sanchez gives you (hopefully) a mid-rotation starter, a #3 on a contending team. For the Royals, he’s better than everyone but Paulino and maybe Duffy, but the fact remains that even if the Sanchez trade works out great for KC, he’s no more than a mid rotation guy. He’s not an ace. He’s not even someone that can be a #2. He’s a mid rotation guy. He can be dominant, but his walk rate means that he will sometimes get banged around. And that was the best case scenario!
Chen is a likeable guy, but as a pitcher, he’d be a back end of the rotation guy for a contender. No contending team would have Bruce Chen as their ace, or their #2, or even their #3. He’s a #4 at best, probably more like a #5.
So in the effort to build a contender Dayton Moore traded for a #3 (best case) and re-signed a #4 (best case). Does improving the middle of the rotation and stabilizing the back end of the rotation really improve the pitching staff? Obviously not. And that was under the assumption that Paulino would be a #1 and Duffy would be a #2. Any hiccup by either of those guys and we would be left with a bunch of #4’s and #5’s on the bump every day.
That’s not improvement.
And yet time and again the Royals make a move and say “this guy is better than what we have.” While that is true, when you’re starting Tony Pena Jr. at short, incremental improvement doesn’t make you a winner. Just because you’re sending Kyle Davies or Sean O’Sullivan to the hill every five days that doesn’t magically make Bruce Chen a top notch starter.
It’s telling that we are at the trade deadline and, of GMDM’s big veteran acquisitions/ re-signings this offseason, Francoeur has little or no value to other teams, Betancourt has little or no value, Chen has little or no value, and Broxton has limited value. Only Mijares, the least heralded (and least expensive) of the group has strong value because he is a very good specialist.
Did I think they would all struggle? Well, with Betancourt, he’s consistently been one of the least productive everyday players for the last three years, so yes, I figured he would have little value. I didn’t think Francoeur would crater, but I knew his history of huge splits would make him nothing more than a platoon candidate for a contender. I thought Broxton and Mijares were good deals for the money. I liked the Chen signing, but felt like we gave too many years and too much money for a back of the rotation starter, especially given that Bruce isn’t an innings eater, he’s in his mid 30’s and we have guys like Will Smith and Everett Teaford internally. We brought in or re-signed 5 guys that were clearly going to have little value to any other franchise.
That’s a bad sign.
And that’s why the Royals continue to land at the bottom of the standings.
Jim Wilson
9 months, 3 weeks agoJay, it’s worse than you say. The Royals did not consider or assume Paulino was a number 1 nor Duffy a number 2 — they went into spring training as “candidates” for the rotation after Chen (our ace and opening day starter), Hochevar and Sanchez. Paulino’s performance was a pleasant surprise. He’s still not a number one. He has great stuff but he’s always been inconsistent. He may yet prove to be a front of the rotation guy but until he does, he’s more of a three or four than a one or two. Duffy made the rotation out of spring training as the number 5 starter (with Paulino hurt). The opening day rotation in order was Chen, Hochevar, Sanchez, Mendoza and Duffy.
John Miller
9 months, 3 weeks agoHere’s one for the stats-oriented folks here. Is there an existing statistic that measures the variation in a pitcher’s performance? Something like a “quality start percentage?”
It stands to reason that a pitcher with a 4.00 ERA who consistently gives up three runs a game (assuming 6-7 IP) gives his team a better chance to win than a pitcher who gives up one run, followed up with six his next outing.