Archive for January, 2011

Baseball America has said it. Keith Law has said it. I’m pretty sure at this point there is no one in the known universe that doesn’t think the Royals have the best minor league system in all of baseball. But for as much attention as the Royals scouting department gets over the next 6 to 12 to 18 months, we must also temper these warm-and-fuzzies of amateur acquiring greatness with a very simple characteristic that has still eluded Dayton Moore’s regime: wins.

Much of the Royals success in 2011 (if there’s to be any at all) is tied into the starting rotation.  After the trade of Zack Greinke, the starters seem to be put together by baling wire and Big League Chew.  With leading candidates Luke Hochevar, Kyle Davies, Vin Mazzaro, Sean O’Sullivan, Jeff Francis and Bruce Chen, you have a group of young guys who may or may not ever be league average statistically and two lefties, one of which could pitch 30 or 130 innings and neither would be surprising, while the other is on his 45th team in his [...]

Last month, Wally, Gage and myself took a glance back at a significant event in the 2010 season – Alex Gordon’s demotion to Omaha and transition to the outfield.  I always find it fun to look back at what I thought at the time in light of new information and with 20/20 hindsight. Today, Gage, Kevin and I are taking another trip in the way back machine to look at another theme of the 2010 Royals season – Jason Kendall‘s confusing chokehold on the second spot in the batting order. The Backstory: On May 18, in his fifth game as [...]

The temperature reached the 60s on Friday afternoon in parts of Kansas which felt like spring was near.  Spring equals spring training, which equals baseball.  And if you’re like me, you’re more than ready for the fresh cut grass of the diamond and the crack of the bat (and if you’re on a baseball themed site in January, you must be eagerly awaiting the upcoming season.) To pass the time until spring training starts, how about you fill up part of your day by checking out some Royals related links out in the wild blue yonder that is the internet…

The man steps in, uniform tugging at the wrong contours of his body.  He’s ready to hit and as the pitch heads towards home plate, he flails at it, missing for strike one.  The pitcher winds again and delivers another pitch and again, this mustachioed slugger swings and misses. On his third swing, however, he drives the ball up into a majestic arc that clears the fence – a home run! In 1985, as part of a World Series winning team, Steve Balboni hit 36 blasts to set a Royals team record in a memorable season. That record stands to [...]

There’s been a lot of buzz this week about the Royals’ future. Okay, so maybe there’s been talk since about a third of the way into the 2010 season. When your team, which normally gets no major coverage, is featured in five front page stories on ESPN’s MLB site in one day, there’s something big happening. And that’s just what happened. Something big. The Royals’ farm system was ranked number one overall by Baseball America and Keith Law. It was widely expected to happen, but it’s sort of a surreal feeling that it actually came to pass. When you start [...]

With it being the end of January, most retail stores have calendars at a discount (if they have them at all).  I’ve seen a 2011 Royals calendar that would be an easy discount purchase – That is, if it weren’t absolutely terrifying.

It’s been mentioned time and again, and while there hasn’t been a lot of suspense, the verdict is in. Kansas City has the top farm system in baseball.  That’s according to Baseball America. “Okay, fine,” you say.  ”But we had a hunch about that in June, hoped it was true in July and knew it would be that way by August.” Yeah, yeah, yeah, that’s all true, but the fun part is a little bit of bonus prospect love.

In response to the news that Wil Myers would officially be moved from behind the plate to the outfield this spring, a reader asked if Myers could be another Mike Piazza or if his defense would be much worse. Piazza certainly had a rough go of it behind the plate defensively, but his bat was solid enough to keep him there because it was so strong relative to other catchers.  Myers projects to be a similar type of hitter (though more of a pure hitter with power than a power hitter like Piazza) and his bat would probably enable him [...]

This off-season a lot of commentators declared the 2011 incarnation of the Royals to be the worst team the club has ever fielded. I’m not so sure. Earlier this off-season when it looked like Kevin Millwood and Luke Hochevar would be the most accomplished pitchers on the staff and the outfield seemed like the Island of Misfit Prospects, I had my reservations. It looked like another 100 loss season and I was bracing myself for a long summer of watching former Braves duff around the diamond while waiting for the Futures Game. But in the past few weeks I’ve been [...]

It’s not a huge surprise, but, like the Jeff Francoeur signing this winter, it’s nice to have it out of the way.  We can move on.  There’s no more speculation. Wil Myers, consistently considered a top catching prospect, is moving to the outfield.

There was a lot going on at Royals FanFest this weekend, but the one event I made sure to get back for was the annual Royals Awards Show.  For me, I wanted to see the gathering of former, current and future Royals and get a hint, even from a short acceptance speech, about the guys coming up that hopefully lead us to the promised land. It didn’t disappoint.