Saturday Night Live Blog

The one negative thing about attempting a live blog is that I’m consistently 20-30 seconds behind live action because the MLB.tv streaming over the PS3 isn’t the most instant of inventions. But, it will do.

The first attempt at the Live Blog was way back on Opening Day, and while it was an enjoyable experience, I didn’t have the guts to commit to another one with the general awfulness that is this year’s Royals have been. But, I’m giving it another shot. If you’re used to watching the game and flooding Twitter with your sarcastic comments about the game or the Royals announcers, leave a comment below and bring some of the conversation here.

Without further ado, the Saturday Night Live Blog:

6:42 – Chris Getz leads off. Again. No one with even half a brain understands why this guy, who can barely hit the ball out of the infield, is leading off. But, there he is, in all his slap hitting glory.

6:44 – Holy crap! Getz almost hit one to the warning track!

6:45 – Personal aside: this weekend The Lady Friend green-lighted our building a fort. That’s right; a fort. So what I’m telling you is I haven’t left the front room in about 20 hours. This is nice.

6:46 – A pretty pitiful 1-2-3 inning as Melky strikes out and Gordon grounds out weakly to second. Fantastic start fellas.

6:49 – OMG! Getz is soo good defensively. That’s what the Royals tell us.

6:50 – Two infield ground balls, two balls that should be outs, one out resulted. Dayton Moore – pitching and defense. Yep.

6:52 – Yeah, that scouting report on Ben Revere that says “can’t really do much but run” apparently missed Jeff Francis before the series. Stolen base (3rd base), one out with Mauer up. This will end well.

6:53 – “Productive outs”! “Productive outs”! Mauer grounds out for an “RBI”. Twins lead “1-0”. (Sorry, got a little crazy with the quotation marks)

6:54 – Jeff Francis was a great signing if you like the signing of guys who live in the middle of the plate and can’t create swings and misses.

6:55 – See. 2-0 Twins. Double Delmon Young.

6:59 – After listening to the Twins announcers (yes I’m watching their feed instead of listening to Frank White chuckle and say “got his hands extended” another 300 times tonight) go on and on about how good Delmon Young can be, Danny Valencia “lines” out. 2-0 Twins. Yippee.

7:01 – Butler leads the Royals second inning. Twins announcers are saying the Royals want him to be more aggressive early in the count so he can hit homeruns. Yay, be more aggressive early in the count Billy, and make more outs.

7:03 – Butler strikes out on a really good “pitcher’s pitch” and immediately does his “I have never made an out in my life” face. That’s getting annoying.

7:04 – Ba-ZING! Twins announcers say Jeff Francoeur is the kind of guy you can build a team around (only if you like really terrible hitters to build your team around) and he “plays the game the right way”. What does that mean? We don’t know, but it sounds so damned good to say!

7:06 – Francoeur doubles down the line (announcers gush) and Moustakas flies out lazily to center. He’s a can’t miss prospect. Inning over. Still 2-0 Twins.

If you haven’t done so, do yourself a favor and read this post by fellow KC-blogger and Friend of KoK Brian McGannon about the top-20 Royals tweeters. By special attention to #9.

7:09 – Trevor Plouffe leads the Twins second with a bunt single. Meh.

7:10 – Plouffe thrown out trying to steal by Brayan Pena. Yep, probably a good idea to let him rot on the bench last year while Jason Kendall “lead” this team…Although, what’s really cool, is the Twins announcers can’t get it straight how to pronounces Plouffe’s last name. They both said it two different ways.

7:12 – Pitching to contact pays offs as Drew Butera (who?) flies out to the wall. That’s how you use the ballpark Jeff. It takes someone that “knows how to pitch” to be able to do that.

7:14 – Inning over as Francis allows a single and a loud out to the wall but no runs. See, all you have to do is use your defense people. 2-0 Twins after two.

7:16 – With the the lady baking me (er, us) some cookies, I’ve given in and flipped back to the Royals broadcast feed. I’m going to give the Frank White nonsensical comments a shot.

7:17 – Hey-o. Alcides Escobar with a bunt single. Everyone born before 1980 just swooned.

7:18 – Chris Getz does what Chris Getz does: hits a 7-hop groundout.

7:20 – Melky swings through a changeup for strike three. Carl Pavano is unhittable. At least, unhittable to the Royals.

By the way, you need to read this. I don’t think there’s really any reason for Melky Cabrera to be on this team past July 31st, but Matt Klaassen does a pretty good job laying out both sides of the argument.

7:23 – Escobar makes the third error (first one actually scored correctly) of the game so far for the Royals. Remember, Dayton Moore was going to bring us a team that was built around pitching and defense.

7:25 – Finally. 2 1/2 innings in and we have our first “plays the game the right way” managerial move. Alexi Casilla sac bunts Revere to second with Mauer coming up behind him. Because you know, anytime you have a pitching on the mound that can’t strike anyone out and give up A LOT of contact, you have to give away an out.

7:27 – Hey whattya know, Mauer strikes out. Now there are two outs. Probably a good thing you’re giving some away, huh?

7:30 – Cuddyer walks (who by the way is a beast on MLB The Show 12) and Francis pulls out the change piece to strike out Delmon Young who looked like a little kid in that at-bat. Remember last year when he had it all figured out?

Inning over, 2-0 Twins, still.

My man Alex leads the Royals 4th and Carl Pavano is pitching like he’s trying to win back Alyssa Milano

7:33 – Gordon flies out to deepish left field. I’m sure about 10,000 people in the crowd all thought it was a home run off the bat.

7:35 – If we could get more Joel Goldberg and less Ryan and Frank, I would be perfectly fine with that.

*Frank chuckles, again.

7:36 – Billy flies out to right. Obviously, he’s just not that good. We should trade him.

7:37 – Hosmer interrupts the Ryan and Frank chuckle-fest to ground out to second. End of Royals 4th, still 2-0 Minnesota. It’s time for a drink.

7:41 – Sorry, I was distracted for a moment to taste test the cookies fresh out of the oven. I hope you’ll understand. Oh and Valencia did something that resulted into an out. Cookies are good.

7:43 – The Royals like to teach “pitch to contact”. Drew Butera (who?) also likes it. He homers. Yeah for moronic baseball strategies. Twins lead 3-0.

7:45 – Niskioka grounds out to Francis to end the inning. This update was brought to you by Adidas.

End of four, Twins lead 3-0. I hate the Twins.

Ah! I got a positive comment on something I’m doing on this site! Somebody hold me up

7:47 – Francoeur first pitch swinging (drink!) one out.

7:48 – Moustakas first pitch swinging (drink!) two out. (By the way, he’s a can’t miss prospect)

7:49 – So after Pavano jumps ahead of Brayan Pena, and is on the verge of a 5-pitch inning, he went all “pitch to contact” and gave up a bloop single. I’m just saying…

Is there any doubt that Bert Blyleven could strike out more batters now than at least three of the current Royals starters?

7:51 – Frank gushing about the Alcides Escobar bunt single. He was born before 1980. This stuff is science.

7:52 – Alcides Bomb! Almost makes me forget Donald. Almost. 3-2 Twins.

7:53 – Chris Getz goes all Chris Getz and hits a 5-hop groundout to second. He’s a gamer. (He’s not any good) Inning over, Royals show the fightin’ spirit.

7:54 – Ben Revere leads off, again, for the Twins. Francis promptly falls behind 3-0. This will end well.

7:55 – Phew

You know, it’s been about a half inning since the last Frank White chuckle. Quick Ryan, say something non-funny so Frank can chuckle.

Serious question, Chris Getz can only play second. He doesn’t have the range or arm to play short. Since that’s the case, what value does he really have as a Major League player?

Tweet from Ken Rosenthal: Royals go all Dayton Moore and extend the contract of J.J. Hardy for 3 years and 22.5M. (I’m paraphrasing)

7:58 – Frank says Francis is saving his “best changeups” for Joe Mauer. Nevermind the four he’s thrown to Young that struck him out and the one he just threw to Casilla for the weak flyout. Hyperbole is fun.

7:59 – Mauer grounds “out” on a good play by Escobar. Inning over. So are the Frank White chuckles. Twins still lead 3-2.

8:02- Melky Cabrera leads off the Royals 6th. He’s had a career year after five years of being a well below-average player. Obviously, that calls for an extension.

8:03 – Cabrera singles. Shut up.

8:04 – Let’s go Al-ex, let’s go. *Clap *clap

8:04 – Cabrera steals second. Nishioka goes bananas. Cowboy Joe West takes out his six-shooter and dares him to keep going.

8:05 – My Alex Gordon love is well documented, but there is no way I would sign him to a new contract at this point. Although, he just walked, and I love me some walks, so I could be persuaded otherwise.

8:06 – Frank says Billy needs to attack the ball more instead of just trying to hit singles (or something like that, I’m not really listening.) Frank, stop talking.

8:07 – Billy with an FC to third. He’s just not clutch at all.

8:08 – Hosmer grounds weakly to third (Butler grounded sharply to third) and gets an “RBI”. Frank applauds him as a guy that can “drive in runs”. Nevermind that Hosmer just happened to be the guy at the plate with the runner on third. Small details; small details.

8:09 – Francoeur grounds out. I’ll pause while you pick yourselves up off the floor. Game is tied because Hosmer is so clutch and didn’t hit a ball hard at all, and drove in a run. Sort of. 3-3.

8:15 – Francis breezes through the 6th and doesn’t give me any time to grab another beverage. How inconsiderate. Still tied at three.

8:18 – Can’t miss Mike Moustakas leads the Royals 7th. Pavano hasn’t thrown a true strike yet but it’s a 2-2 count. Uh-huh.

8:19 – Moustakas flies out to center. Weakly.

8:20 – The Lady, whilst finishing baking the cookies, reloading my beer, and fixing nachos for dinner, takes a moment to mock the Royals announcers. Be jealous.

8:22 – Brayan Pena singles, again. He’s thrown out a runner tonight too. Annoying who says that he couldn’t play last year, and he shouldn’t start for the Royals, is delusional.

8:23 – Esocbar pops to right field on a hit-and-run and is doubled off at first. #Royaling. End of Royals 7th, game still tied.

8:29 – I leave the room and come back to see that the inning is over. I apologize. I will however say that “keeping the ball down” doesn’t have anything to do with how many groundouts the other teams produce. Though, you’re sure to be told otherwise a thousand times a night. Game still tied at three.

8:31 – Getz leads the Royals 8th. Thank goodness. It’s been so long since I’ve seen Alexi Casilla field a ground ball. (zinger)

8:33 – Ahhh, damn. Getz grounded out to first this time. He *never* does that. #prototypeleadoffhitter

8:35 – Melky strikes out looking awful; Gordon strikes out looking awful. Glen Perkins dominates the Royals. game still tied at three.

Twins manager Ron Gardenhire leaves the game early because of an illness. I bet he’s got too much grit in his heart.

8:38 – Holy PfP’s Jeff Francis. Golf clap from a fellow pitcher.

8:40 – Jeff Francoeur looking really graceful. Anyone who says he’s a “really good athlete” has never seen him throw, swing a bat, or run.

8:41 – Casilla lucks his way into a single by blooping one in front of Frenchy. No chance he could have done that earlier when he sac-bunted, huh?

8:42 – Aaron Crow getting loose. Chances we see Tim Collins in this game as well sits at 94.9%.

8:42 – Joe Mauer singles through the right side. Chris Getz shows off his amazingly awesome range and defense. He’s so good.

With Crow entering, we at the Scobee household pause for this, um, break.

8:46 – Crow gets ahead of Cuddyer 1-2 and hangs a slider. Single. Twins now lead 4-3. I hate the Twins.

8:47 – On the Delmon Young chopper to third, the Royals show how to work a sloppy run-down with the out coming with the runner heading home. Pitching and defense, ya’ll.

The inning is over after the Twins take the lead, run into an out on the bases, and the Royals All-Star gives up a run. The AL Central everybody.

8:52 – Joe Nathan enters for the save in the 9th. Immediately jumps ahead of Butler 0-2. This looks promising.

8:53 – Butler flies out. The Facebook people are having a field day. And misspelling every third word.

8:54 – Contrary to what Baseball People might want you to believe, everyone can hit a fastball, and everyone is a “fastball hitter”.

8:55 – Eric Hosmer singles through the right side. He is TEH CLUTCH.

8:56 – Jeff Francoeur, first pitch swinging. (drink!) YOU CAN BUILD A TEAM AROUND HIM!

8:57 – Can’t miss prospect Moustakas is the Royals last hope.

8:57 – Eric Hosmer steals second. Yep, that happened folks. Aggressive baserunning, gamer attitudes, giving up outs.

8:58 – Mike Moustakas ends the game on a lazy pop out. Such is life. Twins win 4-3.

I hate the Twins.

‘Til next time e’rybody.