We Know Who We Are

Chris Volstad. That’s the initial big splash the Royals made this offseason.

Chris Volstad, your newest Kansas City Royals pitcher. Mandatory Credit: Troy Taormina-US PRESSWIRE

The move itself doesn’t bother me. Why not grab a cheap 26-year-old pitcher and see what happens? Most likely he’ll be used as insurance against injury, as he’s yet to show he can be a successful big league pitcher. But it doesn’t hurt anything for KC to take a gamble.

It’s the attitude of our front office that bothers me. In an article  by Bob Dutton, Dayton Moore said:

"“We know who we are and how we have to build this team,” general manager Dayton Moore said, “and how we have to build our rotation. We’re going to be as aggressive as we can, but we know who we are and how we need to do it.”"

Ummm…what? How are we supposed to interpret that comment? Does he mean that we know we need depth, so we are being smart and grabbing players we can stash in AAA in case of emergency? Or is he saying that the Royals can never hope to compete in free agency, and we can never dream of picking up an established starting pitcher?

My fear is Moore means the latter. Moore goes on in the same article to say building a team in Kansas City through the free agent market won’t work. Plain and simple. And I don’t disagree…the team doesn’t have the big market dollars to throw around. However, ownership should have enough money to go out and pick up a couple of legit players. If the scouts and front office officials believe in the position players and bullpen, they can afford to spend on a couple of starting pitchers.

If those players aren’t available, the Royals need to look long and hard at whom they are willing to part with in a trade. Moore does say the trade market is a viable option for the Royals, so that’s not out of the question. I also don’t necessarily believe Moore has the stones to pull off a big deal.

The comment from Moore, in my opinion, just reeks of a defeatist attitude. I’ve defended Moore for the most part during his tenure. I think he’s done a lot of great things here with getting David Glass to spend in the draft and raising the team’s presence in the international market, but maybe that’s where Moore belongs. Head of scouting or player development might be more in his wheelhouse.

I guess I shouldn’t fault Moore for setting his sites lower – most people in his position would probably get beaten down after a few years running this team. But the fans deserve better than that.

“We’re going to be as aggressive as we can, but we know who we are…”

Hey…we’re just the Royals… Mandatory Credit: Peter G. Aiken-US PRESSWIRE

Not exactly confidence building words. We’ve gone from Glass saying that we’ll spend money on the rotation and doing what needs to be done…to this. So much for the excitement fans were feeling. The chatter among Royals fans for the last several weeks has been “Who do you think we’re going to bring in? Anibal Sanchez? Dan Haren?”

The talk moving forward will probably sound more like the fans from the first “Major League” movie. “Chris freaking Volstad? Who are these freaking guys?”

(I went ahead and edited that last part for basic cable)

The difference being, of course, this is not a feel good baseball movie where a bunch of loveable losers go to the playoffs. This is real life.  We need a GM who won’t basically go on record and say “Oh well…we’re just the Royals. This how we operate.”

It’s about time for the front office to stop preparing the fans for failure and start figuring out how to win.