KC Royals: Five Reasons Why Fans Should Be Concerned

The KC Royals are caught in two-week downward slide that began with a three-game sweep in Anaheim. The slump has exposed some significant concerns with respect to the 2016 Kansas City Royals.

In two short weeks, the narrative among fans has gone from debating the potential to create a dynasty to many talking about the 2016 season going down the tubes. The KC Royals sank to 15-17 after a brutal 10-7 loss on Tuesday in New York. Meanwhile, the Chicago White Sox have jumped out to a seven-game bulge over Kansas City at 23-11.

Of course, cold streaks aren’t anything new. In a 162-game season, even strong teams usually suffer through long stretches of poor play. However, since the Kansas City Royals slide has taken place with only 32 games in the books, it threatens to change perceptions about the team more than it should.

Right now, the KC Royals find themselves under .500 for the first time since July 21, 2014 when the team fell to 48-50.

The situation was much more dire in 2014, when the Royals looked poised to blow James Shields‘ second season with the team after a strong start. Many pundits called for the front office to unload Shields and other short-term pieces to load up for a run in 2015.

General manager Dayton Moore stuck to his guns, as reserve outfielder Raul Ibanez delivered a clubhouse speech that many later credited with turning things around. The KC Royals famously went on to earn a wild card bid, pull off a historic comeback against the Oakland A’s to advance to the ALDS, and went on to sweep their way to the AL pennant before falling to the Giants in seven games in the 2014 World Series.

At the time, the Kansas City Royals trailed Detroit by 8.0 games and Cleveland by 6.5.

However, five things suggest that the KC Royals roster might have a real problem recovering from their current slide:

Next: Reason no. 5

5.) Failure In The Clutch

The Kansas City Royals hitters led all of major-league baseball in Fangraphs.com’s CLUTCH metric from 2013-15, which measures how they perform in key situations. In fact, the KC Royals led by a wide margin with 10.01 over the second place Orioles at 4.79.

That’s a massive bulge that the Kansas City Royals enjoyed in key situations over the rest of baseball and goes a long way toward explaining #RoyalsDevilMagic.

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The stat heads at Fangraphs have been delving into whether the KC Royals have just been unusually lucky, or if the Kansas City Royals are good situational hitters that defy earlier norms. The argument supporting the idea that the KC Royals were unique was the combination of their: 1) exceptional contact skills along with 2) the rise of strikeouts across MLB starting in 2008.

This season, the Kansas City Royals CLUTCH ability has deserted them in a big way.

The KC Royals stand 13th in CLUTCH in 2016, with a -0.32 rating, which indicates a worse than average clutch performance. That’s a far cry from lapping the rest of the league for three straight seasons, and is a big reason why the Kansas City Royals aren’t winning games.

They’re failing in the late innings at a rate the team hasn’t seen since 2012.

Take a gander at the top of the rankings, and you see the Chicago White Sox leading all of major-league baseball at 2.62 followed by the surprising Phillies at 2.37.

Right now, people who believed that CLUTCH is not a sustainable skill are saying, “I told you so.” Unless the KC Royals can find a way to succeed in game situations once more, they’re unlikely to repeat the results of the last two seasons in which they won the AL pennant.

Next: Reason No. 4

3). Omar Infante And Jarrod Dyson Look Over-matched

Before the season, the KC Royals believed that Omar Infante could turn things around at the plate after off-season elbow surgery and that Jarrod Dyson could be just as productive as the departed Alex Rios in right field, with better defense to boot.

Neither of these hopeful winter assessments have proved true.

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Instead, both Infante and Dyson look to be long-term black holes in the Kansas City Royals lineup. While the team succeeded last season with little offensive production from either second base or right field until acquiring Ben Zobrist from the A’s at the trade deadline, they haven’t been able to carry the weak spots with Alcides Escobar and Kendrys Morales also failing at the plate.

Critics of turning Jarrod Dyson into an everyday player look vindicated by his recent crash. Dyson simply isn’t getting on base, which renders his speed of little use. Meanwhile, Ned Yost announced that Infante would play no more than four or five games a week to keep him fresh.

Maybe Yost wants to see if he can get reserve infielder Christian Colon going.

He needs to do something. The Kansas City Royals offense has been holding the team back all season. There’s little reason to believe that Infante and Dyson will be anything but part of the problem in 2016.

Next: Reason No. 2

2). No More Three-Headed Monster

The 2014 Kansas City Royals took the baseball world by storm with the post-season performance of their vaunted HDH trio. The KC Royals deployed three almost unhittable relievers in the back-end of their bullpen. They effectively shortened games to six inning affairs.

When Greg Holland struggled in 2015 and finally tore his ulnar collateral ligament, Ryan Madson took his place in Kansas City’s three-headed bullpen monster with Wade Davis taking over as closer. The KC Royals didn’t miss a beat and won the 2015 World Series in large part due to the bullpen’s ability to hold down opponents in the late-innings.

That back-end strength helped the 2015 KC Royals pull off a record eight multi-run comeback wins in the playoffs, including three come-from behind victories in the World Series against Mets closer Jeurys Familia.

When Madson departed in free-agency over the winter, the Kansas City Royals moved quickly to bring former Royals closer Joakim Soria back to the fold. After signing a three-year, $27 million free-agent deal, the KC Royals expected to continue their tradition of back-end bullpen dominance.

That hasn’t been the case in 2016, with Soria losing his eighth-inning job to Kelvin Herrera, and still failing to get it done in the seventh. Soria sports an unsightly 4.96 ERA along with a 4.41 BB/9.

That’s not the stuff of back-end dominance.

Either Joakim Soria needs to turn things around very quickly, or the Kansas City Royals need to give his job to either Danny Duffy (who has looked impressive while throwing 97 mph gas as a reliever) or Luke Hochevar.

Next: Reason No. 1

1). The White Sox Look For Real

The way the Chicago White Sox are playing right now, they look like a threat to run away and hide in the AL Central.

Last season the KC Royals dominated the division from start to finish. The strong start from the White Sox makes it doubtful something similar will happen this season.

The White Sox expected to contend in 2015. In fact, they were a trendy pick to defeat the defending AL champion Kansas City Royals for the AL Central title. Instead, the White Sox finished 76-86 and were never really in the running.

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Instead of blowing things up, the White Sox again added pieces to make a run at the AL Central title. This time, it looks like they got it right. New acquisitions second baseman Brett Lawrie and third baseman Todd Frazier have boosted what was a terrible offense in 2015, while the team has gotten bounce-back seasons from outfielders Melky Cabrera and Avisail Garcia.

What’s scary is that the White Sox are winning despite a humble .741 OPS from superstar Jose Abreu and a .637 OPS from outfielder Austin Jackson.

While skeptics will point out that the White Sox are probably pitching a bit above their heads with a 3.10 staff ERA so far in 2016, Mat Latos has turned some heads with a 5-0 record with 2.62 ERA in his first six starts.

If Latos can continue to turn his career around after an awful 2015 season (4-10, 4.95 ERA while pitching for three teams), he’ll form a solid rotation trio along with ace Chris Sale (7-0, 1.79 ERA) and Jose Quintana (5-1, 1.38 ERA).

Meanwhile, relievers Zach Duke (2.63 ERA) and Nate Jones (1.84 ERA) have given closer David Robertson (1.23 ERA, 10 saves) outstanding set-up men. Now it’s the White Sox with the formidable back end trio.

Skeptics, however, will point out that the Chicago White Sox have been the most CLUTCH team in baseball and are not likely to sustain this performance. Thus, the runs might dry up and bring the White Sox back to earth. No matter, even if the Sox play .500 ball the rest of the season they’d still win 87 games.

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The smart money says the White Sox are going to be in the AL Central race for the long haul.