Sunday On The Deck

It is rainy and cold here on my deck today, not unlike your thoughts might be of the current state of the Kansas City Royals.

Losers of five straight, shutout two nights in a row and scoreless for 26 straight innings, this squad is currently not the ‘fun’ version of the Royals. They are, in fact, decidedly ‘un-fun’ and immensely frustrating.  I say that, by the way, after skipping the entirety of Saturday night’s debacle for a small town wedding. I chose wisely.

There is nothing crippling about a 12-11 start.  Nor is there reason to panic over being four games out of first on May 1st. While I am as big a ‘a win in April counts the same as a win in September’ guy as there is, the fact remains that there are 139 baseball games left on the schedule (sabremetrics at work there).

Even with the American League’s longest current losing streak, the Royals are in no position to panic. You won’t see a massive shakeup or roster changes, nor should you expect or want such. If Ned Yost really does not make a lineup or batting order change until he ‘thinks about it for seven days’, then I would wager you have another series before anything permanent in nature is changes.  That’s a far cry from the days of Bob Boone, who would have used at least 20 different orders by now!

One hears all types of dates and numbers as to when a real baseball man can rationally make real baseball decisions.Dayton Moore has offered up 40 games as a number when one can begin to have an idea of what your team really is. Memorial Day is another date often used as is June 1st – which is, obviously, pretty much the same thing.

The 2014 Royals gave us plenty of opportunities to panic, but Moore and Yost pretty much held the line through the trading deadline and were rewarded.  Quite frankly, a team with this one’s track record probably pushes the ‘panic date’ further into the summer.

So, don’t panic, but feel free to ponder these issues. The time – be it 17 more games or another month or maybe even less – to take action on at least some of these is looming:

• The hot button issue right now is Alcides Escobar and the lead-off spot. He’s been awful and whatever devil magic there was to having a career .300 on-base guy at the top of your championship order seems to have evaporated.  I think the majority of Royals’ fans might well have made a move in this regard before today, but who are you going to put there? Frankly, outside of Hosmer and Moustakas, nobody is getting on-base.
• Well, except for Jarrod Dyson. Do you trust Dyson to continue putting up quality at-bats in the one spot versus the nine spot?  Against right-handed pitching, I might.  This would be an interesting move and one that I am sure Escobar would take as a demotion. Warranted, yes, but worthy of note.
• Alex Gordon.  Where for art thou, Alex? He has actually improved his strike out rate….all the way down to 33%. Despite that and a Mendoza-ish batting average, Gordon’s on-base percentage is still .322, just 11 ticks behind that of Moustakas. You want to ponder something?  How about a Dyson-Gordon-Hosmer-Moustakas top of the order?  Oh, no four lefties in a row! I believe that has been outlawed in baseball.
• Do you take hope in the fact Kris Medlen allowed just one hit in five innings Friday night or despair over the five walks? Dillon Gee awaits your answer.
• Yordano Ventura has allowed more walks than hits. He is in the rotation for better or worse (and it has been mostly better this year), but that seems less than optimal.
• If you are going to carry Terrance Gore as a pinch-runner (something I was in favor of before it happened, just wanted to mention that), don’t you put him in for Hosmer in the ninth on Friday night, down one?  Yes, Hosmer is a good baserunner with good speed, but he is not Gore.  In that sort of situation, if you are going to give Gore a roster spot, doesn’t he run for anyone not named Dyson? Terrance is currently on a pace to appear in 16 games this year, about a half or third of what I thought he might reasonably participate in, back when I projected he could be worth about 6 runs above average in this role.

I was going to offer some rants on the anti-sabremetric noise, elitist ‘real Royals’ fans, Bernie Sanders, Donald Trump, the weather, China, North Korea and, of course, Millenials, but baseball got in the way.

I love it when baseball gets in the way….even if it is bad baseball.