That sweet siren of free agency continues to break up the championship team. It was announced late Monday that Edinson Volquez was the latest Royal from the 2015 World Series title team to exit, taking his talents to South Beach (sorry, that’s a tired phrase) to pitch for the Miami Marlins. If you want to […]
Author: Craig Brown
The Waiting Is The Hardest Part
I hope you had a happy and pleasant Thanksgiving. For those of us inclined to baseball, the holiday serves as another marker in the offseason. One step closer to Opening Day. Up to this point, the winter seems a little more docile than usual. A quick check of Royals rumors on MLB Trade Rumors could […]
Slider Away
On July 6, with the Royals tied in the 8th inning against the Blue Jays, Kelvin Herrera took the mound. It was not a good outing. It began in promising fashion. Herrera jumped ahead of Ezequiel Carrera with three consecutive fastballs. He finished him off with a slider that probably caught too much of the […]
All Of The Options
This is odd. The World Series ended five days ago and Dayton Moore has yet to fire his first salvo of the offseason. By now, isn’t he supposed to have traded for some low-OBP deplorable? Instead, the Royals have spent the time since the close of 2016 to take care of some housekeeping. Let’s take […]
The Free Agent Market And The Royals
October. This is uncharted territory. Of at least the last two seasons. What to do, what to do. We are officially in the Royals news cycle where Sluggerrrr being up for something called the Mascot Hall of Fame qualifies as notable. The World Series is set and starts sometime this week, I would assume. It’s […]
Looking For Payroll Clarity
As part of their annual offseason exercise, the gang at MLB Trade Rumors published their post containing the arbitration estimates for the upcoming winter. For the uninitiated, the estimates are kind of the gold standard when figuring out payroll ahead of the new year. It’s not always perfect, but for the most part they come […]
Can’t Stay Mad About Bumgarner
I suppose like many of you, the NL Wild Card game was required viewing last night. Forget that the Royals aren’t involved in this October. The postseason is the postseason and it’s still worth watching. And boy, was that game worth watching. As pointed out on this site the other day, Wednesday night’s match-up was […]
The Pending Payroll Problem
Back in the day, the annual Royals end of the season press conference could be a maddening exercise. That was when the Royals brass would sit behind the microphones and talk about how they were confident the team could build on a great finish (2009). Or they would extol the virtues of players well past their […]
RECAP: Royals 5, Twins 2; Vargy Pitched A Great Game
There’s not shame to admitting skepticism when the Royals announced that Jason Vargas would begin his rehab assignment close to a year after undergoing Tommy John surgery. The urban myth timetable is usually around a year of recovery. As in, “Oh yeah, that pitcher had the Tommy John in April, so he should be good […]
3, 2, 1… Where’s The Contact?
Part of the Royals recipe for offensive success the last couple of seasons was their ability to put the bat on the ball. With the mantra “Keep the line moving” and lacking power of their peers, the Royals relied on a simple formula of putting the ball in play and putting pressure on the opposing defense […]