I haven’t written about the team since the season ended, so here’s a quickfire recap if for some reason the only thing you read on the entire internet is an occasionally updated non-specific focused blog.
Mark Teahan was traded to the White Sox for Chris Getz and Josh Fields
Noel Arguelles was signed for $7 million over five years
Jason Kendall was signed for $6 million over two years
Miguel Olivio, John Buck, Coco Crisp, Josh Anderson, John Bale, Jamey Wright, Yasuhiko Yabuta, and Mike Jacobs were all cut, released, non-tendered and otherwise told to go work somewhere else
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So my buddy Adam and I were planning to do one of those email pieces based on the old Rob and Rany on the Royals columns. But I’m pretty terrible at keeping up on the emails, and us being under 40 means we text rather than email anyways. (being over 15 means we text instead of twitter) Adam’s stuff is in italics and preceded by an “A:” mine is in regular type and preceded by an “S:”.
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You see that headline and go huh? What? I know. It’s even funnier considering I wrote this piece when the Royals were 18-11 and everyone was talking about how they were on top of the world and had finally arrived. But, considering that the team has gone 5-16 since then, I feel a lot better about my accuracy level.*
*Note that this probably means my accuracy is about to drop off a cliff.
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Sorry about the cutely mispelled title of this one. The game was just to awesome and I’m too high on endorphins not to do it. I also have to give another shout out to the military half-price discount. It’s definitely allowing me to go to more games this summer than I would otherwise.
Just got back from the K a little bit ago. Went with a huge group of friends (I think there were 22 of us total - we went through a box of burgers, four packs of brats, and a couple cases in the parking lot) and to be honest, going into the ninth, the actual game experience had kind of paled in comparison to the tailgating party.
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I hate to be all rainy day Rob Neyer here, but this piece from Royals Authority really piqued my interest. In it, the author argues that the Royals are indeed this good, if not better, and will continue at this pace (or higher) all season. Frankly, that ain’t happening. Here’s why.
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I’d like to start this post with a personal thank you to David Glass, GMDM, and the entire Royals organization. I got to see Monday’s “Zack Attack” complete game shutout for free. I also got to take along my sister, my brother in law, and a friend for no additional charge. I was able to do this because of the Royals’ “Military Night” policy, which grants four free tickets to any Monday night game to anyone with a valid military ID. So um, thanks Royals. Now on to how awesome the team is right now.
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I caught the end of Greinke’s scoreless streak on TV Friday. As frustrating as it is that it came on a play with two errors*, what surprised me the most was what I saw when the camera cut to show Greinke’s face at the end of his streak. Dude was PISSED.
*Aviles hit the runner, then Olivio dropped the ball on an out tag at the plate. Just because the scorer ignored Olivio’s screw up doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.
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Now, I’m not talking about the bench clearing “brawls” that occasionally occur in baseball, I’m talking about fights for roster spots and starting positions. With the Royals, all the action is on the hitters’ side. The rotation is pretty much set - at least until Robinson Tejada reminds everyone why he was moved to the bullpen in the first place. Moore and McClure have given pretty solid evidence that it doesn’t matter who they run out there, results will be at least league average, and having the Mexicutioner to lock down the ninth certainly also helps a lot.
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So the Royals held their first full squad workout yesterday. They had every player there except one. Alberto Callaspo. Callaspo is the guy who spent part of last season in AA and rehab. He’s the guy who has three other players competing with him for the starting 2B job. Alberto’s main detriment from the club’s perspective is his off field issues (or his defense, but that’s a whole other story). So why was Mr. Callaspo late to camp? Apparently there was a problem with his Visa, and then he couldn’t find a seat on a plane coming back from Venezuela.
In general, this kind of visa problem/two days late into camp isn’t a big deal. It happens to a couple of guys every year. But if you’re Alberto Callaspo, and you had the season you had last year, with the issues you had last year, and you’re coming into a camp where theres an open competition for your job, and the boss’ are wondering about your maturity level… well, then why the hell would you take a chance on something like this? Why would you push it to the last day? Why wouldn’t you show up a day early just in case? I mean, like I said before, this isn’t an uncommon problem, he had to know it was a possibility, even if only a remote one. So why didn’t AC take the extra effort to make sure he showed up on time?
If Callaspo has an awesome spring, then none of this matters, but if he doesn’t, well, it might not hurt him, but it’s definitely not helping.
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So I was reading the morning paper (sports section) today and saw a piece about what happened when Trey Hillman reported to training camp in Arizona on Feb. 5th. He found most of the team waiting for him.
Mandatory reporting for pitchers and catchers is today, Feb. 13th. But as of yesterday, Feb. 12th, only six players weren’t in camp already. They are: Brayan Peña (got blocked by Olivio and Buck re-signings in the offseason), Ross Gload (sucks, lost his starting job, needs to be cut), Alberto Callaspo (maybe had conflicts with AA meetings?), Esteban German (old backup who didn’t get to play at all last year), Coco Crisp (new guy, wouldn’t have any awesome team spirit yet), and José Guillen (he’s going to make $4 million more than Adam Dunn over the next two years. Wow that was a bad contract).
It actually means about nothing in terms of predicting regular season success, but you can’t help but feel excited that the team is so pumped about the upcoming season that everyone of note (and most not of note) reported to camp so early and so non-mandatory that they can’t even wear team colors without violating labor rules. It’s about the single most auspicious start to a pre-season the Royals have had since before Mr. K died. Only a month and a half left to Opening Day.
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