Royals Review: An SB Nation Community

Navigation: Jump to content areas:


Pro Quality. Fan Perspective.
Around SBN: Has Kentucky Improved Since the Non-Conference Season?

First Three Starts as a Royal: Tejeda vs. KC's All-Time Greats!


Robinson Tejeda's first three starts as a Royal have been outstanding, so much so that I started wondering: Did any of the Royals' standout pitchers make an even better first impression? After hitting the game logs, I can report: Yes, one. Tejeda leads all candidates in fewest hits/ER allowed, and finishes second in K's. While he can't compete with Tejeda's ERA, the #1 guy gets the nod for turning in two complete games in his first three Royals starts.

First, here's how Robinson Tejeda fared in his first three starts as a Royal:

(2-0, 0.55)

IP        H   ER    BB   K

16.1    6      1      7     16

I compared these results with the 10 best Royals starters I could think of off-hand, plus two future flame-outs who I recalled getting off to promising starts. The standings appear below in reverse order.

Star-divide

___________________________________________________________________________________

12) Dennis Leonard

(0-3, 5.17)

IP       H      ER     BB     K

15.2   20       9      10     8

11) Kevin Appier

(1-2, 4.96)

IP         H      ER     BB    K

16.1   23      9         7      7

10) Bobby Keppel

(0-2, 3.15)

IP       H       ER     BB     K

20     21       7        6       7

Note: OK, so Keppel's start wasn't as "awesome" as I thought at the time. I was desperate for competence in 2006.

9) Jose Rosado

(0-1, 4.19)

IP        H      ER      BB    K

19.1     20     9        9       10

8) Runelvys Hernandez

(1-1, 3.86)

IP        H     ER    BB   K

18.2    22     8      6     15

Note: Hernandez had a 9 K game that turned out to be a huge outlier; he only topped 5 (with 6) once more that year. Hopefully Hochevar's 13K game won't seem equally preposterous to game-log historians seven years from now.

7) Bret Saberhagen

(1-1, 3.86)

IP        H     ER    BB    K

16.1    21    7       3      10

6) Paul Splittorff

(1-1, 3.44)

IP         H      ER    BB     K

18.1     21    7       7        12

5) David Cone

(0-3, 3.48)

IP       H      ER   BB    K

20.2   19     8      7     13

Note: Cone made his big-league debut in 1986 with the Royals, but he made no starts that year. These stats are from 1993, when he was a 30-year-old free-agent signee with an already impressive resume.

4) Zack Greinke

(0-1, 2.37)

IP     H       ER    BB    K

19    18     5        4      7

Note: (0-1, 2.37) in three starts. Sigh. At least he's had several years to grow accustomed to pathetic run support.

3) Mark Gubicza

(0-2, 1.59)

IP      H     ER    BB      K

17     15      3       5      13

2) Larry Gura

(2-0, 1.23)

IP     H      ER      BB     K

22    17     3         3       6

Note: Gura's situation is most analogous to Tejeda's. He was still used largely out of the bullpen, and these numbers come from three spot starts spread over two seasons. In his first full year as a Royals starter, 16-4, 2.72.

1) Steve Busby

(1-0, 1.44)

IP      H     ER   BB    K

25     17    4      7      17

2 recs  |  Comment 11 comments

Story-email Email Printer Print

Comments

Display:

I would say the only knock on Tejeda's starts have been his IP...

but I would imagine that is mainly from him being a bullpen guy, who doesn’t have enough stamina built up..

Desperately hoping for Desperate Measures

by averagegatsby on Sep 13, 2009 6:04 PM EDT reply actions   0 recs

Makes me wonder if we should have used him as a starter all year

Never did understand his alleged “role” in the bullpen, if it was ever actually defined.

by Gus Zernial on Sep 14, 2009 2:46 PM EDT reply actions   0 recs

I believe his problem has always been control

Pitching in shorter stints may have helped to hone that (IIRC, Texas gave up on him). Now he just needs to work on conditioning and the Royals could have a potential #2-3 starter with great strikeout stuff. He’s never lived up to that before, but maybe he will now.

by AxDxMx on Sep 14, 2009 7:27 PM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

What about Leo Nunez's first FIVE starts?

23 ip, 1.96 ERA, 19 Ks

Then he had a mediocre start and a bad start, and then they just gave up on him. That probably doesn’t sound like that big of a deal, except they were still giving starts to Odalis Perez, Jorge De La Rosa, and Scott Elarton…

by marbotty on Sep 17, 2009 3:03 PM EDT reply actions   1 recs

Yeah, I remember being upset about that at the time

Bad decision after bad decision with this team. Though they were worried about his arm’s long term health as a starter.

by AxDxMx on Sep 17, 2009 5:44 PM EDT up reply actions   0 recs

Comments For This Post Are Closed


User Tools

Welcome to the SB Nation blog about Kansas City Royals.
Start posting about the Royals »

Join SB Nation and dive into communities focused on all your favorite teams.

FanPosts

Community blog posts and discussion.

Recommended FanPosts

K_small
Moore-isms Translated
Royals_85_small
Dating More = Dayton Moore

Recent FanPosts

Small
Baseball America Top 32
Images_small
BBQ, Beer, and Baseball
Small
OT: The Who = embarrassing
Royalsreview_small
I Will Be On a Podcast Tonight
Bsnublcd_small
The Case for Michael McKenry
_41153080_gallerysanta_small
OT: Royals Review Fantasy Football Keeper League
Small
Justification
Royalsreview_small
Super Bowl Open Thread
39135485-59af19dbb26654095f910f34176af094_4ae8a81e-scaled_small
Predictions Group

+ New FanPost All FanPosts >


Managers

Royalsreview_small royalsreview