Spent Wednesday night at the K, heard from Ned, Hosmer, Moustakas, Ryan, Dayton Moore, read up about it
College: where you go to take notes about what's occurring in front of you.
10 months ago
BHWick
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Sounds like an awesome experience
I enjoyed the writeup and look forward to hearing from others who were there.
Good stuff.
Thanks for sharing your experience. Sounds like a great time.
"Melky Cabrera will do anything you ask him to do."
Melky! Eat this bug!
Relive Royals History at royalsretro.blogspot.com
OK, Melky, paint my house.
Chaim Mattis Keller New York City's # 1 Royals fan!
Mentioned the possibility of signing 1 or 2 free agent pitchers in the offseason. Which I’d imagine is a guy who could wind up in the rotation and maybe a guy or two who might make the team or not (think Pedro Feliz). The rotation has 3 guys who are strong candidates and at least 7 possibilities already in the Royals organization for the last two spots. So a free agent might be the re-signing of a player already on the team or someone close to that level too.
That sounds about right. And I bet the guy who makes the team is probably not a top tier guy, more like a Jeff Francis.
He said he got two offers for Zack (Milwaukee and Texas) but other reports said he actually had a deal with Washington, but Zack refused?
$60 mill payroll is a bit disappointing. Really feel like a $80 mill payroll should be sustainable even in this market.
And a quote to consider from Dayton: "If you had the same information as me, you’d do the same thing"
Is it just me or does that strike one as a bit arrogant? I get he’s trying to say his options were limited, but there are always a number of different possibilities, and different personalities take different strategies. I think its silly to say “there was only one option!”
Great wrap up.
Relive Royals History at royalsretro.blogspot.com
you could say that
I’d hope one of the 5 people with a recorder was able to capture Moore’s voice good enough to confirm that exact wording.. but i’m sure it’s not the first time he’s said that sort of thing
considering that this team has at least 3/5ths of their rotation in place for next year, barring any sudden occurrences, the 2 FAs probably is probably close to someone who might wind up in a bullpen or a 4th/5th starter.
The only thing predictable about pitchers is unpredictability, so if Montgomery is in Omaha and he pitches well, he’ll get a spot in KC pretty soon because someone will lose their spot somehow.
and Greinke to Texas probably didn’t fly as high due to the Betancourt for Escobar portion of the Milwaukee deal. Although Zack pitching in Arlington fulltime seems like a poor fit
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Chairman, The Melky Cabrera Seasoning Sauce. It's great on your outfield!
I have to say now
that looking back, I’m kinda happy that Zaq went the Milwaukee way. Escobar to me seems like he’s gonna be able to play at a high level for a long time. His overall BA isn’t great, but it just seems like after he pulled out of the giant hole he dug himself, that’s he has mulit-hit games all the time. We all know how strong the D has been. That play last night was great,.
I'm waiting for my wave of talent to arrive.
by mitchfreakingmaier! on Aug 4, 2011 10:30 AM EDT up reply actions
Wasn't Dayton pretty committed
To sending Zack to the NL? I thought he wanted to avoid Zack coming back to the K in an opposing uniform.
Relive Royals History at royalsretro.blogspot.com
Well, we face NL teams these days
Not to mention that the ASG will be in KC next year and if Zack does well, he could earn an appearance. And of course, Dayton should at least give lip service to the hope that the Royals can make the World Series and face an NL team there.
Chaim Mattis Keller New York City's # 1 Royals fan!
I just remember
all of our talk and the rumors about Texas that went on ad nauseum. I remember thinking that the Milwaukee thing came out of nowhere and initially being disappointed, only to be pumped when Yuni was included.
I'm waiting for my wave of talent to arrive.
by mitchfreakingmaier! on Aug 4, 2011 2:23 PM EDT up reply actions
$60 mill payroll is a bit disappointing. Really feel like a $80 mill payroll should be sustainable even in this market.
I have a feeling that what he was saying was “with current fan support” the payroll can only be around $60M. With more wins would come more fan support (greater attendance and better ratings for TV and radio) and thus a higher payroll would be affordable.
You may know me as NYRoyal.
by Scott McKinney on Aug 4, 2011 10:27 AM EDT up reply actions
yeah, with current fan support being 20K a game
Right now, they’re hovering around 20K with a great shot of decisively beating 20K (with BOS and NY in town this month)..
So even an increase to 25K a game with the team winning has to bring in quite a bit of money.
For reference, they were at 23K a game in 2003, up almost 6K from 2002. So even a 78-84 run next year could produce a good increase on 20K a game. That, and the season tickets are counted in the attendance and season ticket sales will go up with the all-star game next year
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You would have to think that with the ASG the season ticket sales will be up.
I’ve thought about going a half season so that I could at least get the ASG sheets. Then I can go and sell on and pay for the season. Just gas costs so much.
yeah
for the sake of reference, there’s 37903 seats in the stadium with 16969 in the upper deck, 2417 in the middle deck, and 18517 in the lower deck.. i’ve always thought that the large percentage of upper deck seats is the reason why the team comes up a few thousand short on the bigger games.
The season ticket base is small right now, and presumably if it rises, maybe it’ll get those walkup buyers into the upper deck. Although not every $17 view level infield ticket is created equal
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Chairman, The Melky Cabrera Seasoning Sauce. It's great on your outfield!
Also have to factor in greater ad revenues
More promotions, etc.
Relive Royals History at royalsretro.blogspot.com
But they were at $70M in 2009 and $75M in 2010 with the same fan support
The $60M is bullshit PR posturing so that the fans don’t demand heads when the Royals settle in at $55M next year. But fans absolutely should demand more from the team.
Glass has said that all he wants to do is break even. And in 2011, he must be pocketing tens of millions of dollars. I understand the need to keep some payroll flexibility to deal with arbitration and extensions, but as an MLB GM, you should be able to figure out how to stagger your salary obligations.
Sign some damn players. We gave you a pass in 2011 because it was more important to get the kids acclimated to the Majors than it was to win. But the team is too close to having a shot in 2012. Spend the money.
which positions do you go for in signing players again?
as for 2012..
they add $8.5M guaranteed (Soria/Butler/Francoeur), and dropping around $10M (Kendall/Davies/Chen/Francis)
I’d imagine another $3M-ish in increases will come from Melky and Gordon at a minimum
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Chairman, The Melky Cabrera Seasoning Sauce. It's great on your outfield!
But we also have a lot of young guys who don't require the same money to be in the majors.
Crow. Moose. Hosmer. Pina or Perez or both. Collins. Coleman. Wood. Escobar (still pre arb?). Giavotella (presumably). Navarro. Adcock. Duffy. Monty? Teaford.
Starting pitching
Make the highest bid on Wilson and/or Jackson. Trade for Wandy. A $50M payroll when they’re trying to contend will be an embarrassment.
This team also needs a catcher. I like Sal Perez as much as anyone, but a 2-year deal for an above average MLB catcher would be a big boost.
Make the highest bid on Wilson and/or Jackson. Trade for Wandy. A $50M payroll when they’re trying to contend will be an embarrassment.
I know it is hard to estimate this, but how much would you offer these guys? With multiple bidders, I think the Royals would have to go big in terms of both dollars and years. For instance, would you be willing to give Wilson a 4/80 deal and Jackson a 4/60?
You may know me as NYRoyal.
by Scott McKinney on Aug 4, 2011 11:45 AM EDT up reply actions
I'm not going to pretend to have an ability to predict the FA market
But going by gut feeling, I’d probably do 4/60 for Jackson. He’s only 28 and he seems to be settling into his prime.
Wilson has been better recently, but he’s older, and he doesn’t have a long track record as a starter. 4/80 strikes me as too steep.
Jackson will be 28 in September
A 4 year deal would end right after he turns 32, so you’d hopefully be paying for productive years.
Jackson has been traded a lot early....
…is that because teams are okay trading him or because he is not a good clubhouse guy?
I think its because
He has great stuff but is wild, and every team thinks they can “fix” him and make him elite. But he is what he is.
Relive Royals History at royalsretro.blogspot.com
And I don't mean to sound like Petro harping on payroll with no regard for how it's spent
But the money is there to add two highly paid starting pitchers. And if the team adds two very good starters, they have a good shot to make the playoffs.
a) if the first 3 are Hochevar/Paulino/Duffy, then either Crow isn’t in the rotation, or there’s no spot that’s open for when Montgomery finally rolls in AAA.
Dayton actually got asked about Wandy last night and mentioned the future payroll in the tone that it was a minus.
b) You don’t need to invest a lot of money for a backup catcher, or for an above-average catcher that you won’t need and can’t move in a year.
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Chairman, The Melky Cabrera Seasoning Sauce. It's great on your outfield!
It sounds like you’re assuming that Monty and Perez will be good MLB starters. But that’s no safe bet. You don’t plan a contending roster leaving holes for guys that you hope will be good enough to join your team half-way through the year.
Which also leads to the question
Are we planning on contending? Or do we feel that we have a shot to contend with what we have?
I think we should--I've said that the team feels like a roughly .500 team to me right now
In a nutshell, I feel like the team has gotten a lot better through the course of the year between additions and development with players like Paulino, Hosmer, Duffy, Escobar, Gordon and the subtraction of Davies. I’m cautiously optimistic that Hochevar and Butler may be turning corners as well.
This is mostly a gut feeling, but I plan to do a more rigorous analysis at some point.
Worth noting
By 1st order wins (estimates W-L record based only on runs scored and runs allowed), the Royals are only 4.6 games behind the division-leading Tigers. 2nd and 3rd order wins have them 8 and 7 games back respectively. This is a supremely winnable division.
if Perez makes the team next year
he should get at least half the starts.. and the guy getting the other half doesn’t have to be above average or paid more than barely 7 digits.
and while pitching has a way of opening spots.. the “multiple free agents” idea restricts their flexibility if any of the pitching prospects make it to the majors.
Another idea would be to trade Hochevar for someone whose reputation is similar.. but i’m suspecting we’re about to get a Hochevar surge that will keep him here despite being 28. Can’t lose him, Humber, ya know
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Chairman, The Melky Cabrera Seasoning Sauce. It's great on your outfield!
■Dayton also doesn’t know about Aaron Crow starting 2012 in the rotation right now.
Huh? He's been quite clear that they've decided to re-convert him back into a starter next year.
You may know me as NYRoyal.
yeah, he said it's a mindset
I suspect they want to be able to keep Crow in the rotation for longer than a half-year and if they can’t feel confident that’s going to happen, they’ll keep him in the pen
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Chairman, The Melky Cabrera Seasoning Sauce. It's great on your outfield!
It probably depends what they do this off-season
Crow is probably their 4th best internal option after Paulino, Duffy and Hochevar. If two more starters (FA’s, trades, internal development) jump in front of Crow, then he stays in the bullpen.
We'll have to see what happens, but I could see this turning into an Affeldt situation
Crow performs ‘ok’ as a starter, but the team decides to make a push for contention. In the push, they decide to move Crow back to the bullpen to ‘stabilize’ things.
Unless I'm wrong...
Also, I could see the following happening
If Crow performs at a decent level, eating innings as a #3-#4 starter, I could see them moving him back to a setup role in the bullpen, because he’s better in that role, even though he’d help the team less there.
You may know me as NYRoyal.
by Scott McKinney on Aug 4, 2011 2:48 PM EDT up reply actions
I think that if he's good there, he stays there
but if he’s below-average, he’s in the bullpen by the summer
If he’s below-average and they get to the point of “oh, he’s running up a lot of innings”, I guess he could move to the bullpen role as a way to keep him contributing late in the year.
Crow had 163 innings last year, will probably finish this year around 75 innings, so if he’s sort of treading water.. well..
I just don’t think a guy with 2 pitches and questionable control in the bullpen is going to just drop into a major league rotation and be an average starter. But if they have to pick between putting him in Omaha to start and KC to relieve, he will relieve
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Chairman, The Melky Cabrera Seasoning Sauce. It's great on your outfield!
First, it’s an open question whether they’ll try Crow as a starter in ST. Second, if they do this, we don’t know if they’ll actually put him in KC’s rotation. They may not like his control, pitches, etc. enough to put him in the rotation at all. Third, being merely average (hypothetically) might not keep him in the rotation, even though he’d help the Royals a lot more there.
I just don’t think a guy with 2 pitches and questionable control in the bullpen is going to just drop into a major league rotation and be an average starter.
Neither do I. I just think he needs a shot, given how thin the Royals rotation is (or perhaps I should say deep with crappy pitchers).
You may know me as NYRoyal.
by Scott McKinney on Aug 4, 2011 4:18 PM EDT up reply actions
Nice write up.
Sounds like an overall great experience too.
I'm waiting for my wave of talent to arrive.
by mitchfreakingmaier! on Aug 4, 2011 10:27 AM EDT reply actions
I still think September 2011
is a good time to experiment with certain pitchers, such as Crow, in a starting role. Should not cause any problems, because of the expanded rosters. Crow (or any other reliever they choose) could be stretched out slowly, without having to go down to the minors first.
Doesn’t give the Royals a LOT of information going forward – but still worth doing, in my opinion.
Alas, we will probably be battling to get out of the cellar by then (or battling to get 75 wins or something) – so Moore will not allow this to happen.
If strikeouts are indeed fascist - then find me some starters that believe in fascism
and
someone else will post the “We’re not gonna out-talent anybody” quote from DM in some form of it’s context.. because there’s a few words in that quote that may be mistakes in wording, like out-talent and anybody
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Chairman, The Melky Cabrera Seasoning Sauce. It's great on your outfield!
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