Royals Rumblings - News for July 22, 2014
Dave Cameron at Fangraphs argues its time to trade James Shields:
As things stand today, our Playoff Odds model gives the Royals a 2.6% chance of winning the division and a 7.9% chance of winning a spot in the Wild Card game. A Wild Card game that would almost certainly be on the road, against either the A’s or the Angels, inarguably the two best teams in baseball to this point of the season...
However, there’s a lot of upside in being the team selling a fall-back plan to the teams who lose out in the David Price sweepstakes. According to most reports, the Mariners, Dodgers, and Cardinals are the most interested teams in Price, and at least two of them are going to be disappointed that they didn’t get him. And when they look around for alternatives, they’re going to find… A.J. Burnett? Bartolo Colon? John Danks?
The market is ripe for the Royals to step in and fill the void with an available starter who is a legitimate upgrade for most contenders. The final two months of Shields’ contract will be far more valuable to another team than they will be to Kansas City.
Clark Fosler at Royals Authority makes the same point I made a few weeks ago - this "lack of clutch hitting" excuse is the wrong diagnosis.
The problem, remember, is not a .313 on-base percentage: it is how poorly they perform with runners in scoring position. In those scenarios, Kansas City is hitting just .262/.324/.386. Those numbers are good for 5th in batting average, 11th in on-base percentage and 9th in slugging.
So….the Royals offense is good enough, they just need to hit better with runners in scoring position, but yet they ARE better hitters with runners in scoring position then they are overall. Wait. What?
To put it another way, the Kansas City Royals have put 2,229 runners on base this season (not counting solo home runs) and scored 14.67% of those runners. In the American League, only Texas, Oakland, Detroit and the Angels have scored a higher percentage of runners. That’s right, your situationally deficient Royals are fifth in the league in actually scoring runners they put on base.
Clint Scoles at Pine Tar Press has a podcast with Royals Assistant General Manager J.J. Picollo.
Jon Morosi says the Royals are looking at outfielder Alex Rios and other corner outfielders to upgrade their lineup.
The Star's Vahe Gregorian talks about the Royals and how much fight they have left in them.
The Star unveiled its "Royals All-Time Dream Team" as voted on by its readers, and the selection of Bo Jackson over Alex Gordon reveals a bit about the intelligence level of the Star's readership.
Charles Pierce at Grantland looks at how the Tigers are built for a pennant, even if Justin Verlander is not himself.
The Royals demise is fortuitously coming at the same time as the Chiefs open training camp, so the city can turn its collective attention towards something shiny and new. Chiefs management is telling fans to trust the process.
If you can't wait til football, and you're done with baseball, Jon Bois looks at some other summer sports to fill your time.
The Atlantic writes a bit about the brilliance of Weird Al Yankovic's video roll-out last week, and how he has adapted to the internet age in a way others haven't.
FXX is granting us access to EVERY SINGLE EPISODE OF "THE SIMPSONS" EVER MADE. So forget about any more content on this site, I am just posting Simpsons-related animated GIFs from now on. Sorry.
via thedroidyourelookingfor.files.wordpress.com
Our own Scott McKinney spotted in New York? (possibly NSFW-ish)
Your song of the day is dedicated to Alex Gordon. It is Michael Jackson's "Man in the Mirror."