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A Critical Analysis of the Royals Part 4: Is the Valencia Trade or Mellinger’s Article More Ridiculous???

One of the truly rewarding parts of being a Royals fan is that they occasionally do something so ridiculous as to actually surprise me. Trading Valencia did the trick. After all, GMDM just said we’re not sellers, and there was a nice fluff piece on Glass’ support for this team, GMDM and Ned.

One of the truly rewarding parts of occasionally reading Mr. Mellinger’s, errrr, "analyses" of the Royals is that he says something so ridiculous as to actually merit a closer reader. Winner winner chicken dinner! Mr. Mellinger achieved that bar twice last week!

[Note: The first time I did a second take was when Mellinger wrote -- without sarcasm I believe, but am unsure (???) -- that the Royals employ a Sabermetrics expert in the front office. This seemed to be in response to ongoing questions about batting Hosmer second. My reaction was immediate – Mellinger told a funny. However, after re-reading the statement and article, I realized that, quite amazingly, he was not being funny, or ironic.

So what prompted my double-take? No idea, but here’s two plausible explanations: (i) for a moment I thought, yeah, Sam’s the expert working for the Royals, thereby forcing me to consider what that would mean in practice; and (ii) it was triggered by the sheer irony of writing that when the Royals were playing a sub-.220 OBP right-fielder (for the 3rd consecutive day, and, coincidentally, 3rd consecutive loss) while Dyson and his ~.350 OBP was on the bench. I’m guessing it was mostly column B.]

[Aside: One can only wonder if they have a birthday expert on staff that can tell them that Ibanez is 42…and 42 is really old in baseball years. Heck, it’s old in normal people world best I can tell.]

In honor of these momentous events, the Critical Analysis of the Royals takes a quick break to ask: "Is the Valencia Trade or Mellinger’s Article More Ridiculous?

At first glance, this is an easy call. It had to be Mellinger’s article. After all, Sam cut his teeth on providing statistics-based analysis of the Royals for the Star. Of all people, he’s the last one to be writing that the Royals have a really good shot at making the playoffs because Sam knows that 10% actually means that it’s 90% likely that we won’t make the playoffs.

Moreover, we know Sam doesn’t pull punches or sing in the choir, right? After all, this is the guy who absolutely shredded Clark Hunt for the Pioli disaster, almost single-handedly (albeit with the help of vocal radio personalities) driving Pioli out of town. (Thanks for that Sam – that was a great example of how excellent you can be at times.)

Since there is no viable explanation for Mr. Mellinger’s article, it has to be the more ridiculous by definition, right?

Hold on. Is there something worse than no viable explanation? I think there is: an explanation that is so ridiculous as to be illogical. Not just lacking plausibility, but actually crossing the line of irrationality.

Although it goes against my nature, I’m going to be succinct in attempting to write what looks like a LSAT logic puzzle:

True or False:

The Royals are not selling, and are going for it 2015 and beyond be darned

The Royals are reportedly buying a RF to help bring it home

Therefore, the Royals will trade an asset to a team that is arguably the most likely to take their playoff spot??

[Aside: I’m pretty sure that 98% of people from Budapest, all of whom hypothetically hate baseball, would guess False.]

At face value, there is nothing about this trade that computes. Valencia clearly makes the Royals better against lefties for the "playoff run." Toronto is clearly better in a position of great need than they were yesterday. Toronto is ahead of us in the playoff standings. This is not a harbinger of more trades. We got zilch in return. I don’t think we saved much of anything in salary.

[Note: I recognize that I said just a few posts ago that we should evaluate Colon at the big-league level. I also said let’s trade Valencia (among other vets). But I’m pretty sure I didn’t say, let’s trade Valencia to a competitor for our Wild Card for zero compensation AND not make any trades in preparation for 2015.

Excellent try Mr. Mellinger. You certainly had me on The Royals Have a Legit Shot to Make the Playoffs. But there can only be one winner, and GMDM’s deviation from the strategy four days after saying he’s staying on strategy -- and strengthening a competitor to boot -- takes the prize. Ding ding ding…

P.S. If you give the benefit of the doubt to the Royals and Mellinger, there are actually excellent reasons for his article (i.e., there is no reason to write the obit with 50 games left) and trading Valencia (i.e., Colon is ready, clubhouse dynamics and/or final eval of Moose). After 30 years of watching Keystone Cops, however, it is sooooooooo hard to give the benefit of the doubt, especially in light of the fact that we’re going to completely waste two hugely valuable assets in Shields and Holland.



This FanPost was written by a member of the Royals Review community. It does not necessarily reflect the views of the editors and writers of this site.