FanPost

Where the 2014 success came from

Jamie Squire

The Royals are playing well and have achieved some level of success. There's been a lot of discussion about what the 2014 team means for an evaluation of Dayton Moore. That's a big subject that I'm not going to delve into here. I just wanted to find out how the various pluses and minuses of this team were acquired. I think those are meaningful pieces of information to use as part of an evaluation of the Royals GM. But I'm not going to get into that. There isn't going to be much, if any, analysis here. It's just some interesting information.

Basically this is just a list and then grouping of Royals players by fWAR (excluding pitcher offensive WAR) and how they were acquired. Then, I will aggregate the groups and show the percentages of where Royals production has come from.

Name WAR How acquired
Jarrod Dyson 3 Draft and develop
Yordano Ventura 2 Int'l sign and develop
Danny Duffy 1.9 Draft and develop
Greg Holland 1.7 Draft and develop
Christian Colon 0.4 Draft and develop
Mike Moustakas 0.1 Draft and develop
Michael Mariot 0 Draft and develop
Johnny Giavotella -0.1 Draft and develop
Aaron Brooks -0.2 Draft and develop
Eric Hosmer -0.3 Draft and develop
Louis Coleman -0.5 Draft and develop
Aaron Crow -0.8 Draft and develop
Jason Vargas 2.2 FA sign
Omar Infante 0.9 FA sign
Jeremy Guthrie 0.8 FA sign
Francisley Bueno 0.3 FA sign
Francisco Pena 0.1 FA sign
Bruce Chen 0.1 FA sign
Wilking Rodriguez 0 FA sign
Casey Coleman 0 FA sign
Scott Downs -0.1 FA sign
Raul Ibanez -0.3 FA sign
Alex Gordon 5.5 Inherited
Billy Butler -0.2 Inherited
Salvador Perez 2.9 Int'l sign and develop
Kelvin Herrera 0.9 Int'l sign and develop
Lorenzo Cain 3 Trade
James Shields 2.8 Trade
Wade Davis 2.4 Trade
Alcides Escobar 2.3 Trade
Norichika Aoki 1.5 Trade
Erik Kratz 0.4 Trade
Josh Willingham 0.3 Trade
Jason Frasor 0.1 Trade
Justin Marks 0 Trade
Danny Valencia -0.1 Trade
Donnie Joseph -0.1 Trade
Tim Collins -0.2 Trade
Justin Maxwell -1.1 Trade
Pedro Ciriaco 0 Waiver claim
Jimmy Paredes -0.2 Waiver claim
Brett Hayes -0.5 Waiver claim
TOTAL 30.9

How acquired %
Trade 36.6%
Int'l sign and develop 18.8%
Inherited 17.2%
Draft and develop 16.8%
FA sign 12.9%
Waiver claim -2.3%

So trades have been the biggest factor, with the Myers and Greinke trades providing the biggest pieces in that group. There is a significant amount of in-house talent too, highlighted by Dyson, Ventura, Duffy and Holland. And of course the Royals are also benefiting from one player that Moore inherited, the team's only big star, Alex Gordon. Free agent signings have provided a smaller benefit. Vargas is the main plus there, with lesser contributions from Infante and Guthrie. There are only two three international signees, but each of Perez, Ventura and Herrera are providing a positive impact. The waiver wire hasn't done much for us this year.

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.