Last night was apparently one hell of a game to miss. I remember, while watching the Celtics-Pistons post-game, seeing the final score on the ESPN Bottomline and saying something to the effect of "that stinks." It looked like it had turned out to be a close slugfest, one that, given it went into extra innings, could have gone either way. It was only when "KC Greinke - 8.1 IP, 3 ER" scrolled across the bottom of the screen that I began to suspect that it had been a painful loss, and even then I really didn't know until I checked the box score this morning. ESPN, as everyone here knows, would prefer to show the Red Sox failing to hit Erik Bedard all night than show Twins-Royals highlights. However, I think that might be a good thing in this particular case. Anyhow, the "earned run" tag meant I had no idea exactly how much the Royals had been leading by going into the ninth. Of course, that Greinke was still in the game indicated that they had been leading, and so my first thought was that Soria had actually had a bit of a meltdown.

Of course, that's not the way it went. You all know as well as I know what happened in the ninth inning last night, with Ramon Ramirez getting singled out of the game and giving way to the now-thoroughly dejected Joel Peralta.

One thing that would not change this night, though, was the despair felt by Peralta -- not for himself, he said, but because he let his teammates down.

"I won't sleep tonight, for sure," he said.

Yes, that definitely sound like a pitcher who gave two home runs in the span of three betters to heavily contribute to what I have little doubt will be the Royals most memorable loss of the year. I should make it clear I'm not attempting to get everyone blaming manager Trey Hillman rather than Peralta by evoking pathos, as I find it hard to blame Hillman for Peralta not being able to get Craig Monroe out. Really, with Nunez now hurting, and with Soria having pitched two games in a row, the decision last night came down to Mahay, Peralta, Yabuta, or keeping Ramon Ramirez in the game. Ramirez wasn't pitching well, so it's easy to see why Hillman turned elsewhere. Yabuta has a 6.00 ERA with no good peripherals. Craig Monroe historically hits lefties better than righties, to the tune of more power and a better OBP. Ron Mahay is left-handed, so assuming Soria wasn't ready to go, Peralta was left as the best choice for a high leverage situation. He blew it, he knows, let's move on.

We've already discussed this game at length, anyway. I'm just pointing this out because I've been critical of Trey, and others here have been a lot more critical of our fearless leader, but I don't think he takes the fall for the ninth inning. You can, as loyal2sdad pointed out, make an argument that Hillman should have just pitched either Peralta or Ramirez through the whole inning. You can also wonder why Greinke was allowed to start the inning with such a high pitch count and a 5-run lead. But either way, it's speculation that really isn't an indictment of the moves that were really made. If we all want something to complain about in regard to Hillman, it's much more debatable whether Peralta should have remained in to pitch to Justin Morneau with Mahay on the roster. Or the Gload in the outfield thing.

But I didn't write this whole thing to bury Hillman anyway. I didn't write to praise him either, because this entire team is in a funk that you usually only see once a year. If you want the bare bones consolation, we will probably go the entire year without the Royals ever playing this badly for this long. Feel better? Yeah, me neither. Maybe I'll just shut up about last night and get to the stuff I really wanted to touch on.

Notes on the Red Sox-Royals Series

Thanks to the heroic intervention of the MLB Extra Innings package, very soon I'll have the opportunity to follow more KC games without having to enlist the highlight reels and gameday. However, the four game set between the Red Sox and the Royals allowed me for the first time this year to actually see more than one Royals game in a row. It was pretty cool despite the obviously disappointing results. And yes, they were disappointing. Those of you who have been on this blog for awhile are well aware of my "split loyalties," but I was really hoping that the series would be a split so both "my teams" could have their moments. Well, I suppose I don't feel that bad that the Red Sox kind of beat up the Royals now that the Royals are getting beat up by everyone, if that makes sense to anyone. Anyhow, I have other places to go in this article, so onto the stuff that I jotted down during the series:

1. The improvements that Alex Gordon has made over last year were evident through the entire series, during which he was one of the few Royals offensive players who distinguished themselves. He looked more patient, more comfortable, and more disciplined than when I got to see him play last year.
2. Gil Meche looked as if he was starting to get turned around, K'ing 9 over seven innings and taking the hard luck loss in the second game of the series. Say what you will about the opposing points of view in the field of pitch count general pitcher workload research, but I think that poor Meche was suffering from a 200-inning, high-pitch count hangover that seems to finally be clearing up. It's like that time where I drank Ice 101 during finals week and didn't begin to function until approximately 2 PM the next morning. My god, that stuff is evil. Thanks to my friend Buddy, who recommended taking more shots of it than were necessary.
3. Joakim Soria - great man, or greatest man? Even though Soria only appeared in one game...and stuggled with his control...in the rain, I could still see the awesome stuff that he has. I was sitting next to a rather skeptical Red Sox fan during his outing, who made fun of me for saying that Soria had great control because Joakim walked two people in the rain. I had a good chuckle when Soria escaped the jam and then Mike Timlin struggled with his control and walked one in the rain on his way to creating his own save situation in the ninth. Funny stuff.
4. Contrary to whenever I saw him in the "highlights" earlier in the year, Jose Guillen had his timing down and more closely resembled the decent power hitter he's been in the past. You know this, but the difference was clearly visible.
5. Brett Tomko is not a victim of bad luck when it comes to his hittablility. After seeing his stuff, I don't think he's got enough to keep his BABIP at league average. I just bring this up because, other than his H/9, he looks like he is underperforming his peripheral numbers. After seeing how mediocre his stuff is, I don't think he's playing by the "normal" .290-.300 BABIP rule.
6. Billy Butler is sitting too far back in his stance, and almost never seems to get his weight forward into his swings. I know I'm not a scout, but it's odd to see a man that muscular trying to fight off pitch after pitch. In any case, he's a data point against the pitching coach. He looked completely lost in the Sox-Royals series.
7. Ross Gload is done. He doesn't look capable of hitting major league pitching. His numbers are terrible, and he's older than you think.
8. Leo Nunez and Ramon Ramirez both looked impressive in their outings. It's hard to believe that Nunez has come full circle and become a very good reliever, but he has. Ramirez looks like a good find, as if you look at his line in 2006 he was quite good before getting hurt last year.

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So Bartolo Colon is still alive, huh?

He'll square off against Brett Tomko (5.32 ERA). For the first time ever, I wish Runelyvs (never learned how to spell his name, not gonna double check now) was still around. Hernandez-Colon would have been a fun matchup.

Speaking of has-beens, is anyone else completely stunned that Odalis Perez is still pitching?

Between Odalis, Livan Hernandez, Sidney Ponson, Shawn Estes and now Bartolo Colon improbably hanging around, it's been a banner year for, um, the year 2003. Do we play the Padres in interleague? I'm sure Estes will shut us down like Livan and Sir Sidney did...

But back to tonight's game. Since Boston is such a cursed sports city and all, I expect Colon will flame out. Oh, wait...