Late last week the Royals and Alex Gordon agreed to a one-year $4.775 million dollar contract, essentially splitting the difference between what both sides had wanted this winter. Although discussions of a long-term contract with Gordon came to a head this month, there is not immediate urgency here: Gordon is still under team control through the 2013 season.

Gordon's at an interesting point in his career. He's not quite the second coming of Jose Bautista, but he fact remains he hit .244/.328/.405 in his first 1641 PAs, then hit .303/.376/.502 in 688 last season. He has the pedigree and a number of plausible explanations for his previous struggles, but you have to look at all the data.

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I'm a Gordon believer and a Gordon defender, and it's a rare opportunity for me to feel right about something. Nevertheless, no matte what you think the ultimate cause was, Gordon has had an up-and-down career, with some definite downs. Heading into his age 28 season, Gordon could take another step forward and develop into a real offensive force. He might also see his batting average drop down closer to his career levels, which might offset continued gains in other areas.

Just under $5 million is still a very good price for Gordon. Jeff Francoeur, mind you, is getting paid $6 million for 2012 and $7.5 M for 2013. If Gordon reproduces his 2011 in 2012, the Royals will have one of those good problems teams face, with a valuable player heading towards a nice 3-arb payday. Having good players is a good thing. Of course, they also risk Gordon deciding he'll want to hit the free agent market.

On the other hand, the Royals hold some flexibility at the moment, which is apparently what they value more. If Gordon struggles again, they might be able to secure him for a lower price.

Poll

The Royals don't have a long-term contract yet for Alex Gordon. Are you worried?

• Yes
• No - They'll work it out
• No- I don't want him long-term yet

  747 votes | Results

Dave Cameron is the latest smug saber-terrorist to attack us. Why does he and the rest of the saber-dorks hate us? I believe he hates our way of life, hates our freedoms, hates our strength. He sees the wonderful strength of our farm system -- ranked #1 by all systems by default since after 2011 everyone stopped doing organizational rankings because we destroyed the metrics by being so awesome -- and our culture of winning, family, team-building, love, prudence, scouting, Bubba Starling and the rest of it he lashes out.

In the latest saber-attack, this basement dwelling infidel defined the Bruce Chen contract as one of the ten worst moves of the winter.

#9 – Royals Sign Bruce Chen For 2/9M

Bruce Chen is 35-years-old and has been a below average pitcher for nearly his entire career, and he showed no real signs of improvement last year – his low ERA was essentially just about preventing hits with men on base. There’s no reason to think that Chen has turned a corner at this point in his career, and he’s still just a generic #5 starter nearing the end of his career. Better pitchers than Chen had to settle for minor league contracts. Meanwhile, the Royals decided to throw money at the type of pitcher that the rest of baseball has learned isn’t worth any kind of guarantee. For a team with a limited budget, efficiency is mandatory, and this isn’t a very good way to spend 10% of their overall budget.

I demand that we show TWO Bruce Chen jokes on the jumbotron EVERY game in response to this. Don't let them win.

Welcome to the Gordon-palooza, in which we avoid the Gordon-pocalypse.

• Royals, Alex Gordon Close to 1-Year Deal - MLB Daily Dish
• Gordon, Royals appear close on one-year deal - KansasCity.com

According to Dutton, the two sides are a) working on a one-year deal for 2012 to avoid arbitration and b) setting up a longer contract. Here's the money quote:

The Royals are believed to have offered an overall four-year package for about $30 million, which would mirror the deal reached last year with designated hitter Billy Butler.

The Royals and Gordon can do the one-year dance for 2012 and 2013, but they presumably wouldn't want to do so, unless one of the parties truly wants out. It's tough to talk about a deal that hasn't been struck yet, but a 4/30 deal could be fair for both sides.

KANSAS CITY - Officials announced today that current Royals GM "Dayton Moore" and UVA Men's basketball coach "Tony Bennett" are one and the same. It is not clear at press time if the man behind the complex and unprecedented double sports life is truly Moore, Bennett, or some as yet undiscovered third identity.

"Bennett" has been the head coach at the University of Virginia since 2009 and has been known in basketball circles for years, claiming to have been born in Wisconsin in the late 1960s. "Moore's" age is similar, though he is known to friends to have decried a Kansas birthplace.

The news came as a shock to both the baseball and basketball worlds, though not everyone has been upset.

"Frankly, I'm impressed," said Virginia fan Thomas Tidewater, "to coach those really boring Washington State teams and spend years methodically building the Royals farm system and acquiring former Braves at the same time? Amazing."

The net began to close on Moore/Bennett a few days ago, when he told a group of UVA beat writers that his biggest worry in ACC conference play was that "we don't have enough starting pitching, but hey, I didn't draft Luke Hochevar. Wait, I kinda did. No wait, I didn't. I mean, I'm a basketball coach."

An anoynmous source tipped off KC and UVA officials with photographs and the list of the exceedingly high number of college players from DC and Northern VA by Moore as Royals GM.

"He was trying to kill two birds with one stone." A local UVA observer tells Royals Review, "I think we were seeing a man running down the end of his rope after years of elaborate deception."

"We wouldn't see him around much in the winter," said Royal 2B Chris Getz, "but sometimes we'd see him in March and he'd always seem really frazzled and tired. Nobody knew."

Despite uproar it is not apparent what the future holds for Moore/Bennett, the Royals, or UVA basketball. Legal experts believe that almost certainly some degree of fraud was committed, but the case could take years to unravel.

"You don't do this alone," said FBI regional officer Mike Johnson, "we're still piecing together an incredibly complex case."

MLB Bud Selig has announced that he will hold off on taking action until all the facts are known, but added, "overall, this is a sad day. I blame the Players' Association and the agents representing amateur talent for allowing this to happen."

As reported tonight, Rex Hudler is one of the finalists in Fox Sports KC's/whoever makes this decision to join Ryan Lefebvre in the booth next season.

My initial reaction to this news was that Hudler-Lefebvre would be a very strange pairing. Hudler's well... hard to describe. I may be inaccurate in this, but when I think about his style the following words come to mind: fast, loud, aggressive, crazy, former jock, etc. Back when I used to listen to Hudler when he was a frequent guest on the Jim Rome show I was convinced I was listening to someone who was not all there, but was somehow weirdly cogent. It was entertaining. Of course, gasp, that was actually quite a long time ago, and I'm not sure what the value of a mellow Hudler would be.

Nevertheless, the more I think about it, this could be a good partner for Ryan. I previously thought that Ryan's best partner was with Denny on the radio, which was kind of a low-key fest, with the two trying to our-wry each other. With Hudler, Ryan could mostly be the straight man, setup Hudler to talk about old-school type things, and pick his spots. It could be really good.

Or, it could be AWFUL. That's a real possibility. Ryan could be drowned out, could end up sounding small and more bitter than wry. It's the line between being an odd couple and just being two dudes who are really different and don't fit together.

That risk aside, I hope they try it. Swing for the fences, FSKC.

Buster Olney, the sage of the "as told to" and doubter of all things WAR, has stepped aside from relaunching the productive outs crusade to share a philosophical musing of great import:

KC Royals C Salvador Perez has a ton of presence, similar to what Sandy Alomar had. Seems like a natural leader.

Talking about Sal Perez's "presence" Olney raises tantalizing questions about presence itself and of course about absence. By understanding Perez's presence we can only consider the implications of his absence and how that binary infuses our understanding of desire. Royal opponents are defined by the lack of Perez, but so too is the viewer. Save, I suppose, Olney himself, who is at once deeply aware of Perez's being but also, we must assume, understanding of some deeper awareness of emptiness. An emptiness made visible in the shadow of Perez's light. In this regard, Olney emerges as a seer vatic.

Continue reading this post »

Pat Burrell retired today, proving once again that if Brian Sabean doesn't want you, no one wants you. Nevertheless, we pause to honor him today.

Burrell doesn't seem likely to have a huge place in history, falling somewhere in the Hall of Good category, and the ongoing WAR-revolution isn't likely to help his legacy. He was, even at his supposed peak, quite often a 1.5 win player. At least by some metrics. Still, in nine seasons with the Phillies, he hit 251 home runs. Had he been a Royal, this would be quite many.

George Brett leads the Royals with 317 homers. Second is Mike Sweeney, who managed just 197, so Burrell, had he been a Royal, would have comfortably been second in team history in home runs. Well then.

The Royals don't really have a comparable player to Burrell in their history, who would perhaps be close to some weird averaging of Danny Tartabull's power with Hal McRae's or Amos Otis's longevity as a Royal. Tartabull managed 124 homers in just 657 games as a Royal, while McRae and Otis took 1800+ games to get to 169 and 193, respectively.

So anyway, if he had been a Royal, he would have been a big deal. But he wasn't.

Jeff wrote about Hosmer's walk rate last week, noting that Eric Hosmer's low BB totals are perhaps, just a little bit, something to keep an eye on.

Hosmer and Mike Moustakas have been mentioned in the same sentence since Hosmer was drafted, and the long held assumption was that Hosmer was the more polished hitter, the more patient hitter. From the beginning really Moose has been fairly aggressive and there have been concerns about this playing out at the Major League level as a problem.

Interestingly, Hosmer and Moose posted identical walk rates of 6% in 2012, and when you factor in IBBs (Hosmer had 7, Moose had none) you actually have Moose rating better in this regard.

Jumping off of our discussion from last week, let's talk about your expectations for Moose and his patience in 2012, and if he or Hosmer will have a higher walk rate.

Poll

Who will have a higher walk rate in 2012?

85%

Eric Hosmer

402 votes

14%

Mike Moustakas

67 votes

469 votes | Poll has closed