Royals Review, a Kansas City Royals community

"Jose Guillen was pinch-hitting for…Alex Gordon.

Alex Gordon, who’s hitting .280/.365/.492 against right-handed pitching.

Gordon, who’s just a tick behind David DeJesus as the best hitter on the team against right-handers.

With Guillen, who’s hitting .257/.275/.420 against RHP.

I dare say it’s unusual to deliberately give up the platoon advantage when pinch-hitting in any situation, unless the batter is a pitcher or his dad used to manage the club but quit in the middle of the night or something. But to pinch-hit for one of your best hitters in a key situation and surrender the platoon advantage at the same time…I’m sorry, but this doesn’t add up.

I suspect there is more to the story here. After the game Hillman said, "I didn’t really like the way Alex was swinging the bat today." O-kay. If you say so, Trey. Gordon walked in the first inning. He struck out in the third inning – both those at-bats against a left-hander, and we all know Gordon has had trouble against left-handers this year. Against Carrasco in the fifth, he hit a soft line drive that Cabrera caught – not a screaming line drive, but certainly one that would have gotten through for a hit had it been placed better. Miguel Olivo, to that point, had a worse game than Gordon – and he’s garbage against right-handed hitters. But for some reason Hillman decided that Gordon was the problem.

There has to be more to the story here. Maybe Gordon wasn't showing enough effort, or he was insubordinate, or he made a pass at one of Hillman’s relatives. But somehow he has gotten on Hillman’s bad side. That’s the only explanation that makes sense here. Whatever the explanation is, it’s not good for Royals fans. Either we have yet another clubhouse crisis that needs to be defused, or our manager is just astonishingly stupid. There’s no way to spin this as a positive going forward.

But today, it was brilliant. Rarely in the annals of Royals history has such a clearly bad move played a more significant role in helping the Royals win."

Anyone else notice Rany trying to one-up RR with "Hillball?" How weak is that? We all know the proper term is "Treyball." As in, "Love that Treyball," or "*&&^% Treyball, we want COSTA NOW!"