Post-Astros sweep hypotheticals

The things that have happened so far this season have been overwhelmingly disappointing, but there have to be some scenarios in which the year ends pleasantly.

This team just got swept by what many believe is the worst team in baseball. The Astros aren't as bad as they were last year, and George Springer might be on your fantasy team, but the Royals just got swept by a combined score of 21-5 in a three-game series against them in Kansas City.

It's only three games. Small sample size ... only May ... etc. 2014 isn't over yet, but the way things are going, it's not going to be much different from the disappointments that have become the norm over the last 28 years since David Glass bought the team.

So, instead of focusing on what will probably happen, let's take a look at some of the things that could conceivably happen that would be way better? Let's start with the scenario that the front office is suggesting:

Power hitting materializes out of nothing, Royals lead AL in runs scored for 2nd half

In this scenario, the just starts to hit because they can during batting practice. It's pretty much the same thing as facing live pitching anyway. Alex Gordon, Billy Butler, and Eric Hosmer combine to smash 100 combined homers the rest of the way and the Royals take the Central with ease.

Youlieski Gourriel, Yasmany Tomas defect, sign with Royals

Arguably the best players remaining in Cuba, the duo of Youlieski Gourriel and Yasmany Tomas would step right into the middle of the order in Kansas City and provide strong defense at third and right field respectively. The players are personally aided in defecting from Cuba by billionaire owner David Glass -- who becomes a surprise hero to Royals fans everywhere who always thought he was pretty much just sleazy, old cash-poacher with no friends and a stupid son. Turns out, they were all wrong! He's great!

Gourriel plays a slick third base and mashes .319/.401/.587 with 15 homers the rest of the way and Tomas makes Yoenis Cespedes look like a back up hitting .333/.365/.601 in 260 plate appearances after being cleared by the U.S. Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control.

Dayton Moore reveals previously unknown minor league team populated by 25 reanimated Martin Dihigos

Martin Dihigo was one of the first Cuban players to dominate the game of baseball back in the 20s, 30s, and 40s. He never got to play in the majors, but he was still inducted into the MLB Hall of Fame in 1977 because he was one of the greatest players that ever lived, the greatest according to Buck Leonard.

Dihigo pitched and played nearly every position on the field ... well. In twelve seasons in the Negro Leagues, he put up a .307 batting average and .511 slugging percentage with 64 home runs, 227 RBIs in 1404 at bats -- or roughly two major league seasons. He drew 143 walks and stole 41 bases. As a pitcher, he went 26–19 with a 2.92 ERA, with 176 strikeouts and 80 walks in 354 innings.

How Dayton Moore could manage such a science-bending feat is beyond explanation, but it would explain his poor results thus far. After all, he's had close to a decade to build something, who says it can't be a shadowy defiance of the the very concept of death itself?

Royals' scientists, engineers combine to develop performance-enhancing nanoids

I don't know anything about the actual capabilities of nano robotics, but I have to assume the definitely real Royals R&D department is working to transform the concept into an advantage on the field. What else are they going to do with all those unpaid UMS&T interns?

Here's how I assume it will work: Tiny robots (10⁻⁹ meters) will be mixed into a superficial saline goop and injected into the players' bodies. These "microscopic robots" wouldn't be like little R2D2's swimming around in human blood. Instead they'd be "DNA nano cages" that would snap open like a clam shell and unleashing a a string of DNA that can bind with the players' cells and "self assemble" with existing nucleotide strains in a sort of DNA origami. This would allow the team to outfit players with designer tools -- such as Aroldis Chapman's hand speed or Yasiel Puig's quick twitch power. Of course, they'd have to sneak on those guys and pluck a hair or two without anyone noticing, but that would probably be the easiest part of the process.

It might take some time for the synthetic skills to materialize in reality, but by the All Star Break, the Royals could have a team of super heroes.

Yost trains harmonica-playing sloth bear cub to pitch, sloth bear cub wins AL Cy Young

Scouting really isn't that hard.

Artificial intelligence transcends matter, physical world becomes irrelevant

So, AI kind of already existed, right? What if, somehow, it took a major leap forward and was suddenly able to evolve as rapidly as a computer can operate? It would then only be a matter of time until AI could program away the nuisance of being tethered to matter, and when that happens, the physical world will no longer be the highest known plane of existence. Humanity, devastated in unison, would simply surrender and begin devolving back into the ocean, making the planet a much better, thought baseball-less, place.

The Royals would still lose, but so would everyone else.