Royals Rumblings - News for October 7, 2016

At BP KC, Craig Brown is drinking the Madison Bumgarner Kool-Aid.

I mean, come on. Seriously. In what can truly be considered Madison Bumgarner’s biggest games of his career he’s thrown a total of 53 innings and allowed a 0.17 ERA. What? It’s easier to take the fact the Royals lost the ’14 World Series when you realize they had the misfortune of seeing Bumgarner three times. A 0.17 ERA!

Had Bumgarner been a one-hit wonder, a flash in the postseason pan, it would have been so much more difficult to swallow. But this is Bumgarner! If anyone deserves an exclamation point at the end of his name it’s him. Let the legend grow, I say. The more insane October outings he throws, the easier it is to aleve the sting of ’14. This disappointment will never disappear completely – I still harbor a grudge against all things Philadelphia just because of the 1980 World Series – but it’s impossible not to marvel at what we saw two Octobers ago and continues this year.

Reminder: Eric Hosmer, the Son of God, is up for the Hank Aaron Award given to the top offensive player in each league. Vote early. Vote often.

The Broadway Bridge got renamed after Buck O’Neil yesterday.

At FanGraphs, Brandon Warne revisits his bold preseason predictions. Not for the faint of heart. And Tony Blengino breaks down the AL Cy Young Race and where Zach Britton fits into the picture.

BP’s Emma Baccellieri ponders a position-free world. The team of Craig Goldstein, Meg Rowley, and Ben Carsley determine who postseason free agent fans should root for this postseason.

At the Hardball Times, Dan Hirsch looks at the ten most important plays of the season for playoff teams.

Hair-plug addiction nearly cost Joe Buck his voice and the chance to fawn over Madison Bumgarner to the world.

As if we needed more reason to be wary of ticks, now people are acquiring meat allergies from tick bites.

Michael Bloomberg is bankrolling the push for universal background checks for gun sales in Maine and might be on the verge of defeating the NRA in a pro-gun state.

Rodrigo Duterte is straight-up crazy and dangerous, waging a deadly war on drugs and drug-users alike in the Philippines.

The world gets its first look at the Lenny Abrahamson helmed Hugh Laurie vehicle for Hulu Chance, and it looks pretty good.

The song of the day is “Girl in Amber” by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds.

And since that’s such a bummer, here’s a second one. “Sleep When Dead” by A Giant Dog.