Royals Rumblings - News for September 14, 2016

Royals Rumblings - News for September 14, 2016

Craig Brown at Baseball Prospectus Kansas City thinks the Royals’ season is hanging by a thread.

The playoff odds remain grim. Anything under 10 percent with less than three weeks to play is a cold splash of reality. This is where the Royals have been for weeks. It’s like watching college basketball where one team falls behind 20, makes an amazing push to cut the lead to a basket, whipping the fans into a frenzy and injecting belief into the crowd. Except they can never quite find that go-ahead basket. This is where the Royals find themselves. It was a helluva run to get back into the conversation for the Wild Card, but it was too much to ask that they pull themselves up to even the first team on the outside. There are simply too many teams ahead of them.

Having dampened your expectations, I will say at this point I’m not giving up hope. It’s slim, but there’s still a chance. If you handed me $100 and forced me to place a bet for or against the Royals playoffs, I’d be betting against it happening, but as long as they remain mathematically alive, I’ll stay on board. This isn’t about how the Royals have been left for roadkill only to rise from the pavement to surprise everyone. This is just about what I view as a basic tenet of fandom: hope.

The Royals think Salvador Perez can improve his pitch-framing.

According to the in-house study, Perez graded out as one of the best pitch framers in baseball in high-leverage situations, including close games and two-strike counts. And then there was last season: From the first week of August to the end of the season, according to the Royals, Perez ranked among the best pitch framers in baseball. Where he rated the worst, Grifol says, is in blowout games and low-leverage counts.

“When the game trended closer, he trended upward,” Grifol says.

The numbers offered hope, and Grifol delivered a two-part message to Perez. First, they would make a mechanical adjustment, focusing on catching pitches more out front. Grifol hoped the tweak would help Perez funnel more pitches toward the white part of the plate. But even more important, Grifol said, was the mental adjustment.

Hunter Dozier was pretty pumped about his Major League debut.

"I think I got a little antsy," Dozier. "That's just the way it is. I couldn't control that. I was just trying to stay ready every day for the time it would come."...

"It was an unreal experience," Dozier said. "It's been awhile since I played a game. But it was incredible. I'm kind of speechless."

Salvy is back following the birth of his son.

Vote for the Royals Fan of the Year.

Should the Twins trade Brian Dozier?

The Rays and Blue Jays nearly came to blows over absolutely nothing.

Could Yasiel Puig be dealt for Ryan Braun this winter?

The Mets fire popular minor league manager Wally Backman for not following orders.

Dodgers fans take over Yankee Stadium.

Adam Jones says not to expect protests in baseball because it is a “white man’s sport.”

Colorado football comes up with a fictional depth chart to make fun of Jim Harbaugh’s secrecy.

Kansas school districts are left holding the bag after new athletic fields don’t work properly.

How the sugar industry came to blame fat.

Remember the time we almost nuked the moon?

Saturday Night Live adds three new castmembers.

Your song of the day is Nirvana with Aneurysm.