Royals Rumblings - News for May 14, 2018

Royals Rumblings - News for May 14, 2018

Danny Duffy talks about his struggles.

Duffy has yielded four or more runs in four of his last five starts. The frustration has mounted. So much, in fact, that when he yanked on a jersey to speak briefly with reporters after the game, Duffy used the words “not good” or something resembling them eight times.

“I just haven’t been good. There’s no cure to this other than being good, and I haven’t been good,” he said. “I wish I had another answer for you guys — I just haven’t been good.”

Rustin Dodd gets into how bad it has gotten for Royals starters.

In a 15-year period from June 23, 1976 to June 7, 1991, the Royals did not have a starting pitcher allow nine earned runs in a game....

And then came Sunday afternoon at Progressive Field, the final day of a six-game road trip. Royals starter Danny Duffy was hammered for nine earned runs in 3 1/3 innings in an 11-2 loss to the Indians. For the third time in four days, a Kansas City starter had yielded nine earned runs.

Jake Junis has crossed paths with Francisco Lindor before.

David Lesky at Baseball Prospectus Kansas City thinks the Royals are slow.

Something that I’ve thought a lot about during the young season is how little athleticism the Royals have at the big league level. Look around the diamond and it’s a lot of plodders out there. If you look at the sprint speed leaderboards, you’ll see the Royals find themselves on the left side of the average line way too often. Alex Gordon ranking as the slowest left fielder is striking to me. You don’t think of him as fast or anything, but you also don’t think of him as having an identical sprint speed to Salvador Perez. Aside from Whit Merrifield and the surprisingly quick Jorge Soler, there just isn’t much about this team that screams any athleticism.

Bubba Starling is hurt again.

The Royals say that Starling, the former first-round pick in 2011, will miss “significant time” as he recovers from the oblique strain, sustained Thursday. And if the timeline sounds vague, it is only because oblique strains are a difficult injury to predict.

Starling, a center-field prospect, could miss a month. He could miss more. One thing is for sure: If this was to be the year that Starling, 25, finally graduated to the major leagues, if this was to be the season in which he finally put a six-year slog behind him, it will not be until the late summer.

John Sickels has thoughts about Royals prospect Josh Staumont.

When Staumont is right his stuff is ridiculous. As a starter he worked at 96-100 but in the bullpen he’s up as high as 102. He also has a plus curveball. In relief he doesn’t have to worry as much about a third pitch or pacing himself and can just come in and throw hard for an inning or two.

An unlikely Brewers rookie strikes out 13 in his MLB debut.

Legal issues will prevent A’s catcher Bruce Maxwell from traveling to Canada.

The MLB fun police fined Mike Clevinger for “non-conforming” illustrations on his cleats.

The single-game strikeout record seems to have the most likeliest chance of happening these days.

Baseball’s pace of play changes are having a mild impact.

Major League Baseball in Portland still faces numerous political obstacles.

Arizona looks to be getting a new stadium, but are they last to replace a relatively young stadium?

Shaq and Judge Judy goofing off at a Marlins game because why not.

Which old college football rankings are you still mad about?

ESPN.com discontinues its public editor position.

The hypocrisy of Amazon’s HQ2 process.

What can extreme athletes tell us about human endurance?

Brooklyn Nine-Nine will come back after all, only on NBC.

Your song of the day is Bleachers with I Miss Those Days.