Royals Rumblings - News for August 10, 2018

Starting with our own Max* , everyone had an article about Players’ Weekend Nicknames. Pete Grathoff got the call for the Star while the poor MLB.com scribe is uncredited.

*Or, as we are required to call him: “His Excellency, Royals Review Editor In Chief for Life, Field Marshal Al Hadji Doctor Max Rieper, VC, DSO, MC, Lord of All the Beasts of the Earth and Fishes of the Seas and Conqueror of the Baseball Blogging World in General and the Kansas City Royals in Particular” (credit also goes to Sweep_the_Leg as it looks like I stole a joke of his from 7 years ago)

A couple of days ago, Ned stated that four of the past five teams (it’s actually four of the past six - but the sentiment remains the same) who lost 100 games in the season went on to make the playoffs in the next three years. The Star’s Sam McDowell looks at this claim:

The 100-loss clubs to reach the playoffs within the following three seasons are the 2016 Minnesota Twins, who made the playoffs in 2017; the 2013 Astros, who also hit the century mark in 2012 and 2011 before making the playoffs in 2015, but we’re only counting them once here; the 2012 Cubs, who qualified for postseason play in 2015; and the 2010 Pirates, who made it in 2013. A common thread runs through those success stories — high-ranked prospects. And that is precisely what has been absent of late from the Royals’ farm system.

BPKC’s David Lesky talks about pitch framing and the Royals:

The point here is that framing makes a big difference. Maybe stealing a few extra strikes won’t put the Royals in the playoffs in 2019 (okay, no maybe about it; it definitely won’t), but it could help in numerous ways for the years when they are fighting for that spot. Teams like the Royals can’t be passing up opportunities to get a little off the edges. You never know when it might pay off.

RFR’s Drew Osborne profiles Samir Duenez:

The original placement on the 40-man was the Royals being cautious, the continued placement is because he deserves it. I would not be surprised to see Duenez finish this season on fire and make up for some lost time in a winter league somewhere. Next spring, still as a 22-year-old, the best placement would probably be to repeat the Texas League one more time.

In case you had forgotten about Michael Mariot (or never knew of him) - here’s some news on the former Omaha closer:

At Fansided:

• KCK’s Leigh Oleszczak claims “Heath Fillmyer has looked good in 2018”.
• KOK’s Chase Da Silva asks “Is the departure of Ned Yost inevitable?”

This is your daily dump of links from The Athletic. For each subscription, I get a commemorative wooden spatula with the likeness of one of the mediocre Presidents. You won’t find their faces on dollars or on cents.*

*There’s Taylor, there’s Tyler, There’s Fillmore and there’s Hayes. There’s William Henry Harrison (“I died in 30 days”).

R.J. Anderson of CBS Sports lists Ned Yost as #3 on his manager hot seat rankings. I’d dispute that quite a bit. I think his job is safe as long as he wants it. However, I think it’s very possible he decides to retire of his own volition.

3. Ned Yost, Royals: Yost’s deal will expire with the conclusion of the regular season. He’s acknowledged in the past that he’s unlikely to see the Royals’ rebuild all the way through, and this would seem to be a sensible time for him to move into a figurehead role with the organization to whom he delivered a pair of pennants and a world title.

I might have lied last week when I said it wasn’t going to be Guitar Hero month. Well, it still may not be but work had other ideas for this week. We’re piggy backing off last week’s theme using the final song in Guitar Hero 2: the encore to end all encores.