The best of Royals Review in 2019

The 2019 season was deja vu all over again for Royals fans, with the club losing over 100 games for the second year in a row. But the emergence of Hunter Dozier, an All-Star performance by Whit Merrifield, a home run champ in Jorge Soler and a promising group of arms in the minors gives some hope for the next decade.

The highs and lows of this year certainly gave Royals Review staff a lot to write about, so let’s look back on the best of what they had to offer.

Best opinion pieces

Josh Keiser thinks that had baseball expanded rosters a long time ago, Whit Merrifield could have helped the Royals win the 2014 title.

Hokius didn’t care so much whether or not collusion was happening in baseball, just that it was bad for the game, and he had some ideas for on how to fix it.

He also called for the Royals to spend more, but not necessarily on free agents.

Alex Duvall criticized baseball for how little they paid young players.

And he wrote that despite saying they weren’t tanking, the Royals were absolutely tanking.

Matthew LaMar felt the Royals had an obligation to fans to be aggressive sellers at the trade deadline.

And heworried that the Royals were wasting our time with a lack of direction.

And he wanted REAL powder blue uniforms.

Craig Brown thought the Glass family selling to John Sherman was the best thing for everyone involved.

Best analytical articles

Michael Augustine praised Cam Gallagher’s pitch framing.

Shaun Newkirk wrote that high expectations, not collusion, was to blame for the slow market.

And he looked at how much money the Royals would have to eat in an Ian Kennedy deal.

Max Rieper thought that moving to a performance-based salary model might be better for both players and teams.

Hokius had a mea culpa on the Martín Maldanado signing, showing that the catcher had been quite valuable.

Seth Jarman found Jorge Soler’s breakout to be legit.

Matthew LaMar used Cheslor Cuthbert as an example to show the difficulty of Major League Baseball.

Ryan Heffernon noted the Royals had terrific talent on a really bad team.

Craig Brown detailed the mediocre track record of Dayton Moore in free agency.

Best history articles

Bradford Lee looked at how baseball history interweaves through our lives.

He also had terrific biographies of former Royals like Roger Nelson, Moe Drabowsky, Paul Schaal.

Jesse Anderson looked at the Zack Greinke deal that could have been.

Max Rieper wrote about the most-anticipated MLB debuts by Royals players.

And looked back at how the 1994 Royals were cheated out of a pennant race.

sterlingice took a detailed look at the history of sign-stealing and what could happen to the Astros.

Best humor articles

Matthew LaMar loved spring training photo day, as should you.

He was also pretty excited about the return of baseball in the spring.

Josh Keiser took a humorous look at how the Royals could have won the second Wild Card.

He also compared Royals players to Game of Thrones characters, which was better writing than final season.

Best game recaps

Ryan Landreth captured the frustration of fans after an early nine-game losing streak torpedoed the season just as it was beginning.

sterlingice and Hokius teamed up for a Mad Libs recap.

Ned Yost is a space enthusiast, so Hokius had a lunar-inspired game recap.

Everything is getting automated, so Matthew LaMar outsourced his game recap to artificial intelligence.

Best fanposts

Ian Badeer had an amazing time at Royals Fantasy Camp, leaving us green with envy. Here is recap of Day 1, a recap of Day 2. Day 3, and Day 4.

kcstengel simulated the season on OOTP before the season, and saw slight improvement.

Connor Moylan returned to give us summer camp letters from Mitch Maier.

Nopioli looked at a run of bad decision by Dayton Moore.

BHWick questioned why Ned Yost wouldn’t experiment more in a losing season.

JackMcGee made the case for bringing back Alex Gordon.

jayhawkkirk pretended that he was owner of the Royals.

Coming in just before the new year, cmkeller gave us a coda to the club home run chase.

Best GIFs/Videos/Photoshops/Social Media

Shaun Newkirk compiled every hit of Whit Merrifield’s club record-setting hitting streak.

The Omaha Storm Chasers have one of the best twitter accounts in baseball.

Hey, we got jokes too!

Best comments

We also had a Game of Thrones-themed comment from dustfan.

I think unclejesse outed himself as Dayton Moore’s burner account by posting this hours before the Royals acquired Mike Montgomery.

In this house, we appreciate puns.

You have to read all the comments in this Royals Rumblings, because they sum up the Royals Review comment experience perfectly.

Other

Matthew LaMar categorized Royals players by what their role was in the rebuild.

Alex Duvall wondered if ownership forced the Nicky Lopez promotion.

Seth Jarman got the scoop on Mike Matheny from some Cardinals fans.

Max Rieper took a look at how Sinclair Broadcasting purchasing Fox regional sports networks could affect the Royals.

Minda Haas Kuhlmann had a great piece talking to Nick Heath having a blast playing baseball.

sterlingice looked at the state of the baseball card industry.

Once again, we spent a lot of fake money in our annual MLB off-season simulation.

Max Rieper, Shaun Newkirk, and David Lesky tried to do a mock expansion draft.

Thanks to all our writers and readers for another great year and here’s to a better 2020!