Royals Rumblings - News for August 28, 2019

Of course the biggest Royals story of the day is the potential sale of the team.

Per Alec Lewis at The Athletic ($), Alex Gordon has wanted to pitch for 10 years before finally getting to take the mound in Monday night’s blowout loss. And he did an emotion after giving up a home run!

A number of Gordon’s Royals teammates had told him to throw Chapman a changeup. So Gordon did, and Chapman uncorked a ball to the left-field fountains, his 30th long ball of the season.

“I should’ve just stuck to my fastball or my sinker or whatever it was,” Gordon said. “I was kinda laughing at him as he ran around the bases. He smiled back at me, but I don’t think he wanted to show me up or anything. I was trying to joke around with him.”

Also from Alec Lewis, the Royals have a minor league teenager from the Netherlands named Darryl Collins - “Darryl” like Strawberry. The Royals signed Collins hoping to find the next Max Kepler.

[Royals scout Nick] Leto had to explain how the minor leagues work, outlining where Collins would live and the food he’d be eating. He stressed the importance of Collins, even at his young age, moving across the pond, and why it made sense for development purposes. While doing so, Leto was selling the Royals’ brand, in the same sense.

“It was a pretty extensive meeting there with his family,” Leto says. “I’m 99 percent certain we were the first team that went to his house. There were other interests. But I’m pretty certain we were the first to explain it all and go through it. … He was somebody we really, really wanted. This wasn’t, ‘If we get him, great. If we don’t, no big deal.’”

Brad Keller was among three pitchers who discussed the development of their slider with David Laurila of FanGraphs:

“I’d been taught more of a cutter-ish grip in high school. It was kind of like a four-seam, putting my fingers together and trying to get on top of it that way. The movement was more horizontal. Now I have more of a curveball-ish grip. I just get on top of it; instead of a curveball where you kind of get like that, I get like this. I have more tumbling action — curveball-ish action — but it’s a slider.

Jeff Todd MLB Trade Rumors has a reminder that the August acquisition period ends, well, when August ends:

If teams want to add a postseason-eligible player, they’ll have to do so on or before midnight eastern time this coming Saturday. The end-of-August rush won’t be nearly as exciting as it has been in recent years, since there are no more August trades of MLB contracts, but it could still force some action. Teams contemplating whether to expose veteran players to waivers will face a decision point, knowing that those players won’t hold as much appeal if they’re not eligible for the postseason with a new organization.

Keon Broxton of the Mariners accidentally glove-slapped a home plate umpire, and got ejected for it.

From the LA Times, an appreciation of Sheryl Crow.

An investigation by the New Republic into the giant number of people who are “working homeless.”

Amanda Mull at The Atlantic (not The Athletic, though I always have to look twice when the name of either site scrolls by in my Twitter feed) explores a bunch of expensive wellness-related crap she bought from the Goop store.

My favorite Ask a Manager letter of the week is this person’s infuriating office-mate who argues with her husband on the phone in the office (ugh, weird) and does her conference calls on speaker phone (FIRE THIS MONSTER).

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So...today is a hard day for the Haas family. A year ago my Dad died. He was an unwavering Royals fan, and an impossibly good person who inspired his community to do incredible good deeds in his honor, and these first 365 days without him have all felt wrong.

Anyway, he really loved this song, and so do I, so here we go. Do something good out in the world today, please.