Royals Rumblings - News for September 25, 2019

Joe Posnanski on Ned Yost for The Athletic:

Now, at his retirement (and at the end of his second consecutive 100-loss season), the task is to try and put Ned Yost in some kind of perspective, and it isn’t easy to do.

I think the best thing to say is that he had some kind of magic, even if it was and is hard to define. In Kansas City, when Ned’s teams were at their best, his teams played loose. The players liked each other. The bullpen was invulnerable. The Royals kept winning games that seemed lost, and they kept coming back when things seemed insurmountable, and they beat odds and probabilities and statistical likelihoods enough times to create a folk story they will tell in Kansas City forever.

Andy McCullough also wrote about Yost, also for The Athletic, which is a site that does not pay me to encourage people to subscribe to it but it would be cool if they did:

I was shuffling toward the clubhouse one day that first spring when I heard a voice behind me.

“Andy, where is your ass?” Yost said. He turned to one of his coaches, Pedro Grifol. “Pete,” he asked, “how come Andy has no ass?”

Yost was commenting on the sagging of my skinny jeans, which were a hot topic that spring. Yost suggested I “buy a pair of pants that let your calves breathe.”

Weeks later, during one of those sessions in his office, I said I was worried about the Royals. How could this team compete when their manager spent so much time pondering my fashion sense?

“I could really care less about your pants,” Yost said.

Over at Kings of Kauffman, Michael Huckins revisits the Nixon-era phrase “nattering nabobs of negativism” and tries to avoid that moniker by finding the positives in this lousy Royals season:

Adalberto Mondesi is the real deal. He has had some injury issues through the first few years of his career. But he has also shown he can play shortstop at a very high level. He may always have an allergy to taking a walk, but he can hit, and he has some real pop for a shortstop. Even while missing significant time this year, he is still a threat to lead the league in both triples and stolen bases. And he will only be 24 at the start of next season.

At KC Kingdom, Leigh Oleszczak dislikes the idea of Mike Matheny as next Royals manager:

Matheny was fired from St. Louis for a reason. The Cardinals, who as much as I hate them and don’t want to compliment them, are typically a playoff team yet when Matheny was there, they missed the postseason in three of his seven years. He wasn’t there for all of 2018, but they were hovering right around .500 when he got canned.

The Angels may be in the market for some catching help as Max Stassi is having hip surgery that will keep him out four to six months.

Curtis Granderson will be 39 when Opening Day 2020 rolls around, and he hopes to still be a Major League player at that time.

Hannah Keyser with Yahoo Sports asks a question that I have always wondered, too: does it hurt to attempt a diving catch?

I don’t think I could make myself do it again after the first busted bursa sac or thigh-length turf burn.

“Yes you would,” Jones said. “If you were on the field, you would.”

How?

“Adrenaline,” Kiermaier said. “If I did that just on my own time, it wouldn’t feel great. But when you’re out there in front of all the fans and everything, you see the ball in the air, for me I have a mindset where my eyes just light up. I can’t really speak for anyone else but for me: Adrenaline.”

The Phillies have been eliminated from the postseason. The Phillies spent $400 million prior to this season.

Weird injury alert: Oakland reliever Lou Trivino is done for the season after cracking a rib falling in the shower.

Vox Media bought New York Media, whose properties included New York Magazine.

Texas Monthly has the story of a serial killer in Laredo, Texas, who hid in plain sight. The story was written by Skip Hollandsworth, who is incredible, so hit up his archives if you want to lose like a week reading thorough longform crime stories.

Commenting note: obviously there is a lot of politics in the news right now. We will not stop you from talking politics here, but please remember our community guidelines. You can discuss; you can debate; you cannot call people names or use hateful speech when a fellow commenter disagrees with you.

Song of the Day: I truly do not understand this video, at all, but the chorus is so damn catchy.