Royals Rumblings - News for September 4, 2019

Jorge Soler is Kansas City’s new home run king. I am a sucker for a good curtain call, so let’s watch that again.

Elsewhere in Royals feel-good moments, Ryan (Sweepy) McBroom(erton) made his Major League debut, and got a hit in his first at bat, and Ryan O’Hearn had never had a pinch-hit walkoff home run before last night. Great night for milestones!

In his latest Minutes, Sam Mellinger of the Kansas City Star had some thoughts about what the sale of the team means.

Other than the team staying in Kansas City, and perhaps moving downtown, the thing fans are probably most interested in is whether the spending patterns will change. And I have no idea. Sherman has been in the weeds of transactions the last few years with his minority stake in the Indians, who haven’t been an enormous spender, but they have generally been above the Royals. The Indians have higher attendance and revenues, which factors into this somewhere. He has said in the past that to be an owner you have to look at it like a fan, and think of the team as a community asset. Does that mean he’ll be willing to dip into his own pockets more than David Glass did? Again, I have no idea. It’s possible, but he’s also a businessman. We tend to think of Ewing Kauffman as a saint around here, and for damn good reason, but as the owner of the Royals he operated it like a business until the last few years.

At The Athletic ($), Alec Lewis explores the new surgical alternative to the Tommy John procedure. It’s what got pitcher Jesse Hahn back to the Majors.

After looking at the MRIs, Paletta sat in the room and told Hahn he could be a candidate for the procedure, but the surgeon wouldn’t know for sure until he digs into the patient’s arm, makes an incision into the ligament and dissects the tissue. Hahn, wanting to pitch again in the majors for those family and friends who have followed this career and for his own love of the game, agreed to sign a waiver, allowing Paletta to operate on his arm days later in the best way Paletta saw fit.

“Whatever was best for me, I wanted to have that done,” Hahn says. “When I woke up, I was going to deal with it.”

Atop the AL Central sit the Minnesota Twins, who have been helped by the guidance of Nelson Cruz, writes Andy McCullough for The Athletic. My favorite bit:

At Cruz’s request, the Twins installed a room for naps at Target Field. Cruz is zealous about pregame shut-eye. That fit within the contours of Baldelli’s devotion to rest and recovery, cutting down on unnecessary activities that sap players of energy, like sleep lost on early buses to the ballpark or the hours wasted under the sun during infield practice.

Former Royals catcher Drew Butera is back in the Majors, with the Rockies.

Meanwhile, former Royal Jeremy Jeffress has been released by the Brewers.

The true star of the Yankees is Gleyber Torres, writes Mike Mazzeo at Yahoo.

The high-third angle is the best part of this double-slide (?!) in Atlanta.

The Los Angeles Rams signed quarterback Jared Goff to a 4-year extension.

Absolutely awful destruction in the Bahamas from the slow-moving Hurricane Dorian.

As always, you can find peace and fulfillment in my full gallery of baseball dogs here.

Returning to Bonnie Raitt for today’s song, because...Bonnie Raitt.