Royals Rumblings - News for December 30, 2020

At The Athletic, Alec Lewis makes some predictions about the Royals 2021:

8. Kyle Isbel will emerge as the next homegrown Royals stalwart in the outfield.

Khalil Lee was added to the Royals’ 40-man roster recently; the Royals wanted to protect him ahead of the Rule 5 draft. He’s still 22 years old and has loads of power potential, but there’s another outfielder who may be closer to contributing on the big-league stage: Isbel. Injuries hindered him in 2019 at High-A Wilmington, but Isbel bounced back at the Arizona Fall League, with his .867 OPS leading to an All-Star selection. He has strengthened his body since, and his hitting ability has remained. He’ll become a big-leaguer soon enough.

It’s great to see Josh Staumont getting national recognition, writes David Scharff at Kings of Kauffman.

At Fantrax HQ, Chris Clegg looks at all of KC’s young pitching from a long-term fantasy team perspective:

Bubic relies on three pitches; a four-seam fastball, changeup, and curveball. He used the fastball nearly 55 percent of the time in 2020 and the changeup right at 30 percent. I previously mentioned Bubic’s changeup is his best pitch, and it showed in 2020. While he did not strike out a ton of hitters with it, it produced a 31.1 percent whiff rate, which leads me to believe he could strikeout more hitters with it in the future. I would love to see Bubic decrease his fastball usage and feature both the changeup and curveball more in the future.

Bubic does have solid upside that you could argue is higher than Singer. Both Bubic and Singer will be back in the rotation in 2021 with a (shortened) season of Major League experience under their belt. It will be fun to watch both young pitchers continue to develop.

Look back on the time the Royals traded away Johnny Damon, with Kevin O’Brien at Royals Reporter:

Damon was just the start of the “purging” process for the Royals. Midway in 2001, Dye was also traded to the Athletics in a three-team trade with the Rockies that netted the Royals shortstop Neifi Perez (woof). Furthermore, the Royals let No. 1 starter Jeff Suppan go in free agency after the 2002 season, and even though the Royals had a winning season in 2003, they struggled in 2004, and in the process, traded franchise cornerstone Beltran to the Houston Astros. The Royals had the potential to have a legendary outfield trio of Damon, Beltran, and Dye. Instead, they let go of all three, starting with Damon in January of 2001, and in the process, the Royals won more than 65 games in a season only once (2003) from 2001-2006, which was Baird’s tenure as general manager.

Bill Thompson at Beyond the Box Score says old friend Trevor Rosenthal is worth the risk for whoever signs him next.

The Cubs aren’t done blowing things up, and are shopping catcher Willson Contreras.

The Padres are doing what every team could. ($)

A Carolina Panthers player is having part of his salary paid out in Bitcoin.

You can be part of a publicity stunt to get someone to change his legal name to Sixers Adam, because he covers the Sixers.

Wonder Woman 1984 was perhaps not a great movie, and also had some pretty backwards old attitudes about the Middle East.

What is the point of non-essential work?

Do you have a new habit you hope to do every day in 2021? Here’s a printable calendar where you can fill in a bubble every time you do whatever the thing is.

How much snow did y’all get? Any back injuries from too much shoveling?

SOTD: How about a little dance party at your desk? Carly Rae Jepsen can help.