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Royals Rumblings - News for August 17, 2020
It’s been a really nice year for Salvador Perez at the plate. Alec Lewis profiles how Perez got there with the work he put in his swing with Mike Tosar ($):
Making those changes required work, and work is what Perez knows best. Each day, Tosar talked Perez through certain drills, explaining their purposes but not over-complicating them so that the correct feel taken from the drills would begin to be ingrained in Perez’s mind.
One of the daily drills would have Perez swing flat-footed. He would widen his stance and swing without his typical leg kick. The purpose, he would realize, was stability. Perez’s back heel would stick to the ground, providing a platform for him to maintain power throughout his actual swing.
Also, his head and eyes remained still and in positions to identify and handle specific pitches.
Terry Bradshaw and Damon Hollins, the Royals’ two Black coaches on the MLB staff, weigh in on the importance of the Negro Leagues 100 years after it started:
“For me, it’s everything,” Bradshaw said of the celebration. “When you do your research and look back on the days of the Negro Leagues baseball, the challenges that they faced, what they had to go through, it just shows you how courageous, how disciplined those guys were to deal with all of the challenges that they had to go through as far as playing baseball games and leaving, jumping on the bus and traveling, not knowing would they be able to stop somewhere and eat or even have a place to stay after they’d played baseball or sleeping on a bus.”
The Kansas City Royals lost yesterday. Sergio Romo was talkative, the umps weren’t very good, and it was yet another close loss against a first-place team. As a result, there was some...testiness at the end of yesterday’s game with the Minnesota Twins. Take of it what you will.
Sounds like Romo said "Keep talking!" after striking out Soler. https://t.co/ZPtawZNwoc
— Pete Grathoff (@pgrathoff) August 16, 2020
Nicky Lopez: “Without fans you can hear a lot of stuff and (Romo) may have heard something (from us to the ump). There was a ball called that was a little down and we said it was down and he may have thought we were talking to him. I don’t think we said anything out of line.”
— Jeffrey Flanagan (@FlannyMLB) August 16, 2020
Royals bench extremely upset after the game. 3B coach Vance Wilson and others on the coaching staff not happy and talking to umps. Can’t tell if it was the strike zone or an animated Sergio Romo celebrating the win. Stay tuned
— Joel Goldberg (@goldbergkc) August 16, 2020
In case you missed it, Foster Griffin announced over the weekend that he had Tommy John surgery. If you’ll allow me to editorialize a bit: it sucks. Griffin’s career has been a bit of a grind, but he finally got to the big leagues and was poised to have a big role for this year’s team. He’ll likely be ready to kick off 2022.
I’ll be back @Royals pic.twitter.com/QUMZGAzlih
— Foster Griffin (@Foster_Griffin) August 16, 2020
Over at Kings of Kauffman, David Scharff argues that it’s up to us to carry the torch of baseball to the next generation.
Baseball is for everyone, regardless of age, gender, race, etc. It is a large part of the sports world, (typically) spanning from February to October with plenty of news breaking in-between.
But, without us, baseball is nothing. Players can play and the commentators can continue to tell their stories, but without the fans, baseball would eventually fall into nothingness. Fans are an important piece of the puzzle that keeps baseball alive and well.
Also at KoK, Mike Gillespie wonders if the rest of the Royals schedule will help or hurt the team.
At Royals Reporter, Kevin O’Brien ponders what the Royals should do with Ian Kennedy for the rest of this year.
Welcome to the Vox Media tour, where I showcase pieces from around the Vox Media group of websites, definitely because I like to promote the work of my distant work relatives and not at all because I am lazy and bad at putting off topic links together.
Vox: The Postal Service says tens of millions of mail-in ballots are at risk of not being counted.
The Verge: Apple and Epic’s feud is a actually big deal, with lots at stake.
Polygon: These are the 22 best Nintendo Switch games.
Eater: Congratulations: there is a pepperoni shortage now.
Elsewhere on SB Nation, over at Arrowhead Pride, newly re-signed Kansas City Chief, Travis Kelce, is going to open a STEM lab for at risk youth.
Summer Games Done Quick, a charity video game speedrunning competition, is on all this week. Here’s what to watch and how to watch it.
Song of the Day
Spotify’s Discover Weekly playlist is often a great way to discover music you might not ever find on your own. Sometimes, the playlist sucks, but when it delivers a song that’s great, it’s worth it. I was given this gem a few weeks ago. It’s a folk song with wild, intricate instrumental parts, a solid melody, and tight three-part vocal harmonies.