Year Two of the Matt Quatraro tenure. Time to take a step up this year. Active in free agency and trades this offseason. A new look pitching rotation and bullpen. Will the young players take the leap up offensively? Bobby Witt extension? New stadium? Will Vinny recover from injury? Salvy taking aim at the Royals record book? Will Cole Ragans turn into the best Royals starting pitcher since Greinke 1.0?
Free Agents/Trades Acquisitions
Seth Lugo, SP
Michael Wacha, SP
Kyle Wright, SP
Hunter Renfroe, OF/DH
Will Smith, RP
Chris Stratton, RP
Nick Anderson, RP
Adam Frazier, 2B
Garrett Hampson, INF/OF
Matt Sauer, RP [Reply]
They don’t have a great answer close to the majors, at Omaha. It’s not a AAAA dude like CJ Alexander or John Rave (whose best case is something approximately like Isbel, anyway).
If you want to poke holes, poke holes at signing Hampson or Frazier in the first place (you can and I will join you). At this point, Hampson is the backup CF unless you want to roll with Isbel every day, and I do not (they need to try to squeeze out some platoon advantages).
You look back at those 2020 and 2021 drafts and wish you could pull a re-do really badly. Pete Crow-Armstrong was heavily connected to the Royals when they took Lacy. Who knows how the Royals would have developed him. He 21 draft has a bunch of guys that would have been much better picks.
Being thin at the top levels just makes it hard to reinforce the good young core that IS here.
But still. I give this front office credit for being aggressive and trying to improve rather than shrugging their shoulders and whining about luck. That’s what a lot of small markets would do.
Hopefully they can recover from this tailspin and get things pointed in a positive direction before the end of the year. [Reply]
Originally Posted by Why Not?:
Thankfully. Renfroe is Mickey Mantle compared to anyone else we can trot out there to play outfield.
He started out so bad earlier this year but he's really turned it around since May. But yeah they need anything they can get to pull out of this tail spin. [Reply]
Originally Posted by TLO:
What's the playoff picture looking like?
Royals still 4.5 games up on the last wild card spot. Royals are 3-7 in their last 10 games, however the Red Sox have also been 3-7 and the Yankees, Twins and Mariners are all 4-6 in that same time frame. The Guardians have been 6-4 so the Royals have really only lost ground to them. [Reply]
Originally Posted by TLO:
What's the playoff picture looking like?
Royals are still up 4.5 games on the last Wildcard spot.
Thankfully, Boston keeps losing while we keep losing. Detroit has caught Boston, though, and has been pretty hot lately. We gotta keep our eye on them too. We play them next week, I think.
Hopefully we can get out of this funk by then. [Reply]
Originally Posted by TomBarndtsTwin:
Royals are still up 4.5 games on the last Wildcard spot.
Thankfully, Boston keeps losing while we keep losing. Detroit has caught Boston, though, and has been pretty hot lately. We gotta keep our eye on them too. We play them next week, I think.
Hopefully we can get out of this funk by then.
So, with 22 games left and a 4.5 game lead for teh final WC spot, I'm guessing that means our magic number is 18?
Hoping the Royals figure something out before these other teams do and it looks like Detroit has already done that. They have a 7-3 record vs our 3-7 in the last ten games. Going to be tight. [Reply]
Originally Posted by duncan_idaho:
Five in a row is tough.
They don’t have a great answer close to the majors, at Omaha. It’s not a AAAA dude like CJ Alexander or John Rave (whose best case is something approximately like Isbel, anyway).
If you want to poke holes, poke holes at signing Hampson or Frazier in the first place (you can and I will join you). At this point, Hampson is the backup CF unless you want to roll with Isbel every day, and I do not (they need to try to squeeze out some platoon advantages).
You look back at those 2020 and 2021 drafts and wish you could pull a re-do really badly. Pete Crow-Armstrong was heavily connected to the Royals when they took Lacy. Who knows how the Royals would have developed him. He 21 draft has a bunch of guys that would have been much better picks.
Being thin at the top levels just makes it hard to reinforce the good young core that IS here.
But still. I give this front office credit for being aggressive and trying to improve rather than shrugging their shoulders and whining about luck. That’s what a lot of small markets would do.
Hopefully they can recover from this tailspin and get things pointed in a positive direction before the end of the year.
What would you think of putting together a package for Roman Anthony? I have just read a little about him, but he seems like he would be one of few options that could be the leadoff guy we need desperately in front of BWJ for the next six years? These leadoff lefties seem hard to find [Reply]
Originally Posted by dlphg9:
Gentry gets 5 ABs and it's time to say fuck off for some old pieces of shit. This is some of the most embarrassing shit I've ever seen from this team and that's saying alot.
Don't even get me started on the bullpen. This shit franchise is doing everything they possibly can to turn this special season into a miserable one.
Dude - Ken Harvey once threw a baseball through Jason Grimsley's forehead before running into him.
Are you 13 years old, my guy? Because no, nothing this team can do this year will APPROACH anything resembling the Tony Pena era Royals. Those dudes lost 100+ games like clockwork and spent the better part of a decade leading off every TWIB blooper reel. [Reply]
Detroit plays a few more vs San Diego and then goes to Oakland (who have been scrappy lately). Boston has one more vs the Mets then get the White Sox at home for 3. Detroit then gets the Rockies at home for 3. I don’t see any reason (other than blind homerism, which is not my bag) to think we do anything more than take one at best from both the Twins and the Yankees. We absolutely cannot get swept in either of those series. We also must win the Pirates and the Tigers series. Then we can see where things stand. Oh and it would be helpful to go ahead and win today. [Reply]