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]
Originally Posted by dlphg9:
I'm gonna get a lot of flak and push back, but Bo Jackson was the most overrated player of all time. 4 fairly good seasons and 1 AS game and people talk like he was the greatest ever.
Also I don't care about how athletic he was, because Joey Gathright jumped over a ****ing car.
He was turning into a really great player. He was only 27 when he got career injury. His 1990 season was just as good as his all star year before. Just was hurt. Prime of his career. [Reply]
Originally Posted by ChiefsCountry:
He was turning into a really great player. He was only 27 when he got career injury. His 1990 season was just as good as his all star year before. Just was hurt. Prime of his career.
Yeah I get injuries, but injuries derail promising careers all the time. He had a career 8.3 BWAR and his career OPS was .784. I just don't get the absolute obsession older dudes have with the guy. Is it because he had a few spectacular highlights? [Reply]
Originally Posted by dlphg9:
Yeah I get injuries, but injuries derail promising careers all the time. He had a career 8.3 BWAR and his career OPS was .784. I just don't get the absolute obsession older dudes have with the guy. Is it because he had a few spectacular highlights?
a few???!!!!
The guy did things that mere mortals had never done (athletically) on the field before.
Sure, if you want to only look at stats, go for it.
Sorry - Bo is a god among mortals.....don't care about the stats.
Go do some research and learn about some of the things he was doing in high school and college (and subsequently on the MLB and NFL field). [Reply]
I'd rather pay to see Bo for what he might do, than Trout for what he does.
The fact that Buck O'Neil said the sound off Jackson's bat sounded like the ball coming off Josh Gibson's bat is all I need to know.
142 OPS+ in his age 27 season before the hip injury.
Just imagine if he committed to baseball full-time as a college amateur and a pro. He's splitting time and he's still borderline great at age 27. [Reply]
Originally Posted by dlphg9:
Yeah I get injuries, but injuries derail promising careers all the time. He had a career 8.3 BWAR and his career OPS was .784. I just don't get the absolute obsession older dudes have with the guy. Is it because he had a few spectacular highlights?
I do think you kinda had to be there to really appreciate the guy.
I was lucky enough to be in attendance at then Royals Stadium when he finally hit his first major league homer. He didn't even really get all of it, it just kept carrying and carrying, and ended up becoming the longest home run ever hit in the ballpark to that time at an estimated 475 feet to the deepest part of left field landing in the grass a few feet away from the outer fence.
He was just the force of nature. An unbridled mustang of almost supernatural athletic ability. Dude was 6'1", 225 lbs of pure lean muscle, never spent a day in the gym, and could run the 40 in under 4.2. The stories from his youth and time at Auburn are like something from Paul Bunyan.
Football was easy for him. It was the obvious choice, and if Tampa hadn't done him dirty, we probably never see him suit up in a Royals uniform, and if he'd remained healthy, I have no doubt in my mind, he'd have a bust in Canton right now.
But baseball was a different animal, and it was something he had to work at. And I won't sugarcoat it, his first couple years in the majors were pretty rough. There was controversy about where he'd play in the outfield, with an aging, but prideful and still capable Willie Wilson patrolling CF. But mostly, he was just soooo raw. He was a strikeout king who often looked horrrrrrrible at the plate, and his outfield play was not great. He often ran bad routes to the ball, and would overthrow the cutoff man all. the. time. He was always trying to do way too much on every play to try to be the hero, when he really needed to slow things down and let the game come to him.
He started to do that, and come into his own in 1989. If he'd committed to baseball out of high school, and remained healthy, I think there's a very good chance he would have been a perennial all-star in the majors. Maybe not a HOFer, but with his power, I could see him being a 400+ homer guy.
Health was always a concern because he just played balls deep on every play. Christ, the guy was so strong, he pulled his upper body and torso away from his hip when that motherfucker Kevin Walker tackled him and Bo kept going. But the worst thing, was that his hip injury was misdiagnosed until it was too late, and he'd developed vascular necrosis of the joint.
He's just the ultimate "what if" story of my generation, and while he was never THE best player, he was absolutely THE story whenever he was on the field because you just never knew when you were going to see something you'd never seen before. Sorry to be long-winded, I could honestly go on and on about the guy. He was must-watch tv, and for a time, was probably the biggest star in all of sports. [Reply]
Originally Posted by dlphg9:
I'm gonna get a lot of flak and push back, but Bo Jackson was the most overrated player of all time. 4 fairly good seasons and 1 AS game and people talk like he was the greatest ever.
Also I don't care about how athletic he was, because Joey Gathright jumped over a ****ing car.
[Grampa Abe Simpson voice] Since 2000&ought5 the planet has had a few discussions about Bo Jackson. Here is my post from 05, reposted in 09 and reposted again in 2012 after the premier of 30 for 30 about Bo.
Keep in mind, the guy had very little professional training in the game. Dude was a unicorn. Had he played baseball with the same training he had in football throughout his life and not been injured in that playoff game, he would have had a great career.
And he did the one thing that all the huge baseball superstars have done through the decades. The man put asses in the seats. People didn’t go take a leak when guys like Reggie Jackson, or Willie Mays or Mantle or prime Albert Pujols were due up in that half of the inning. Same with Bo Jackson. Yea, any of the above players may strike out, but you didn’t want to miss a a titanic home run or a screaming double down the line.
That kind of stardom doesn’t show up in a box score.
Originally Posted by :
I think this post is from 09, but I remember copying and pasting it again from a thread in 05. It's one one of those events you had to see to know it was true. And to this day, it was one of the greatest shows of arm strength in baseball I've ever seen.
If you ever saw him during infield/outfield workouts you would have no doubt about his ability. And his hard work. That HR he hit in the ASG in Anaheim went 500 feet and was a thing of beauty.
I've mentioned this before but on the final day of the 1986 season the Royals were playing the Twins, who had clinched their first post season since 1966. I was sitting in LF GA with my brothers. The team was taking infield/outfield practice.
Lonnie Smith and Bo were the two LF'ers, with BO being a recent callup from Omaha [Memphis]. When it came time for them to make their throws to 2nd, 3rd and home.... that's when the action started.
Ground ball to LF, Lonnie scoops it up and throws a high lob, that comes fairly close to third base.
Bo is up next. Ground ball into LF, Bo scoops it up and throws a BB that (I swear) never got more 6 feet off the ground and it hits Brett's glove right on the bag. Crowd screams in delight.
They do it again and this time Lonnie throws another semi rainbow to 3b about 3 feet offline. This time the crowd boos. Lonnie's shoulder slump.
Bo up again. He fields a line drive on one hop and fires another BB that hits Brett waist high, while straddling the bag. Crowd goes crazy.
The next two balls that come to LF are for throws to home plate. Lonnie is up and fields it clean and throws a 14 hopper to the plate. The crowd boos. Loud.
Bo fields his attempt and throws a laser to the plate. ON the fly. Crowd (bigger now because of the hubub and everybody came down the line to see what was happening) screams their approval.
Lonnie filds his last attempt, bobbles the ball and throws a rainbow that misses home plate by such a margin that Sundberg has to run up the first base line to field it. The crowd rains down "BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO"!!!! on Lonnie. He leaves the field and Lonnie was visibly shaken. (Can't blame im).
Bo's final throw from LF was another cannon shot that went home on the fly to Sunny who was straddling the plate. The crowd went beserk.
I remember Howser talking about it in the paper the next day. He stopped Lonnie after practice and told him he was still the player who helped win this team a WS. Lonnie saw the writing on the wall though. He wasn't the same in limited duty in 87. Played in 48 games.
Lonnie took a lot of grief but he was a championship player and the Royals never win the AL West without him in 85. They were 7 games back at the AS break and couldn’t find their footing. Lonnie shows up and they play incredible baseball down the stretch to win the division.
The Royals Hall of Fame is not Cooperstown. There are several players in there who don't pass the stat test to be worthy. Bo Jackson should absolutely be in there with them. [Reply]
Originally Posted by Ocotillo:
The fact that Buck O'Neil said the sound off Jackson's bat sounded like the ball coming off Josh Gibson's bat is all I need to know.
142 OPS+ in his age 27 season before the hip injury.
Just imagine if he committed to baseball full-time as a college amateur and a pro. He's splitting time and he's still borderline great at age 27.
yep.
Not getting wrapped up in WAR.
With that logic, Mahomes was the 8th best QB in the league last year (QBR).
As you and others have put it, you were always witnessing something that other mortal players simply could not do. [Reply]
Brett and Gubicza said Bo's biggest problem was strikeouts. Struck out way too much and didn't hit for average but said both would have been corrected if he was committed to baseball. [Reply]