*** Official 2018 Royals Repository ***

[duncan_idaho]

The season is upon us, even if spring is not.

2018 MLB Draft Picks
#18
#33 - Compensation (Eric Hosmer)
#34 - Compensation (Lorenzo Cain)
#40 (Competitive Balance Round A)

018 Draft Names to Watch

RHP Kumar Rocker, N Oconnee HS, Georgia.

Spoiler!

Possibly goes top 10 but is a big, physical SP with ace potential. Moore and co. will be all over him if he slips a bit and could offer top 10 money at No. 16

OF Jarred Kelenic, Waukasha West HS, WI

Spoiler!

Kelenic is the top prep bat, toolsy OF. Royals would be ecstatic to have shot at him.

1B Triston Casas, American Heritage HS (FL).

Spoiler!

Tremendous raw power, best in HS bats. Royals typically like HS arms or HS bats with "special" tools. He qualifies.

RHP Carter Stewart, Eau de Gallie HS (Ga).

Spoiler!

Another big, physical specimen with huge upside. More likely to be available mid-first than Rocker.

ANY Any, Any (Any). Any current top projected pick who slides for injury concerns. Includes current top prospect prospect SP Brady Singer, U of Florida.

Current Prospects to Watch:

OF Seuly Matias - Huge tools. Hit 2 HR in Lexington (A) season opener.

1B Nick Pratto - Top pick in 17 has advanced approach and good glove; needs to start tapping into power in first full year in minors. Also at Lexington.

OF Michael Gigliotti - Good defender in CF, good OBP skills, plus baserunner. Next mainstay in CF for KC, IMO. Advanced college bat also starting at Lexington.

OF Khalil Lee - Probably has highest upside in Royals' system. Could hit 30 HR in majors, could steal 30 bases. Plus defensive ability in RF. Nice test at Wilmington this year.

3B Emmanuel Rivera - Really nice approach and good contact skills. Power is still developing. Also getting a good test at Wilmington.

SP Foster Griffin - Made nice strides in 2017. Needs to continue to progress in 2018. Could be a lefty version of Jakob Junis (good breaking ball that he can really manipulate, OK fastball, good command).

1B Samir Duenez - Duenez still is intriguing, hoping for a step forward in his power production this year at Northwest Arkansas, which would turn him into a legit prospect.

Others to keep an eye on:
SP Gerson Garabito (Wilmington), OF Marten Gasparini (Lexington), C MJ Melendez (Lexington), RP Tyler Zuber (lexington), RP Richard Lovelady (Omaha), SP Dan Tillo (Lexington), SS Nicky Lopez (NWA), SP Scott Blewett (NWA), OF Brewer Hicklen (Idaho Falls),

In general, Lexington and Wilmington are the most interesting spots to watch. Nice depth and a lot of interesting pieces at both.

[Mecca]

It does matter because if they have a track record of never developing pitching prospects into anything other than marginal starters or great relievers...and with the hitters they can't develop them at all unless they are top 20 in all of prospect lists type of talents..

That doesn't speak great for the future.

If we are being honest yes they won a world series in spite of never really fully developing any of their players.

[TomBarndtsTwin]

Originally Posted by Mecca

Why are so many fans so stupid?

Many of them (like said idiot above) became a fan around 2013-2014.

They hopped on the bandwagon and don't know shit about baseball.


I'm glad all of them are leaving now so the rest of us that are left behind won't be stuck conversing with ****ing idiots till the next Royals contender comes along . . . .

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by Mecca

Probably...Houston basically had all their guys develop into stars...they had a few misses but the ones that developed became major stars.

Guys they cut from tryout camp became MVPs.

The Astros are a perfect confluence of skill and luck. They've done very few things wrong (Appel instead of Bryant) and a lot of things right (Correa and Bregman) but even those wouldn't have been enough.

They needed Justin Verlander to change his mind 3 minutes before a deadline. They needed Charlie Morton to do...well whatever the hell Charlie Morton has managed to do. Bregman and Correa had to hit their apex ability. Altuve had to go from an interesting story to a nice little player to arguably the most valuable player in baseball (given his position scarcity).

They simply haven't taken any bad breaks along the way.

[Mecca]

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut

Guys they cut from tryout camp became MVPs.

The Astros are a perfect confluence of skill and luck. They've done very few things wrong (Appel instead of Bryant) and a lot of things right (Correa and Bregman) but even those wouldn't have been enough.

They needed Justin Verlander to change his mind 3 minutes before a deadline. They needed Charlie Morton to do...well whatever the hell Charlie Morton has managed to do. Bregman and Correa had to hit their apex ability. Altuve had to go from an interesting story to a nice little player to arguably the most valuable player in baseball (given his position scarcity).

They simply haven't taken any bad breaks along the way.

You didn't even factor in things like hey doing what they should do and drafting George Springer and simply not ****ing him up or poning up to get Lance McCullers signed.

Building a winner will always take luck but when they've had so many guys develop so well there is something they are doing properly.

The only real high profile prospect they had that I can think of truly busting was Singleton.

[Prison Bitch]

They simply haven't taken any bad breaks along the way.


Uh.....game 4 2015 ALDS????

[tk13]

I totally agree they've done a terrible job developing pitchers but it's not like the hitters have been horrible. Cain and Moose turned into about what we thought. There were worries Salvy would never hit but he did. Gordon was a 25-30 WAR player in the five years leading up to the championship. Hosmer didn't become quite the superstar we thought but he wasn't a bust by any stretch.

I don't get where that criticism comes from. They haven't had an Altuve but they've developed major league hitters. They set out to build a team that plays great defense and puts the ball in play, and they went out and did exactly that. They were the best defense in the league and they were by far the best team at not striking out by a large margin.

[Chiefspants]

Originally Posted by Prison Bitch

Hoz 0.1 fWAR. 101 wRC+ (1% above league avg, and that's by a 1B)


It's ugly.

Some fans are starting to get ****ed - even going as far as saying they should have signed Matt Adams...

They'll even out once they see this is just a regular trend for Hos. If he has a chance for any postseason brilliance, he'll win them over easily.

[Mecca]

Originally Posted by tk13

I totally agree they've done a terrible job developing pitchers but it's not like the hitters have been horrible. Cain and Moose turned into about what we thought. There were worries Salvy would never hit but he did. Gordon was a 25-30 WAR player in the five years leading up to the championship. Hosmer didn't become quite the superstar we thought but he wasn't a bust by any stretch.

I don't get where that criticism comes from. They haven't had an Altuve but they've developed major league hitters. They set out to build a team that plays great defense and puts the ball in play, and they went out and did exactly that. They were the best defense in the league and they were by far the best team at not striking out by a large margin.

I guess Moustakas is close to what was expected, I think my biggest issue is Hosmer was suppose to basically be Votto and while he was a good player he was never that. It's like they never got the true full potential from any of those top of the line prospects.

[OKchiefs]

Originally Posted by tk13

I totally agree they've done a terrible job developing pitchers but it's not like the hitters have been horrible. Cain and Moose turned into about what we thought. There were worries Salvy would never hit but he did. Gordon was a 25-30 WAR player in the five years leading up to the championship. Hosmer didn't become quite the superstar we thought but he wasn't a bust by any stretch.

I don't get where that criticism comes from. They haven't had an Altuve but they've developed major league hitters. They set out to build a team that plays great defense and puts the ball in play, and they went out and did exactly that. They were the best defense in the league and they were by far the best team at not striking out by a large margin.

I'm ecstatic we won the world series, and I'll take that over any individual accomplishment. However, I'm also of the opinion that we won it at the perfect time when some of the typical AL giants were down. I'm not sure the 2014-15 Royals would get through the postseason going up against the 2018 Astros, Yankees, or Red Sox. Those teams all have too many superstars. Yes they are all bigger markets, but each of those teams developed at least one player better than anyone on our championship roster. We've never developed a hitter the equivalent of Mookie Betts, Aaron Judge, Jose Altuve, or even Lindor/Ramirez from the Indians. Also, almost every one of our highly touted prospects took way too long to develop. If Hosmer and Moustakas were good earlier on instead of taking several years to develop we might have started our postseason run in 2013 and had 3 years of contention. Merrifield is the best pure hitter we've had and he was a college player that spent forever in the minors.

I know it's hard to develop players, but I can't exactly say I'm confident in our system. Escobar and Perez both used to be .300 hitters, I struggle to understand why they've fallen off so much so quickly. It seems like we are hardly able to develop any solid all around hitters who have good plate discipline and can work the count. It's why I'm so critical and skeptical of Matias, Pratto, and Melendez. They're still young, but I won't believe any of them can improve much on their 30%+ strikeout rates and low averages when very few hitters in our system have shown a lot of progression. I don't know nearly enough about baseball to know what the problem is, but I'd be willing to guess our player development system is archaic and we probably don't rely on advanced metrics as much as we should. But, I could be wrong.

[FringeNC]

Originally Posted by Prison Bitch

Hoz 0.1 fWAR. 101 wRC+ (1% above league avg, and that's by a 1B)


It's ugly.

I noticed how bad he's been lately. At least we're not saddled with that contract, too.

[DJJasonp]

I kind of get what Mecca is saying.

It seems that the royals organization has difficulty developing players. I think it's a legitimate statement.

Yes, we won a WS.....but if we had more "hits" in the draft and/or developed better, would it be more than 2 playoff appearances in past 32 years?

I'm still riding the high of the '14 and '15 seasons - but I'm also a realist. There are other small market teams that seem to make better moves, better draft picks, better development - on a more consistent basis than the royals.

[suzzer99]

Originally Posted by OKchiefs

I'm ecstatic we won the world series, and I'll take that over any individual accomplishment. However, I'm also of the opinion that we won it at the perfect time when some of the typical AL giants were down. I'm not sure the 2014-15 Royals would get through the postseason going up against the 2018 Astros, Yankees, or Red Sox. Those teams all have too many superstars. Yes they are all bigger markets, but each of those teams developed at least one player better than anyone on our championship roster. We've never developed a hitter the equivalent of Mookie Betts, Aaron Judge, Jose Altuve, or even Lindor/Ramirez from the Indians. Also, almost every one of our highly touted prospects took way too long to develop. If Hosmer and Moustakas were good earlier on instead of taking several years to develop we might have started our postseason run in 2013 and had 3 years of contention. Merrifield is the best pure hitter we've had and he was a college player that spent forever in the minors.

I know it's hard to develop players, but I can't exactly say I'm confident in our system. Escobar and Perez both used to be .300 hitters, I struggle to understand why they've fallen off so much so quickly. It seems like we are hardly able to develop any solid all around hitters who have good plate discipline and can work the count. It's why I'm so critical and skeptical of Matias, Pratto, and Melendez. They're still young, but I won't believe any of them can improve much on their 30%+ strikeout rates and low averages when very few hitters in our system have shown a lot of progression. I don't know nearly enough about baseball to know what the problem is, but I'd be willing to guess our player development system is archaic and we probably don't rely on advanced metrics as much as we should. But, I could be wrong.

Yep and we hit the tail end of the Tigers too. I still firmly believe we lose to them n 2014 unless Baltimore knocks them off first.

[suzzer99]

Originally Posted by KChiefs1

Facebook fans are the dumbest on the internet.

No idea what you're talking about.

[tk13]

This may be the most Kansas City sports discussion ever. Making excuses for why they won a championship.

I agree they didn't have an Altuve or Judge type player but there's no one formula to win in baseball. That's the beauty of it. They beat an Angels team that had the best record in the league and the best baseball player in the universe. None of these teams have a player better than Trout. They didn't just win, they swept them. They beat a Blue Jays team that was loaded with offensive stars. I'm pretty confident they could have held their own against any of these recent champs. They had a lineup of All-Star or nearly All-Star caliber players hitting 1-9 and probably the best bullpen in recent history. If we had a lead after 5 it was over. They could have held their own. There's a reason why Joe Buck said the 15 Royals might be the best team he's ever covered.

[Mecca]

Originally Posted by tk13

This may be the most Kansas City sports discussion ever. Making excuses for why they won a championship.

I agree they didn't have an Altuve or Judge type player but there's no one formula to win in baseball. That's the beauty of it. They beat an Angels team that had the best record in the league and the best baseball player in the universe. None of these teams have a player better than Trout. They didn't just win, they swept them. They beat a Blue Jays team that was loaded with offensive stars. I'm pretty confident they could have held their own against any of these recent champs. They had a lineup of All-Star or nearly All-Star caliber players hitting 1-9 and probably the best bullpen in recent history. If we had a lead after 5 it was over. I'm pretty confident they could have held their own. There's a reason why Joe Buck said the 15 Royals might be the best team he's ever covered.

It's great they won and it was different but I will ask one question...is that series played today or in 15? With the juiced ball that'd hurt the 15 team.
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