Championships are dumb? Isn't that the goal? Or being a ****ing obtuse reerun like normal for you?

Ok it's not so much the farm system is barren because of trades, it's more barren because they completely whiffed on a lot of picks for a 5 year period.

Your rebuttal is dumb, sure. Because we didn’t choose between a “trophy” or being consistent. We are only in this position because we had terrible drafts for several years. Produced 1 good player since our vaunted 2011 farm ranking.



Another dirty little secret: we wouldn’t have eithe trophy had we swapped divisions with Tampa. (Keep that on the Down low)

The Championship was great but it's kind of lipstick on a pig. Over the past decade the Rays have averaged 8 more wins per season despite averaging $30 mil less in payroll. They've had 3 playoff appearances to the Royals 2 appearances and the Rays even had 2 other seasons with 90 wins where they didn't make the playoffs.

They are a better run franchise by just about any standpoint and are in a division with 2 payroll behemoths and the Jays are in that next tier down in terms of payroll.

Lipstick on a pig is the Royals 2013 finish, I'd say. Bit harsh to use that phrase when describing a ship.

I feel like I sent a probe into outer space, and found intelligent life.

i dont think anyone is denying that overall the rays are a better franchise then the royals but id take that championship over any of the seasons the rays have had

We all stipulate 13-15 was a great run. Let’s agree and move on to today. That was 4 years ago. Suppose DM capped off his decade with the 15 Title and left. Our next GM won:

81
80
56
60?
65?


I mean what would you say? DM should be in the baseball HOF for what he did before. But what he’s done SINCE 15......honestly, nothing at all good.

2020 is my year where we have to start seeing payoffs, and not necessarily at the major league level - prospects need to be tearing it up and we need to at least get a picture of the key cogs in our next run at contention. It should feel like the end of 2011/2012.

2021 is the make/break year for me.

Bumgarner?

Some angry yelling going on at the game today.

Anderson jacked a HR against Keller. Keller hits him at his next at bat. Benches clear. Game is on in the background so I’m not hearing who is getting ejected.

Yost looked like he was going break Ricky off. Pretty dumb of Keller though, 2-2 game.

Anderson (on his HR), did a monster bat flip and barked something at maldonado.......

Next time up to lead off this inning, Keller pegged him in the hip.

after the non-dust-up......renteria was barking at the royals coaching staff and Ned made a bee-line back at him.

I think Ned would have took him! :)

And by the way - Anderson got exactly what he had coming to him (plus, Gordon got plunked in the ribs earlier in the game)

DM has done a lot of dumb things since 2015, the 2/13 on Chris Young (lol), Ian K, Hammel, on and on. Duffy was his worst IMO and Salvu well.....could’ve dumped him. I get trying to win 2016&2017.


What I don’t get: why we have no talent anywhere. Wasn’t DM supposed to be the talent guru? The great scout? Where is everybody? There’s literally zero at AAA or AA. That’s what bugs me more than the bad signings.

Thanks. Volume is turned down as I’m at work.

Not dumb, imo. **** Anderson. He absolutely had that coming

Eh. I'm no Anderson fan but it's time to move on from hitting guys for enjoying themselves while playing a child's game. Plus, now we're watching Ian Kennedy.

I've tried figuring this out, but I never get an answer and some people act like im an idiot for questioning DMs expertise. It's pointless to try.

The Royals had a 4-5 year period where they didn’t add much to the farm system, and that shows at the AAA and AA levels and the current MLB level.

They have to be better. They didn’t adjust well to MLB turning the draft season after the 11 draft.

I won’t say they’re zero, though, at those levels.

Nicky Lopez is going to be a good major league starter. He’s at AAA. Khalil Lee is at AA.

Re: only having success in 14 and 15 because of division, the Royals had a winning record in 15 vs the East and were .500 in 14. They were the best team in baseball during the 15 regular season. Division wouldn’t have affected that much.

Another BIG 2-out hit. Way to go, Doze!

Hitting Anderson... It's all good, it's baseball. That's how things go down in this sport...

Doing it in a tie game, that's a bit risky.

TRADING JOHNNY CUETO RUINED OUR FARM SYSTEM

Kennedy trying to give up the lead.

Royals....

That deal was, and still is, amaze-balls. But, not nearly as amazing as this...

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/OqzSgTuEaW4" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Atta way Diekman!

NEED
INSURANCE

That dude was in Gore's head. And Gore waited WAAAAY to long to go.

This bullpen must hate wins...

Time to avoid sports media for the next two days. Royals are going to be the punching bag for every bloviating pundit.

You forgot the "/Ned" part..

Good that we hit that player time to reignite the royals fire.

Hunter Dozier rules.

Dozier best player on the royals team not named Whit

Pop the corks. We got a road win!

https://media2.giphy.com/media/129hM...5a354a6776ff61

**** the White Sox.

Woot woot.

I haven't been a fan of Barlow...but apparently he prefers keeping a lead instead of blowing a lead...so I like him now.

Barlow is now the official closer. He actually throws strikes

LOL. Solid argument.

sorry. Ryan Madson

You do not have to be literate to post on CP.

Wow do they make a participation trophy that says all those nice things?

Ian Kennedy has been pretty good in his role. But the bullpen is the least of my concerns. Maybe we can flip Ian Kennedy if he can become a Wade Davis reliever, but I doubt it since he has an albatross of a contract.

Anyone know of any good free streaming links of Royals games?

The bat flip stuff is something these guys need to get over. The guys need to do more shit like that, the average age of a baseball fan is like 56. If they continue to want everyone to be boring that will never change either.

No one cares about celebrating in other sports so hey get over..don't like bat flips..don't get up HR's. Harper did a monster one a few weeks back, no one got pissed.

Guys celebrate in baseball all the damn time. However, some of the shit is excessive. Taunting in the NFL gets you a flag, the NBA a technical foul, MLB a fastball to the ass.

Don't like bat flips? Don't give up HR's...

We're literally talking about you getting to drill a dude because he hurt your feelings, how pussified is that?

You must be new to baseball.

Not really, baseball needs to learn to roll with the times. Theres a reason they are struggling to get new, younger fans.

All of the stupid unwritten rule bullshit is why. Younger fans especially want dudes with personality.

Yes, because there's nothing younger fans hate more than a little in-game fighting....

Did you hear Dozier talking after the game? He said it was fun. Fans love fighting, and players like mixing it up as well.

Well yea people like that part.

I still think it's dumb people get butthurt about celebrations. **** there are pitchers that celebrate should hitters throw bats at them?

In my youth, I was a pitcher armed (haha) with a pretty big fastball. I definitely dusted guys inside around the belt a few times if I felt like they were too comfortable or had tried to show me up. It’s part of baseball.

I didn’t think Keller handled yesterday poorly. He kept the ball low and drilled Anderson in the butt. It’s not like he came up and in on him.

Keller is a pretty emotionless pitcher. Chris Archer drilling a guy for showing him up is silly and hypocritical. He reacts to big Ks all the time. Keller doesn’t do that stuff.

I didn’t think either player should have been ejected.

Archer is a pretty classic example of a pitcher that celebrates all the time.

Anderson knew it was coming and didn't charge the mound or anything. A 92 MPH fastball still hurts like a MFer so he can say some shit along the way but he was still taking his base like a man.

The bigger problem was the benches clearing which stirred everyone else up and I think Keller and Anderson got tossed because they were at the start of it, even though they didn't do anything wrong.

If MLB instituted a rule like in the NBA where the 2nd man in or anyone leaving the bench gets suspended and fined, that would take care of something like this.

That being said the video of the incident was top video on MLB.com so it's not like they or the players really care if intentionally hitting someone or fighting offends anyone.

Bat flips = FUN
Drilling people due to bat flips = MLB HATES FUN
Benches Clearing = FUN
???
Profit

Whatevs. That was a fun shake-up to a losing season.

IMO it says a lot about Anderson and the Pale Hoes. It’s one thing to act like that in a big game but he’s a scrub playing in a meaningless regular season game in April.

remember when grienke was averaging 92 all game then he decided to plunk someone and dialed it up to 99?

I remember that one dust up when Runelvys Hernandez came racing in from the bullpen but both teams had already been separated and were back in their dugouts before he reached the infield.

Didn’t he throw slow on purpose one year to prove a point that pitching was more about movement and location than velocity?

The difference with this situation is Anderson was barking at Maldonado after the bat flip, on his way to first.

You can celebrate, flip the bat, etc........but once you make it personal, it gets a personal retaliation.

While the NBA has Ts, and the NFL has taunting........I like how the players self-police those actions in the MLB.

Bench clearing brawls should be part of the "Let them play" push.

Let them PLAY. That includes stopping with long suspensions for fights. Hell, back in the day a good dustup would happen and then the guys having just brawled would go back to their base all bloodied up... No ejections, even. THAT was fun.

Now folks are ejected, suspended, and fined for walking up the line and staring down a guy that just drilled you in the ass (take that context as you will).

I have no patience for Archer throwing at a guy for watching a home run or a bat flip. He does the equivalent stuff all the time.

Personally, I love the passion Archer plays with. He just can’t decide to drill people for displaying the same. It’s hypocritical.

Agreed. Baseball is dumb. Some guy dunks over you in the NBA, they flex in your face, talk shit. Then one play later you are both probably laughing. And that is waaay worse than flipping a god damn bat after a HR.

Celebrating as a pitcher or batter, should be expected and embraced. Taunting is different.

Guys do their dances and shit on base all the time..pitchers do a fiery fist pump after a big K, guys dog pile agter a big walk off. Baseball is filled with all kinds of emotional fun. Don't act like it's the ****ing PGA. Take your "old white guy" hating shit to DC.

Hunter Dozier - what's under the hood here?

Genuine change in approach or is he just seeing the ball well? His story's a pretty common one; one time solid prospect who never got much traction. We see these quite a bit and most of the time they vanish pretty quickly. The last time he did anything that would establish him as a legit ML possibility, let alone plus starter, was 2016. His recent history is pretty cruddy.

Do we have a swing change here? Sustainable change in strike zone discipline (uncommon as that may be for a someone with as much professional experience as he has).

Why should I believe he's legit? Or is it a case where Royals fans don't even think he's legit and expect him to crash to earth soon.

Personally I've gotta squint quite a bit and hope pretty hard to convince myself that this is a guy who will end the season with an OPS north of .800 or a K-BB rate that stays above average, but I'll listen to arguments to the contrary.

Archer's a bitch and an overrated punk. If anyone deserves a Manny Machado 'bat thrown at him' incident, it's Archer. It's absolutely unbelievable to me that he'd have the stones to throw at someone after making a career of being a showboat on the mound.

Screw off, man. Live by the sword and you can die by it. If you're some stoic dude like DeGrom and you have someone pimping a homer on you...eh, okay - you're living by your own code and I can accept that. May not be how I'd do it, but I can accept it.

But if you're gonna be someone like Archer and dance after giving up 2 runs and striking someone out in the 3rd inning, then when somebody watches a ball they hit into the ****ing river, you should probably just make a better pitch next time.

Exit velocity

Off the charts right now

Keeps his K <150, he’s a 2-3 War guy. I didn’t think he could keep Ks low but we shall see.

Glove sucks tho. Throws well to 1b. Limited range.

I’d like him as a DH or RF personally.

We’re seeing a continued evolution of the player he was in August and September last year.

I’m not sure he’s a .900 OPS guy, but a solid starter? Yeah.

He has immense physical tools, just has taken forever to utilize them.

He through fastballs down the middle too see if the hitters are that good and he said he got rocked. My favorite grienke story is that Gordon struck out and grienke wabed him to the club house to look at the replay but instead of Gordon striking out it was a replay of a hoker grienke hit.

Ridiculously talented guys always have the best stories because they can just toy with people.

One of my favorites was one I heard about Matt Morris years ago. He was pitching in the Cape between his Soph/Junior years and some guy leaned out and smoked one up the box and pissed him right off.

He's in the middle of finishing up a complete game and sees that the guy isn't gonna bat unless he puts some runners on. So he walks a couple guys, strikes a couple guys out, drills this dude to load the bases and then strikes the last guy out to finish off the game.

Extremely athletic normal human beings are interesting enough creatures; we all know guys like that. Some dude that hasn't played golf in 10 years or hasn't held a bat since high school and he just drives one 300 yards dead down the fairway or steps in for a buddy with a sprained ankle and pops a 320 shot to center in a softball game. Those dudes are fun.

But 'make a living playing sports' athletic is just a breed apart. Those friggen guys just floor me. I've known a couple in passing in my life and they're just ...different.

Greinke was like that - just a naturally athletic guy. The kind of guy that gets called up to the majors and asks his coach if he can go down to A ball instead and learn to play shortstop (true story). Those guys just toy with people and there's simply not a story I could hear from folks like that that I wouldn't believe.

He still throws curveballs in the low 60s just to **** with guys. He's done that since his rookie year.

Yankee Stadium, where fly balls turn into 320 foot home runs.

Homer Bailey reclamation project seems to be working out the past couple starts.

Okay so hypothetically.. you're a manager.

And the manager you're facing is one of those 'opener' goofballs.

Assuming he can't change his 'opener' after seeing your starting lineup, isn't the optimal strategy to negate his perceived advantage burning a decent reliever as an 'opener' is that your first three hitters are on the card at the typical positions for your first inning guys but instead you use starting pitchers who aren't likely to appear in that particular game, then put your actual starters in on defense the next half inning?

I just noticed Chris Owings isn't playing tonight!!!!
HOORAY

Why is Duda on this roster? :shrug:

DFA Duda, Hamilton, Owings

Ex-players of interest:

Alcides Escobar (Charlotte Knights AAA) .340 avg, 47 abs, 1 hr
Brandon Maurer (Pittsburgs AAA system) Still sucks, 5.08 ERA
Brian Goodwin (Anaheim) .340 avg, .923 ops
Mike Moustakas (Milwaukee) .231 avg, 6 hr, .911 ops
Ben Zobrist (Cubs) .271 avg, .650 ops
Kendrys Morales (Oakland) .200 avg, .569 ops
Lorenzo Cain (Milwaukee) .306, 2 hr, .836 ops (we should have ****ing signed this guy)
Paulo Orlando (AAA Dodgers) .185 avg, .645 ops
Jarrod Dyson (Dbacks) .270 avg, 2 hr, .831 ops
Christian Colon (AAA Loiusville) .333 avg, .835 ops
Cheslor Cuthbert (AAA Omaha) He's sucking balls & about ready to get cut
Drew Butera (Colorado Rockies) 4 at bats & who cares

Edinson Volquez (Texas Rangers) 7 era, 2 starts
Johnny Cueto (Giants) 60 day DL
Kelvin Herrera (Sox) 9 ip, 1.0 era
Wade Davis (Rockies) 4 ip, 0.0 era
Greg Holland (Dbacks) 7 ip, 0.0 era
Jason Vargas (Mets) 7ip, 14.5 era