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This looks like another tough and long summer at the K, but hey at least the Chiefs have a promising future I guess. In the lost art of the stolen base, the Royals could potentially have three players with 40+ stolen bases on the season in Whit Merrifield, Aldaberto Mondesi, and off season signee Billy Hamilton from the Reds. If Hamilton can actually reach first base that'll be a good move, and they reunited with speed demon Terrance Gore. Neither of those guys can hit, but if Gore ends up making the major league roster (and with Brian Goodwin released the other day it makes it easier for Gore) that would be some pretty nifty speed on the bases in late game situations. With Salvy potentially out for the year with Tommy John surgery they signed ex Astros catcher Martin Maldonado. They did a revamp of the bullpen adding Brad Boxburger, Drew Stored, Jake Diekman, and Homer Bailey in the off season.
Best case for 2019: The veteran bullpen guys all have good first halves of the year and Dayton can ship them off for prospects at the deadline. Lucas Duda, back on a 1 year deal hopefully has a good first half, so potential for him to move again. Mondesi, Hamilton, Gore & Merrifield combine to steal 175 bases, and Gore with a chance to get regular ABs for a rebuilding club proves he can hit.
Worst case for 2019: The starting rotation is even worse than it was in 2018. Puts too many innings and pitches on the bullpen arms, and they prove ineffective and nobody wants them come July. Tigers rebuilding project goes better and moves faster along, and they pass the Royals in the standings at the end of the year.
My prediction for 2019: Merrifield continues off where he ended last year, but not quite league leading average of 40 SB's. Even going to a new league Hamilton shows he still can't hit, but still winds up with 30 SB's. Gore won't get meaningful playing time to accumulate any statistics. Duda has a nice first half before being a deadline seller, and they finish in 4th place in the Central. There was no hope for optimism, and even less so now with Salvy likely out for the year. On the bright side at least they make the New York trip relatively early this year (I think like April 18-21) so I'll hopefully get the chance to see them right away out of the gate, but I'm going up to Toronto at the end of the June for the series up there. On the flip side: with only that 1 trip to New York, and the Toronto trip, that's the last time I'm going to see them in person, and they sure won't be on national TV a lot. Thank God for MLB TV though!
Game 1 of 2019 goes at home against the White Sox on Thursday. Carlos Rodon (6-8, 4.18 in '18) gets the ball for the White Sox against Brad Keller (9-6, 3.08 last year) for the Royals with game time beginning at 3:15
First half anlaysis:
Obviously they aren't winning anything this year. Maybe a couple games against the Tigers or White Sox, but that's about it. Salvy's out for the year, Maldanado is going perfectly fine filling in, but wish Ned would play the minor league catchers more, see if there's anything there. I don't think there's a big market for the catching position here this month, so I don't know why Maldonado continues to play every day.
I know Duda was hurt for an extended time, but he stinks this year. They'd be lucky to get a post card of a stadium in return. There best bet is for some contender that needs 1b/dh help gets a injury at one of those positions. Maybe the Nationals Matt Adams gets hurt because Ryan Zimmerman will likely get hurt again, so that could be a match if you want to take a single A lottery ticket guy.
Nicky Lopez wasn't as highly sought after as Hunter Dozier, Mondesi was, but I love watching him play, he's a keeper!
Same with Dozier, Mondesi & Jorge Soler, wasn't happy about the trade at the time, but it has worked out so far.
You STILL can't steal first base and because of that Billy Hamilton is STILL useless. Why he continues to play, I have no idea. Honestly, I'd rather see Terrance Gore get Hamilton's at bats. We've seen Hamilton for a good 5 years, starting in Cincinnati, he has never hit, this year still can't hit, and probably will never hit. Gore has never gotten a chance to be a consistent starter, I doubt he can hit either, but why not give it a shot?? Hamilton has been getting shots for 7 years and doing the same exact thing every day.
Whit continues to do Whit things, and this will be controversial, but if you get a worthwhile return, I would trade him. I don't think he's going to be a part of the next Royals champions team, and he's about to become really expensive, so I'd think long and hard about moving him.
Brad Keller is about the only starter that you actually have a chance at a win when he goes out there, the rest of them are rally meh to bad to awful, though Homer Bailey ended the first half not pitching terribly.
Bullpen hasn't been terrible, but certainly not good. Seeing they still have about $30 million tied up to in Ian Kennedy, they might have found something with him in the bullpen. Potentially the next Luke Hochevar & Wade Davis, failed starters turned relievers?? Someone posted that on twitter way back in the first 2 weeks of the season. Davis & Hochevar were a lot younger obviously, but so far this year it seems to be working out relatively well, so they should keep him there....next year too. Jake Diekman has been a pretty good set up man, and should definitely be moved by July 31. Only reason to hold onto him is if he's signed to a multi year contract, and even with that, next year doesn't look much better than this year, so no sense to hold onto decent relief pitchers. The other big off season addition to the bullpen, Brad Boxburger, sucked, and has subsequently been released. Drew Storen hasn't pitched with the major league team this year I believe.
Ned Yost announces his retirement end of season. For all the #Yosted moments I posted on Twitter he probably goes down as the second greatest manager in Royals history, Even though he overtook the club wins record from Whitey Herzog a couple of seasons ago I'd say Herzog is probably still #1, but Yost has closed the gap. Won them a World Series, and were 90 feet away and a historic relief outing away from back-to-back titles, got the franchise back to respectability at least for a few years and so far has started the transition to what is hopefully the next group of Cain's/Moose's/Hosmer's of the Royals organization in Mondesi/Dozier/Starling. The new manager will have some big shoes to fill in 2020 and beyond, but Yost has put his successor in a good position for a playoff run in 2022 or 2023.
It’s official, Mike Matheny is the new manager: https://www.kansascity.com/sports/ml...236855658.html
Along with the new ownership, it will be interesting to see how things pan out.
The one common denominator during the last 25 years of Royals mediocrity was ownership (or lack thereof during the early years of that stretch), ‘14 and ‘15 being the most obvious outlier years..
Last edited by sub; 10-31-2019 at 12:48 PM..
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