May/092
Royals Swept At Home
Posted by: Casey on May 31, 2009.
Royals Lose 7th Consecutive Series (AP Photo/Ed Zurga)
Well, just when we thought the series against the White Sox was coming at a good time, well we were wrong. In a series featuring the best three starters the Royals have, the Sox swept the Royals.
Greinke looked kinda mortal, although he didn’t get the loss. He pitched 7 innings, giving up 4 runs, 3 earned.
Perhaps the lone good news of the weekend is Soria is back. Maybe it’ll give our bullpen some confidence back. Meanwhile, our defense is still awful, although the offense did wake up a little bit today.
Royals have a travel day tomorrow to Tampa Bay, where they start a series on Tuesday.
May/090
Royals and White Sox Start 3 Game Series Tonight
Posted by: Casey on May 29, 2009.
Clayton Richard (1-0, 3.55 era) will face off against upstart Brian Bannister (4-1 2.79 era) at 7:10 tonight at the K. If Greinke hadn’t been so dominant this far in the season, Bannister would be the talk of the town after being called up from Omaha and delivering some solid starts. The Royals will need another solid start from him tonight if they intend on making up ground in the Central. Detroit, meanwhile, is playing at Baltimore for the weekend.
None of the Royals have seen Clayton Richard very much, with the most experience against him being 6 AB by Teahen. Bannister, meanwhile, has always had a tough time against the White Sox in his career (2-3, 7.66 era). Coco should be back in the lineup today, and hopefully his rested shoulder will help him wake up at the plate.
May/094
Stadium Debate
Posted by: Casey on May 28, 2009.
I know people have had this debate before, but now that I have my own site, I thought it would be fun to have one myself. With the Royals licking the wounds in the hot tub’s today, what better day to have it?
What Did Happen
Okay so the “New K” is pretty cool, the outfield experience is amazing and stuff, right? Being around the fountains after all the years of watching them from field level, it is pretty cool being out there. They also widened the concourses, which is very nice. There’s an HDTV everywhere you go, there’s some really neat visual effects added (the banner thing around the facade is neat), obviously the huge HDTV is very nice. There isn’t a roof over the complex like was the plan for all these years, but that hasn’t happened and it won’t happen now. I’m sure I’m forgetting things, but I’m pretty sure I named the biggest improvements. Whether the new features have brought added attendance, or perhaps it was the 18-11 April record, added with Greinke’s draw, attendance is up 3k from this point last year.
What Could Have Been
Tampa Bay Rays Possible New Stadium
Alternate View Of Rays Possible Stadium
Oakland A's Potential New Stadium
Marlins Possible New Stadium
Marlins Possible Stadium Alternate View
While all of these stadiums look amazing, it would be more likely that the Royals stadium would resemble the Twins new stadium:
Target Field, Opening in 2010
Alternate View
Okay, so all of these new stadiums look absolutely amazing. There is no denying that they would be a better place to enjoy a game then the 3-decade-old “New K”. Obviously, the reason why they didn’t build a new stadium is due to money issues, but the fact that they did spend 256 million renovating, a new stadium will be well down the road.
The Debate
I would have prefered to build a new stadium rather then renovate Kauffman. I would have been fine with renovating Arrowhead, because I don’t really care about the Chiefs. When you look at these new stadiums, then imagine one of them being in downtown Kansas City, rather then having to drive to Florida, doesn’t that make you wish we would have built a new one? Look, the Royals have won one World Series at Kauffman. We haven’t been good since then, and the originalality of the ballpark when it was opened was amazing. But why hold onto those things 36 years after the park was opened? Why not start a new ballpark!?
Now, I’m not a resident of Jackson County, so it’s easy for me to play the devils advocate when I’m not going to have to pay out anything at all. But I’m pretty sure that I’d have the same stance, and maybe even a greater stance for a new ballpark if I did live there.
Obviously, it doesn’t matter now. Like I said, a new stadium is at least a decade off, so it will be even cooler then when it happens.
How did you feel about the situation? Did you want a new one or did you want to stick with Kauffman?
May/090
Royals Lose To Tigers 8-3
Posted by: Casey on May 27, 2009.
Davies Gives Up 8 Runs (AP Photo/Orlin Wagner)
The Tigers took two out of three games in a big series between division leaders in Kansas City, which increases the Tigers lead in the AL Central to four games. None of the games of the series were close, and the Royals lose yet another series.
Rick Porcello won his first game against the Royals this year, he’s now 1-1 against KC. For a kid who’s only 20 years old, he’s definately shown his promise. He throws hard and has some nasty stuff. It’s amazing how many of the pitchers for the Tigers throw in the upper-90’s. It seemed like every reliever that came in threw hard and threw effectively. I think the Tigers have showed the Royals that they deserve to be where they are, which is in 1st place.
The Royals get a day off tomorrow, which is a much needed rest before the White Sox come in for a weekend series. Hopefully we can win that series, as the boys in blue have now lost 6 straight series (although they won 2 out of 4 against Baltimore in that stretch).
May/090
Hillman Suspended One Game
Posted by: Casey on May 27, 2009.
In a ridiculous decision handed down by MLB, Trey Hillman was suspended one game for reportedly spitting in an umpires eye during this game. The pitcure shown shoes the argument, and when you watch the video, you can see where the umpire backs away from Hillman during the argument.
If you watch the video in slow motion, which FS Royals has showed several times, you can’t see any spit flying through the air.
Okay so lets say he did spit in his eye, you really think this is the first time saliva has been exchanged between a manager and an umpire? Give me a break.. Even if it did go into his eye, it was completely unintentional. This decision is made even more ridiculous by the fact that Hillman was only ejected 3 times all of last year, which was the fewest amount out of any manager in the AL. He’s always respectful to umpires, and he was obviously trying to keep Bloomquist in the game. Now he could have just ran out and been very calm, but the fact is, Hillman was frustrated with how his team was playing and he thought he would just kill two birds with one stone.
Hopefully the Royals can get a win with Davies on the mount, 1:10 first pitch. Davies vs Porcello (whom the Royals beat earlier this year).
What are your thoughts? Apparently managers are not allowed to appeal suspensions, because if they were I’m sure Hillman would appeal, judging on how royally pissed he is. This is very uncharacteristic, but I would like to state that I noted before that Hillman would start to show some more emotion.
May/090
Royals Rebound Behind Zack, 6-1 over Tigers
Posted by: Casey on May 26, 2009.
Royals Beat Tigers, 6-1 (AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)
It took awhile, but the Royals ended up scoring some runs. I was a little worried that perhaps the Royals would yet again not give the pitching staff some run support, but they came through in the 6th when they scored 3.
Greinke continues to give us solid innings. He gave up one run off of two fairly light hits in the first inning, then didn’t give up another run for his 5th complete game of the season.
I was very happy to see the Royals employ some small ball, some hit and runs (although they weren’t successful), some bunts and slap hits. It’s good to see the offense when they are relaxed and going with pitches, but it’s obvious that they aren’t always that way. It took a bad throw from Jackson to ignite the offense, and a very nice clutch hit from Mitch Maier. He pulled a pitch up the middle that was well outside, but it worked, and I’ll certainly take it.
The win draws the Royals back to 3 behind the Tigers in the central, and hopefully we can get out there and get within two games tomorrow in the day game.
Game notes:
- Luis Hernandez had his best game as a royal, going 1-3 and had a sac bunt which was thrown away by Jackson. I think the bunt surprised Jackson and the hustle Luis showed down the line helped matters.
- Callaspo had a very nice night defensively, making several back-handed plays, and turned a key double play on a hit-and-run.
- Coco left the game early due to his shoulder, hopefully he can get better.
- Maier replaced Coco and had a key two-run single.
- Hillman had another well-managed game.
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