Aug/100
GWBH% and the Royals
Posted by: Bertkc01 on August 11, 2010.
Ever heard of VORP? Have we really gotten our heads around what OPS means? I think WHIP and ERA determine the Cy Young now not wins or strikeouts. Let’s face it we just keep thinking of new numbers to make the game more interesting. Hell they won’t let us have instant replay so why not?
In pure sport I submit to you another dumb equation to possibly explain our lack of clutch hitting. Please read the following in jest.
Oh great reader I stand before you befuddled. For 2 reasons my befuddlement has reached the highest level since the “steroid era”.
1.)The Royals are in fact putting the prospects in play that we all have been gawking over for some time. Alex, Kila, Bullington and Betemit were all at AAA for a substantial time before arriving and we know they’re potential. We all saw they’re stats and were screaming for Dayton Moore to start bringing up this hot, young talent. (Not another way of saying hot chick. These are highly regarded, highly performing young guys that we want to see play.) Yet at this moment after a west coast roadtrip we have gone 2 – 7. Befuddling.
2.)If it were not for the 7-1 loss to Seattle we can say that about 6 of the 7 games were lost by 2 runs or less. I think 6. Could be 5 but I’m not entirely sure. On top of that every game we lost we had one last at bat and, save for 3 of the 7 losses, we were easily one big hit away winning the game. Serious befuddlement.
It is for this reason I propose yet one more meaningless stat to help us understand what the heck is going on with the Royals. Can it truly be meaningless? Yes. Baseball has a way of putting importance on things that shouldn’t matter (or does it?).
Here’s the stats I shall use to calculate a teams ability to get the Game Winning Base Hit (GWBH%):
Wins, Slugging %, games played, RBI’s and what the hell let’s try and put the teams ERA into it (what good is all runs if your pitching can’t keep it right?).
Royals have a .392 Slugging %, won 47 games, 445 RBI’s so far in a 114 games played. They also have 5.01 ERA (2nd worst in AL).
Okay let’s call the GWBH% a means of calculating the odds a team has of hitting the last RBI in the game. Sooo….
1.) First step of equation: RBI’s/game
445 RBI’s /114 games = 3.905 RBI’s/game
Sooo… with a .392 Slug we have 3.905 RPG which equates to 47 wins. Since there is a team ERA of 5.01 we can easily see why a team might be in last place. Since we can’t score a fraction of a run I’ve decided to round up to 4 RPG. Divide this by Slug %.
2.) Step 2. A weird answer.
.392 slug/4 rpg = .098 slug/rpg… what does the .098 mean? It’s small and since baseball is a game of inches day in and day out we have to extrapolate this number on a season basis. Soooo…
.098 slug/rpg * 114 games = 11.72 slug/rpg/game
Just too add another layer of voodoo let’s make it a percentage. At 11.72%. Thus an 11.72% chance the Royals will get the GWBH.
That means that 88.28% chance the Royals will give UP the GWBH. In the end it makes no sense but damnit doesn’t just feel like I’m onto something?
Jul/100
Eff Steinbrenner and the Yankees. Why I hate the White Sox. The Royals culture (This whole thing is a plot against me isn’t it?).
Posted by: Bertkc01 on July 22, 2010.
First of all… go here and do this.
https://secure.minorleaguebaseball.com/milb/fans/moniker_madness/y2010/moniker_madness.jsp
Now on to the reason I’m here.
Baseball lost a man who both made baseball great and demonized for generations to come in George Steinbrenner. You can’t deny his significance on the game and impact he made in New York. Yada yada yada. Everything you can say you put in that last sentence. Point is though I still hate him. Don’t get me wrong I would still share a drink with him and listen to any advice he gives me (or would have if, in my perfect day dream world, we both went to the same golf club). I just happen to hate what he did to the game of baseball. He turned it into a bidding war. I hope the Yankees of his era do not become the model in which to make a baseball team because I admire what the Braves and Twins are doing a whole heck of a lot more. Solid minor league system constantly moving talent through the system that leads to just making sure 4 or 5 guys are happy, producing and winning and surrounding them with young talent that is replaced in 3 years (you know when they get tooexpensive). Thing is you start winning enough then that talent sticks around and you start making money because the fans love it. Then you can trade some of that talent for other guys who are All-Stars or you sign them in offseason. Oh wait… that’s what Steinbrenner did. Guess I can’t be mad. He did it better than anyone else and left behind a $1.1 billion legacy. * Sigh *
I just got to be clear on one thing though. I friggin’ hate the White Sox. I mean hate them. Like remind me of people I didn’t like in high school hate. The way you hate someone when just looking at them makes a little bile shoot into your throat a little bit. *^#)&)&*#)*EG)&(*UDLJKDV. Hate. I hate them so much I typed garbledy gook on my work. Here’s why: They aren’t good yet they are in first place. What they have is the equivalent of 6 dumb jocks, 2 freshman and 1 nerd playing on the team at all times. The freshman are clearly having off years (Pierre and Beckham) and the nerd (pitcher) is basically doing all the work he can and waiting for the dumb jocks (Konerko, Quentin, Ramirez, Kotsay so on and on)to finally start doing their job which is to kick sand in the faces of all the dumb jocks. So what motivates them? The coach starts talking about benching them or trading. IS THAT ALL IT TAKES? I’m stuck in KC waiting for the talent pool to develop and the whole world of division winning and post season play to come to me in 2 years (it’s always 2 years) and all Guillen has to do is mutter something about sending them to the some other cellar dwelling team and then they are like “Oh okay boss huh huh.” and in a month they’re in 1st place. Give me a break. I wish my team was that dumb/good.
Here’s the point of all this. I had planned to write an article about who we could get in trades and I mean I was going to go over everything and everyone. From Pena to Greinke. Everyone is looking at DeJesus and Guillen and Soria to trade then all of the sudden they trade Callaspo. I can only assume this means that they are planning to make room for Moustakas to get in the lineup eventually and get better starting pitching. Hopefully that means that Davies is on the chopping block next. I can hope right? So now we are completely at a loss of what to do. We have developed a legitimate right side of the diamond with Aviles, Billy Butler and David DeJesus we can say that these are legitimate Royals players. They play the way we want them too and they play it well (only 3 players hitting over .300). Then we have the pitching staff. Greinke, Blake Wood, Soria and Dusty Hughes. You can argue D-Hughes but I think he can develop into a great role player. The Dayton Moore 10 year plan (we are in year 4) calls for majority of the players to be home grown. They’re is 25 on a roster.
So that means 7/25 are part of the future. We need 5 more. I am going with Kila Ka’aihue (sp?), Moustakas, Hosmer and Gordon to be added in. That brings us to 11. Another problem comes when we see that we now have three first basemen. Most likely to be out? KK. Moore isn’t giving up a prized 1st round pick like Hosmer and Billy Butler is an excellent DH. So that takes back to 10. We are getting close people to starting to go down the path of White Sox and the Yankees. It’s just a matter of getting the right pieces in place.
Jul/100
First 1/2 evaluation and random thoughts
Posted by: Bertkc01 on July 14, 2010.
Passing thoughts on the Royals since the midway point (which isn’t the midway point but it’s like the Christmas break of baseball)
Hey our AAA, AA and High A minor league teams look awesome!
From a fan’s glance I’m gonna break down the first half of the season into 2 halves. Le’ts call them Yuni and Betancourt.
The Trey days (Betancourt):
Royals were error prone fools. THE BULLPEN. Should I even start? They couldn’t close a case on Usama Bin Laden. They worked walks like they were outs and they were the worst in baseball. If not statistcally then they were the best at deflating morality in baseball.
Offense: OBP and AVG. are among the best in baseball but (and it’s a big but) none of that matters when the defense is error prone and the walks (heard the saying “beware the 2 out walk” multiple times) are escalating to the point of embarrasement.
No play illustrates this better than when, on opening day, Robinson Tejeda came in and gave up a lead by way of Johny Damon. I listen to the radio. I heard the frothing. We started off 0-1.
Since Hillman’s firing (Yuni):
The Royals are at .500.
The Royals seem to finally have figured it out. Good D and good pitching will go along way to overcoming a lack of a slugger. A Kila Kai’ahue and Jose Guillen and Ankiel filled line up (with an Alex Gordon twist) would resolve this issue I think but maybe Gordon needs to work on his approach a bit. Or maybe we should trade him? Seriously though we got Parraz, Dyson and Robinson lined up to accept the succesor’s job so why not? That means we got Podsednik and Gordon to trade. Wow, what would you give for that? Pods as CF and Gordon as LF. Not so much what but who would trade for that? It feels like a National league team would want that. What team in the NL needs a better outfield? How about the Cubs or the Astros? Anyone got any ideas?
The high point of the year? Beating Strasburg and kick starting a 10-3 pace for 13 games before being swept by the White Sox. God I hate the White Sox.
2nd
Since Guillen got gimpy on us who will they have play his spot? It appears Betemit is the answer. On top of that Moustakas was just moved to AAA and Hosmer is projected to go to AA (See last article for my secret “I told ya so” idea). Where it not for Betemit we would see KK in the majors and my idea would be in full fruition sigh. Alas it was not yet ment to be. KK I will see you in 2011. sniff, sniff
Here’s hoping we stay even now and make our late year run we made like we did last 2 years with both KK, Moustakas and Gordon stepping onto the podium’s we have waiting for them.
So I want to open it up for next article: Should I write about the Royals playing culture where I point out the Royals players brought up in the system are playing better than free agents? Or should I write about the job Dayton Moore has done? Just a thought.
Jul/100
A New Moon! (or) Growing up Royal! (or) Why we have no phenom’s!
Posted by: Bertkc01 on July 6, 2010.
The future of Kansas City is growing to a crescendo. To anyone that has access to mlb.com or listens to Royals game you can see the development of the farm system. I never in my life have spent so much time following so many teams as I have following the Royals minor league system. That’s how desperate I have become as a fan. Losing seasons don’t sit well after a while and we begin to hope for a savior. No savior comes into place without the form of a need for rebellion. In this case it’s the draft.
I say the Royals farm system will climb because in the most recent years I’ve noticed a pattern in performance. Early picks that tend to take their time. Royals don’t like a Strasburg. Nothing wrong with that it’s just that when we pick we want to make sure the players comply with the batting philosophy and pitching philosophy and to be a dynasty you have to have guys that buy in.
Buy in to the Kevin Seitzer Philosophy on hitting and McClure Philosophy on hitting.
K Seitz philosophy is simple. Work the count. Work for your pitch and hit it up the middle. This leads to long AB with full counts and the starting pitchers being taken out early because they’ve been overworked and the bullpen (mainly one inning guys) open to multiple run scoring innings (View what we’ve done to Felix Hernandex, Strasburg and Wakefield). A walk is as good as a single and a strikeout is the worst thing you could do to help your TEAM. Team. It’s all about helping the next guy succeed. Butler works a walk so Guillen can work the pitcher for Callaspo. This philosophy is in full effect at NW Arkansas and would be in AAA Omaha if it weren’t for a lesser overall talent level. Seriously the Naturals are freaks at working this philosophy. You can tell the newer guys by their batting averages. 6 of the 9 batting lineup made the lineup the other 3 were promoted starting this year so they’re a year behind. It’s actually scary to think that if 2/3 of your guys buy in. Betancourt and Kendall and Callaspo are in the top 10 of hardest to strike out and we lead the Majors in hitting. We will revisit this analysis in the future but I will give you a chance to naysay on what I just said. Alliteration anyone?
The Bob McClure philosophy is maybe contrary to what other commentators have said but it’s a simple pitch to contact for ground ball philosophy with an 0-2 count go for the strike out.twist. The early season problem (and what may have gotten Trey Hillman fired) was the decision for the pitcher to do all pitching off the mound and on flat ground. I suppose the intent was to provide the pitchers with an extra boost of speed or confidence standing above it all with the mound but what we found was the bullpen was awful. Pitches we’re left over the plate and homerun’s ensued. The pitchers couldn’t hit their spots and they led the league in walks and had the worst ERA. Then a new manager comes in and says “No, throw off the mound for practice and warm up” and we are 2 games above .500 with that guy. Only time will tell if that was the right decision.
The point to all of this is don’t worry about a first rookie in the farm system. Look at them next year. These philosophies take time to assimilate to an athlete’s head.
Don’t worry about Crow or Colon. You’ll see their true selves next year.
Moustakas in 2009: BA .250
in 2010 (7/2010 ish) BA .358
Hosmer in 2009: BA .241
in 2010 (7/2010 ish) BA .350
Kila Ka’aihue 2009: BA .252
in 2010 (7/2010 ish) BA .313
Chris Dwyer 2009: ERA 4.15
in 2010 (7/2010 ish) ERA 2.99 (and promoted to Moustakas team(yes it is his team))
Do you believe yet?
Jun/100
What to do when your “stuck” at the ballpark
Posted by: Bertkc01 on June 19, 2010.
How to survive the rain delay
The Royals would lose the day the All-Star game is announced to come to KC. I could talk about that.
I could also talk about the pitching and unfortunate breaks the team had but almost every stinking blogger does that. I’d rather talk about the beauty of a rain delay. It is beautiful.
It was a beautiful presentation by Bud Selig or David Glass or whatever city authorities and it was slowly turning into a beautiful evening for a ball game until I realized the nice breeze was due to a storm a comin’. Well I spoke to ushers and I spoke to concession stand people (who are exceedingly nice by the way) and as fans began to file in to the cheap seats with me I noticed a small state of concern come apparent by the masses. The storm would be pretty bad. Now I’ve been through some storms and this wasn’t the worst one I’d see but you’d think some people have never been in a storm. In fact some people are just plain waste their good looks and intelligence on how they react to a thunderstorm. Yes it’s loud and yes it flashes but man do you have to panic?
Here’s why you should never panic in a storm at a public venue. If it was going to be really bad and I mean really, REALLY bad there’s nothing they can do about it and if it’s not as bad as that then you’re going to be okay. So I never worry I just take my lumps, get a little wet and calm down after the loud bangs (startle reaction is scientifically proven to be unavoidable) and focus on my ball park environment.
Moving down to the lower level to avoid the pummeling the crowd as a whole was pretty happy to be there. Vendors were laughing and carrying on to customers and serving the magnificently overprice food (gotta pay for Guillen’s contract somehow) and felt compelled to break my first rule of baseball game viewing. Don’t buy any food before the 3rd inning. Not knowing how long this is going to take I opt for a footlong hotdog, chicken tenders and fries and a souvenir large diet Pepsi (because I got to keep my figure). So I already am feeling weird because now everything is off.
I see what appears to be an 18 year old girl shivering and closed up tight but wearing about as much skin tight clothing and revealing apparel as you can and it seems odd to me that she’d be here in this situation. Realize that she probably doesn’t check the weather much and it is summer so clothes become more optional as the hotter days close in. Then I see she has a cell phone and I feel a little less sorry for her because she could have gotten on the internet with the device and checked on it but then again I don’t know her circumstances and maybe she can only use it for talking. Then my sympathy fell away completely as she places her cell phone in her BACK POCKET. Which is about as smart as smoking during a tonsilectomy. You sit down and crunch there goes your communication during a worse case scenario. Then I see that the phone has a Justin Bieber picture on it. Sorry young lady but you just received negative energy from me. Hope you make it inspite of it, which you probably will.
The weather let’s up a little bit and I go up to the 400 section area and see some vendors closing shop and I start a conversation. Joking say “Hey got any extra food left over?” They say, “Want a shaboygan?” I’m shocked and say “Yes.” Two minutes later I get my free shaboygan. I love the ballpark.
The clouds leave but not before leaving a double rainbow. Then it gets dark and in about the 4th inning I think, “I’ve got to write about this.”.
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