Sox Machine: Chicago White Sox blog

Know thine enemy: 10 questions with a Royals blogger

Those who frequented this site last year may remember exchanging questions and answers with Twins blogger Stick and Ball Guy.  I liked the concept so much that I'm attempting to expand it to the rest of the AL Central.

We'll start this year's series with Max from the Kansas City Royals blog Royals Retrospective.  He's currently in the midst of ranking the 100 greatest Royals of all time, an excellent exercise in obscurity, and looks back at individual seasons and draft classes as well.

It's a lot of fun to read as a non-Royals fan, if only for the names (Rusty Meacham, Bruce Dal Canton and Pete LaCock, to name a few), and it's the type of site I'd do if I weren't doing this one.  Maybe some Sox fan will take up the cause.

He's posted my answers to his questions on his blog, and now we'll get to his answers to my questions:

No. 1:  Trey Hillman seems to have said more right things in the last four months than past Royals managers have said in the past 10 years.  How much optimism is he providing to fans?

Max:  Well it's a bit mixed. Initially a lot of casual fans wanted someone with a connection to the glory years - Frank White. Personally I love Frank, but that would have been a huge mistake. Trey seems to have won over the local media by showing an inclination for OBA, by putting an emphasis on fundamentals (which honestly, every manager in baseball does) and by saying he's not afraid to reject conventional wisdom and think outside the box. A lot of people also like he has a bit of a track record, albeit not in the major leagues. He took over a last place, small market ballclub that had trouble scoring runs (gee that sounds familiar) and turned them into a two-time pennant winner.

However, he'll have to produce with an improvement in the ballclub immediately, or fans will simply see this as simply rearranging chairs on the deck of the Titanic. It won't take much, simply a season in which the Royals are sniffing .500 ball, but he really doesn't really have the luxury of losing 95 games and saying "we're making progress."

No. 2:  I love watching Zack Greinke pitch – is this the year he finally gets over his mental hurdles and sticks in the rotation?

Max:  Wow, your guess is as good as mine. Talk about a wild card. He certainly gained confidence as a reliever last year, and he was pretty darn good as a starter too (3.80 ERA in fourteen starts). He's always going to be a flyball pitcher with a tendency to give up home runs, but if he can maintain his K-BB numbers, I think he has a great chance to be a solid #2/#3 type starter with a 4.00 - 4.20 ERA.

He's still a young kid (23), but he's been through a lot already. I saw an interview with him the other day, and for the first time in his career I thought he looked and sounded like a man. Not a boy, but a man. I have no idea if that means anything.

No. 3:  After Greinke, Gil Meche and Brian Bannister, how will the back of the rotation pan out (and would you like it to shape up differently?)?

Well they seem committed to Tomko as the fourth starter for reasons that escape me, and I think the fifth starters role will come down to John Bale and Jorge de la Rosa. de la Rosa is out of options, but he'll be 27 in a few weeks, has a 5.85 ERA in 274 major league innings and has pretty much proven he's only dependable for a few starts at a time before imploding. He actually could be pretty serviceable as a lefty reliever, but with Jimmy Gobble, Ron Mahay, and minor leaguer Neal Musser, the Royals are well stocked in that department. He could be dealt or waived.

I really like John Bale, although I've only seen about half a season of him. I think he could be a decent 4.50 - 4.80 ERA guy with good strikeout numbers, not a bad guy for the back of the rotation.

Tomko has a hot wife, which is about the most I can say for him. He was just awful last year in a couple of pitchers parks in the NL and should really have to prove 2007 was a fluke before being handed a rotation job. My guess is he's in the pen by Memorial Day, and possibly even released by the All-Star break.

Later in the year I think you can expect Kyle Davies, Leo Nunez and Luke Hochevar making starts for the Royals. Carlos Rosa is a guy that has risen through the system quickly and could see a few starts. And they've also talked about Joakim Soria being a starter long-term, so you could see him make some spot starts late in the year.

Hochevar has actually really impressed a lot of coaches this spring. His numbers in the minors have been less than impressive, especially considering he was the #1 overall pick in the draft. However, his apologists will tell you his peripherals were great, and that his pitch selection was limited because the Royals wanted him to work on certain pitches.

I would guess that [Royals GM] Dayton [Moore] is sensitive to service time issues, so you may not see Luke come up until June or so. That's at least how I'd handle it anyway. May as well let the kid have some minor league success, work on his craft and delay his service clock all at the same time.

No. 4. The White Sox were reportedly in the hunt for Yasuhiko Yabuta, but the Royals snagged him.  How’s he looking so far?

I haven't heard much about Yabuta which is probably a good sign, because middle relievers only garner headlines when they mess up. Its hard to say how Yabuta will perform. The performance of Japanese relievers in the States has really been all over the map. I'm guardedly optimistic that under the tutelage of Hillman, Yabuta can have a solid first season. That is, until American hitters figure him out.

No. 5:  The Jose Guillen signing struck me as unnecessary for the Royals.  Am I wrong?

Well, it was necessary in that they needed to improve the offense, but I would tend to agree that paying $36 million for a 32 year old corner outfielder known as a malcontent who hit just .216/.276/.398 a year ago may have been a waste of resources. But the guy has posted an OPS+ of 115 in four of the last five seasons. The options on the market weren't that great, and the Royals will have to overpay to bring players to a franchise with their history of losing. Even if Guillen is a huge bust, $13 million a season at this point won't actually break the bank with the Royals. They are swimming in more revenue than ever before, and most of their young players won't be making good money until Jose Guillen is long gone.

No. 6:  Who will have the bigger year at the plate – Alex Gordon or Billy Butler?

Gordon because he's older and has a full season under his belt. I fully expect him to have a break out season - .280/.350/.470 25 home runs or so. Butler had a good start in his half-season in Kansas City, but the power isn't quite there yet. I suspect he'll have some sophomore struggles as pitchers develop a book on him, and he may press to hit more power. They're still trying to make him work at first base, and his struggles defensively may carry over to his bat. Also, no one has really talks about it much, but this is a kid who isn't exactly in great shape. It probably won't be an issue until he's closer to 30, but the injury bug worries me when I see that barrel-shaped trunk of his.

No. 7:  How are things going to shake out at first base?

Well as I mentioned above, they're trying to make Butler work, but the guy is about as graceful there as a hippo on roller skates. I think Ryan Shealy is the favorite to get the most playing time at first base. He was awful last year, but this winter he revealed he was hurt for much of the year. I think he can redeem himself, and he's off to a great start in spring training. He's a much better fielder too, so it makes sense to play him at first base and DH Butler.

Dayton inexplicably signed Ross Gload to a two year deal this winter. I like Ross, but he's a bench player, and probably a luxury for a team like the Royals. If he's getting 400-500 plate appearances for you, you're in trouble. He's also a guy that should be fighting for a job every year, not given the security of a two-year deal. But he seems to have some sort of hypnotic Jedi mind trick powers over managers. Buddy Bell loved him. Trey Hillman has suggested Gload could be his #3 hitter in the lineup. Think about that - the #3 hitters in the division will be Travis Hafner, Gary Sheffield, Joe Mauer, Jim Thome and.....Ross Gload. Yikes.

First baseman/outfielder Justin Huber was given virtually no shot of making this club when camp began, but he's hit really well in spring training, making him hard to ignore. He's never been given a shot in Kansas City since being named a Texas League batting champ. He's become a bit of an internet cult hero, both because of his Aussie accent, and because of his sabermetric-friendly skill set of high OBA, good power numbers. He's brutal with the glove, and the Royals have pretty much taken the "first baseman" tag off his former title of "first baseman/outfielder."

With Jose Guillen likely to be suspended to begin the year due to PED use, and Olivo also missing time due to a fight last year, Huber could be a candidate to make the opening day roster as an outfielder and emergency catcher. That could give him a small window of opportunity to make his case.  He is out of options however, and if the Royals decide he's not in the picture, he'll be either traded or waived.

No. 8:  Are the Royals going to improve their broadcast quality at all?  I’m not talking about the announcers, but the picture clarity.

Yea, it was dreadful last year. Always low quality. Always. The Royals finally ditched their efforts to develop a regional sports network, which was a shame because had they invested the capital to do it right, infiltrate the midwestern states of Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Nebraska and Iowa, and maybe tie-in with Big 12 sports, they probably could have developed a good moneymaker for the franchise. Instead they went cheap, which made the organization look even worse than it really was, no easy task.

This year they just ditched it all and signed a deal with Fox Sports. FSN will carry all Royals games this year and I believe many of those games will actually be in HD. Also, Ryan Lefebvre moves from the radio booth to replace the excitable Bob Davis. Bob, I love ya, but you belong on Jayhawk radio broadcasts, not screaming in excitement over an Emil Brown pop-up.

No. 9: How many games will the Royals win, and in what place will they finish?

I think this team can improve quite a bit, yet not improve a whole lot in the standings. Let's face it, the AL Central is a beast. The pitching is likely to regress a bit, but the offense should have a pretty good improvement. I think 73-77 wins is probably a good conservative prediction, with the Royals challenging the Twins for fourth.

No. 10:  Can we have Joe Posnanski?

You already stole Buddy Bell from us you monsters. Kansas City is really lucky in the quality of sports writing we get. The area gave birth to Pos, Bill James, Rob Neyer, John Sickels, as well as numerous interesting and hilarious blogs. Something about losing year in and year out brings out quality sports writing.