Royals legends are relieved to see this team create 1985-like memories

Those are the Royals over there in front of all the cameras. That’s Eric Hosmer on the cover of Sports Illustrated. That’s him and his teammates making the funnest kind of off-the-field news by dropping around $15,000 on a bar tab to say thank you to fans. That’s James Shields starting for the third time in five playoff games for a franchise writing a brilliant, welcome and enthralling new history.

And that’s George Brett, off to the side — always off to the side now — thankful for it all and saying something that may surprise you.

“I’m tired of talking about 1985, I really am,” he says. “I am sick and tired of it. You know? You can only look in the past for so long.”

This is a sentiment long shared by Brett and others who pushed the Royals to a proud time as one of baseball’s best organizations in the 1970s and 1980s, and World Series champions in 1985. They’ve talked about this in the past, usually privately, and usually in conversations about the organization needing to create a new pride instead of holding on to an old one.

For them, this American League Championship Series that starts against the Orioles on Friday night in Baltimore represents something personal. This is a long-awaited, much-welcome release. For nearly three decades, the Royals have been chasing something they could only see through the rearview mirror, or in grainy old video while the rest of baseball moved on in high definition.

“You hear about 1985 a lot,” says Billy Butler, drafted by the Royals in 2004. “As you should. They won a World Series. You’re never not going to talk about it.”

But this is something new. New tradition. New memories. New stories. The comeback in the AL Wild Card Game goes next to victories in three straight elimination games in both playoff series in 1985. Finally, a new reason to push 1985 to the back. And that’s entirely fine with the men whose baseball identities are largely tied to that moment. Twenty-nine years is long enough.

George Brett and Frank White and so many others now have to share the organization’s best moments — and they’re entirely OK with that.

“When you put so much of yourself into a team, you want it to be thought of positively,” White says. “You just want something else for people to be proud of. You want these guys to achieve things on their own and not always have to go back to 1985 for something to hang your hat on.”

At some point, and at some moments, 1985 has felt as much like an anvil to some. No matter what, today was always compared to 1985. Kevin Appier and Zack Greinke were compared to Bret Saberhagen. Carlos Beltran was compared to Willie Wilson. Alex Gordon and Johnny Damon were compared to George Brett. And anyone who has ever hit more than a few home runs for the Royals is always compared to Steve Balboni, who holds the club record with 36.

Instead of something prideful, the stories began to position the Royals like a former child TV star grown into middle age but forever forced to hear about how great he used to be. For a while, during the Royals’ darkest days, those inside the organization basically stopped talking about it. The past was to be run from.

That started to change when Dayton Moore was hired as general manager in 2006. The Royals’ history is personal to Moore because this is the team he grew up rooting for. He wanted the franchise to embrace the past, but not as some unavoidable shadow. He wanted the people involved to know where the organization had been and to believe that they could get back.

That’s why he brought back the Royals’ postseason banquet after years of dormancy. He named organizational awards and even some fields at the spring training complex in Arizona after great players and other figures from the past. He invited those men to work with current players, to share both old stories and new guidance. Be proud of that history, even as you try to rewrite it.

It’s interesting that the Royals’ opponent in this series is going through something similar. The Orioles won 93 games and a Wild Card spot two years ago, but this is their first time in the ALCS since 1997 — when Cal Ripken was their third baseman and Rafael Palmeiro had not yet wagged his finger at Congress over steroids. The O’s are playing for their first World Series since 1983 — Ripken’s second year and his first season of 162 games.

But even if the Orioles can relate as a former power that found hard times, these stories aren’t the same. The Orioles made the playoffs two years ago and didn’t go as long between national relevance as the Royals.

There have been so many moments that make people inside the Royals confident and proud about changing the franchise’s narrative. Two recent ones tell a nice story.

At the rally before the Wild Card game last week, Dennis Leonard was doing a light interview with a Royals staffer. The conversation was being played through the stadium’s speakers, and it was basically what you’d expect. The Royals’ career leader in complete games and shutouts was talking old memories from five playoff seasons and trying to relate them to today.

Then third baseman Mike Moustakas walked onto the field for batting practice, and whatever Leonard was saying was drowned out by thousands of screaming fans who had shown up on short notice in the middle of a Monday. That’s the sound of progress.

The other thing you hear people inside the organization talk about now is a homemade sign they saw in the crowd the other night. The television broadcast showed it and it struck a chord. There probably aren’t more than a few team employees who haven’t talked about the kid who waved the sign saying: “Finally, no more stories about 1985.”

In some very real ways, the goal for the organization over the last decade or two has been to inspire some kid to make that sign.

When Brett thinks of the larger meaning of what the Royals are doing right now, he thinks of something he heard Mike Sweeney say once. Sweeney was making a point about life or baseball or both, and he was comparing this (or them) to driving a car. When you drive a car, you look in the rearview mirror quickly, and only to see where you’ve already been. You keep your eyes on the road ahead, through the front windshield, because you always want to see where you’re going.

The image is plain. Look ahead to move forward or look in the rearview mirror to see where you’ve already been.

“For years we’ve been looking in the rearview mirror in this organization,” Brett says. “Now we get to look forward.”

That’s what this playoff run, however far it goes, will mean to a lot of people who have put their lives into this organization. The constraints of only having successes so far in the past are gone. Gordon and Shields and Sal Perez can now stand next to Brett and White and Saberhagen with the franchise’s best moments.

Both sides understand they’re better off this way.

This story was originally published October 9, 2014 at 4:23 PM with the headline "Royals legends are relieved to see this team create 1985-like memories."