Mellinger Minutes: a bad anniversary, KU football’s mess, and Bobby (F.) Witt Jr.
Maybe you’re like me and you tend to mark your years and life events by sports events. It’s a weird thing, and probably proof that those of us who do it care a little more about sports than a doctor would recommend.
But that’s where we are. I will always remember the last KU-Mizzou game happened in mid to late February 2012, because my wife and I watched it on TV from our honeymoon. Our first son was born Feb. 27, and one of my first thoughts was that I’d have to make sure my trips to spring training wouldn’t conflict. Our second son was born April 7, so I always keep an eye on the Royals opening day schedule and Final Four.
This all comes to mind this week because for me the world didn’t shut down on March 12 of last year. For me, the world shut down the day of the Big 12 tournament quarterfinals. I hope to go to the Big 12 tournament most years of my life, and I’m not sure I’ll ever go without connecting it to the day that changed everything.
Do you remember where you were?
I was at home, already filled with uncertainty, still hoping that we could at least have the end of the season played without fans. Kansas would’ve been assigned as the NCAA Tournament’s top seed in Omaha, one of the country’s best host cities.
The night before I’d been at (what was then) Sprint Center, talking to people about how they felt attending what none of us knew at the time would be one of the last major games played for a while.
I remember how little anyone knew. Even the experts — doctors, scientists, public health officials — were guessing. In the beginning, we were told more about wearing gloves than masks. To be careful, you shouldn’t open or touch deliveries for a day or so.
Can we still exercise outdoors? Go to restaurants? Travel? Go to the pool? Everyone had a guess.
There will be a time we look back on the information we have right now as incomplete or worse. We don’t know if even those who recover from Covid-19 have long-term issues. What about women who are pregnant? Should they get a vaccine? How are the variants different?
But what I think about more than anything else this week is how far we’ve come. It’s a miracle, really. More than 500,000 Americans are dead, and even now as case and mortality rates are dropping the seven-day average is well over one thousand deaths.
But the progress. Three vaccines are being put in people’s arms, each essentially invented, tested, and distributed to millions of people in less than a year. Vaccines are outpacing new cases something like 30 to 1, and the rate is only going to increase. One in four American adults has at least one shot of vaccine. A miracle.
This week, one year after we were told to stay in our houses except for emergencies, basketball games will be played with fans in attendance. The NFL played an entire season, many games with fans. Baseball games are happening right now in Arizona and Florida with fans. Opening day will be cheered by thousands across the country soon.
We’re not back to normal. Even those of us with vaccines* should wear masks and distance and do all the things. We’re getting closer, and to use a sports analogy maybe we’re even in the fourth quarter. The most important quarter.
* I volunteered at a distribution event last week and got lucky. It was an incredible experience, even before the shot, to see it all happening and what it meant to people. Cannot recommend this enough. Here are two places you can volunteer, and I know there are others.
So, anyway, this time of year will always mean a lot to many of us. It will always be sad, tragic, and historic.
I am well aware that many of you have lost jobs, income, or someone you love. I am well aware that I’ve been mostly fortunate to avoid the worst, so maybe what I’m about to say won’t matter.
But if you think about where we’ve been, about the worst moments and biggest scares and grimmest numbers ... it feels amazing to see progress. It’s been the longest year of our lives. The next year will be so much better.
This week’s reading recommendation is Brendan Quinn on Emoni Bates’ path to the NBA, and the eating recommendation is the chicken salad sandwich at Mildred’s.
Thanks to everyone who’s listened to our Mellinger Minutes For Your Ears podcast, and here is a big warm invitation to start if you haven’t already. We’re out from behind the paywall and free on Apple or Spotify or Stitcher or wherever you get your shows.
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Yeah, it’s not what you want. Suboptimal. Less than ideal.
Also: embarrassing.
I’m going to write more on this soon, but someone is going to have to convince me why Les Miles’ replacement should not be chosen by Jeff Long’s replacement.
Long was supposed to know Miles. He either knew about this and hired him anyway, or he didn’t know about something he needed to know about.
We all make jokes about the racket of college coaching search firms, but if Long used one he would’ve avoided most of this — the firm would have presented it as fact, or he would now have plausible deniability.
Long mismanaged David Beaty’s firing several different ways, and his explanation of both his motive and process there never fully made sense.
Long was sold as a true college football insider, but his “search” seemed to be laser focused on Miles and only Miles from the beginning. It’s also worth noting that Long hired (and fired) Bobby Petrino at Arkansas even after Petrino had created a reputation so unlikeable that some of the nicest people in football who will say only positive things about people make an exception for Petrino.
He hired Bret Bielema to replace Petrino (after John L. Smith’s time as interim) which was both splashy and an awful cultural fit.
I’m not here saying Jeff Long does not know how to run an athletic department. I’m here saying that his record on coaching hires is less than spectacular, and a close-minded process has backfired.
I don’t know why you’d trust that man with another shot.
There are some real challenges that KU football is always going to face. Those challenges include geography, K-State, culture, the basketball program, and local recruiting base.
Even at maximum efficiency, KU football is the sort of program that should be thrilled with bowl games three or four years out of five, and conference championship threats once every 10 or 15 years.
But the administration — and this is way bigger than Jeff Long — has generally operated in a way that would torpedo a program with major advantages.
Lew Perkins ran out one of the most successful coaches in program history, and replaced him with a guy whose only winning season was 8-6 in the MAC. Sheahon Zenger showed his naivety when he gave Charlie Weis $12 million to not care about KU, and then replaced him with an overmatched position coach from what was then an underachieving program.
Charlie Weis went desperate toward the end with juco kids, a mistake that David Beaty used to blame his struggles his first year or two before going desperate toward the end with juco kids.
Meanwhile, eager and capable coaches like Dave Doeren aren’t given a chance.
KU football has a lot of challenges, but you could say something similar about a lot of Power 5 programs that don’t stink this bad — Washington State, Wake Forest, Vanderbilt, etc.
They need a new coach, and they need a new AD.
But they probably need a lot more than that, too.
This is (obviously) something we’ll talk a lot about in the coming weeks.
I don’t think it’s quite this simple. If The Process 2.0 works, it will be done with a generally older group, without going through the draft-and-develop success that gave the Royals one of the best farm systems in modern baseball history.
There is no 2011, for instance, where a wave of top prospects are promoted together to the big leagues.
If you’re wanting to tie it to a mile marker from the last time, then this probably needs to be something at least close to 2013.
But when I say the builds are different I mean it. Jorge Soler and Danny Duffy are scheduled for free agency after this season. The Royals will try to sign Sal Perez long-term, but if they’re unsuccessful he can also test free agency this winter. Andrew Benintendi, Carlos Santana and Mike Minor are each on two-year contracts.
We can and should talk a lot about the pitching prospects, but this isn’t 2011 when you just knew the core of the team would be around for baseball’s version of forever.
Again, we’ll talk more about this as the days go one, but it’s a really interesting mix. There should be urgency. This group is going to have to skip some steps to make this work, and then the front office needs to make sure that there’s another wave of talent ready to contribute next year and beyond.
This group does not have the talent of the one that won the World Series. If you go position-by-position, you will consistently lean toward the 2011-2015 group. Lorenzo Cain is better than anybody the Royals currently employ.
But they do have some dudes. Whit Merrifield is going to be a good player. Jorge Soler has as much power as anyone Benintendi is athletic and versatile. Adalberto Mondesi has the floor of an adequate big league shortstop and retains the ceiling of something close to a star.
The Royals have arms for days, and it’s a good mix. They have talent that complements other talent. They could win one day on Soler’s power, another day on Mondesi’s legs, another day on Perez’s bat or Kris Bubic’s changeup or a line drive in the gap by Hunter Dozier or any other number of other signature talents.
That’s a good place to start, particularly with a group that seems to get along and work for each other. Merrifield’s voice in that room is confident, with high standards. Perez is a source of unending energy.
This thing can work, but it’s a much older group than the one that’s a natural point of comparison.
We’re not going to need to wait five years to see if this rebuild works, is what I’m saying.
The question is whether the Royals should promote their most valuable asset immediately, essentially trading a season at 20 years old for one at 26, at a point in history when the whole of his professional experience consists of 37 games in rookie ball, a few months against other non-big-leaguers at T-Bones Park, and some spring training games.
My best guess — and I’ve asked some questions about this — is that Witt Jr. will start at Class AA Northwest Arkansas. The Royals would like take it slow with Witt Jr. They don’t need to rush him, and in fact see some danger in that path.
But they also have a well-established pattern of promoting prospects honestly, which sounds like a dumb thing to point out but in fact makes the Royals something of an endangered species.
Witt Jr. being on the opening day roster is a fun thing for fans to think about, but really doesn’t make sense in reality.
You could make a case for a pitcher. Stuff is stuff. If a pitcher has 98 with nasty breaking stuff, that’s going to play. We’ve seen Brandon Finnegan in the playoffs the same year he was drafted.
But hitters take a little longer. Hitters need to take steps. Hitters need to develop, level by level.
Putting Witt Jr. in the big leagues before he’s ready is setting a potential star up for failure.
Witt Jr. will have his day. He is doing everything he can, everything he needs. The talent is obvious, and he’s backing that up with work ethic and respect. There is a natural animosity that can exist from veterans to a $7.8 million bonus baby who’s about to take someone’s job.
Navigating that takes an unnatural balance of humility and confidence. There are a dozen challenges Witt Jr. will face that have nothing to do with hitting a big-league slider. He appears to be well equipped for anything this life will throw at him, but the Royals need to let that process happen naturally.
And there’s been nothing natural about Witt Jr.’s time in pro ball so far.
I’ll answer this, but first I’d just like to acknowledge that talking about Witt Jr.’s comparisons can make you sound like a crazy person.
Jim Callis, who is perhaps better qualified to speak on this than anyone on the planet, rated Bobby Witt Jr. as the second-best shortstop prospect since 1987 — behind only Alex Rodriguez, and just ahead of Chipper Jones.
He is a classic five-tool guy. He is good enough to play big league shortstop, which means he’s athletic enough to play anywhere. He’s fast, blessed with soft hands and a strong arm. There was some question about swing-and-miss, but he appears to have shortened his swing a bit and closed some holes. He has significant power.
There could be some Alex Bregman in Witt Jr. I’ve seen some reference Kris Bryant. The one that makes the most sense to me is Carlos Correa — similar builds, well-rounded talent, athletic, etc.
He can fill in anywhere, too. He can play big-league shortstop, but the Royals wouldn’t move Adalberto Mondesi for him. That’s not an age thing, either. Mondesi is just a little more fluid.
But if Nicky Lopez isn’t a big league hitter, then the Royals could put Witt Jr. at second base and have perhaps baseball’s most athletic middle infield.
Or, if the Royals want to move Whit Merrifield to second because then Witt Jr. could play third base and move Hunter Dozier to the outfield. Witt Jr. can play anywhere but catcher, though if you gave him a year he’d probably be a good catcher, too.
So, I’m torn on this. The Royals might find themselves in need of some starting pitching, particularly in a transition year for prospect promotions after a 60-game 2020 season.
So part of me thinks the answer here is Jacob deGrom.
But I also think the Royals finished 13th out of 15 American League teams in runs last year, and 14th the year before that. Andrew Benintendi and Carlos Santana can only do so much, so if you’re making Mike Trout off limits then what about Cody Bellinger or George Springer?
Or, if you’ll step with me outside this box, maybe we take Trevor Story or Fernando Tatis Jr. and move Mondesi to centerfield?
My hunch is that if you asked Royals officials this question they’d go with the starting pitcher, but I’m going to swing for the fences here and give the prospects room to grow and fatten the middle of the lineup.
Michael A. Taylor becomes a fourth outfielder, and Fernando Tatis Jr. becomes the best bat-flipper in club history.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but it wouldn’t be another lost season, right? We have YouTube TV at the house and watched the Royals last year.
I’m hoping to write more about this in the next few weeks, and will do some reporting to see if I can find out anything new. So I’ll try to keep this relatively short.
But it was about this time of year in 2020 that YouTube TV reached a deal to stream Royals and Sporting KC games.
The Royals have always prioritized distribution. They’re not stupid. They know they’re not the Dodgers and can’t grow and thrive if a significant chunk of their fan base can’t watch the games. The world has too many entertainment options.
Maybe that priority has shifted somewhat under the new ownership, but I doubt it. John Sherman wants people in his city to be able to watch his team. I would assume that’s been communicated to Fox Sports KC (or whatever we’re supposed to call it now).
My suspicion is that both sides want this to happen. There will be posturing, including Fox Sports KC trying to position itself as the good guy here — we’re here for you; it’s your streaming service that’s leaving you out in the cold.
It seems like a losing argument for a lot of reasons, most notably that people left cable for a reason and the Royals do not want to wall themselves off from many thousands of fans.
Having Royals games on is good for the streaming services, it’s good for Fox Sports, and it’s good for the Royals. Even if you take the cynical point of view that none of those entities care much about what’s good for fans, it seems as if self-interest should win the day here.
It has before, anyway.
One thing I want to add here before moving on: the complication here is created by MLB viewing its own (awesome) streaming service as a revenue generator and not an interest generator.
Because cord-cutters fit the profile of interested customers for MLB TV, and many would happily pay $130 for an entire season of games. But MLB doesn’t want those subscriptions eating into traditional TV ratings, which would then diminish the value of those contracts.
There seems to be a fairly simple solution here. When you watch a game on MLB TV, you don’t get commercials. There is a sort of “Game in progress, commercial break” message between innings.
There must be a reason MLB TV can’t show the commercials, but I don’t know why it would be reasonable. Put the commercials online, count viewers there along with traditional numbers, and you have more eyeballs to watch the product.
However this goes, it’s a bad look for MLB. The league is fighting for growth anyway, particularly among younger Americans who are more likely to have streaming services. MLB needs to meet people where they are, same as any other business.
But, like I said. More on this soon.
I actually don’t mind the overtime rules, and here are some reasons:
- While I personally prefer the college system (feels like more excitement) the NFL system is probably more fair, and is played more like normal football.
- The 2018 AFC Championship Game — along with the Chiefs presenting a proposal to the league for each team for each team to be guaranteed the ball in overtime — tilted public opinion on this, but if your defense is so garbage that you can’t fathom getting a stop in overtime then I’m not going to feel sorry for you.
- My opinion on this did shift when the league created the qualifier that the team receiving the kickoff could only end the game with a touchdown, not a field goal. Especially with how good kickers are, the receiving team used to be a touchback and three first downs from a win. Now they have to earn it.
- Also, I come to this from a place of believing that each team had 60 minutes of football to win. They did not. Therefore, I don’t have a lot of room to care about minor tweaks here and there is not a huge statistical advantage for the team that wins the overtime coin flip right now.
Now, I’m glad you brought up the onside kick. The new kickoff rules effectively killed the risk-reward ratio — success rate went from 21 percent to 6 percent in the first year, though they have risen modestly since.
I love the AAF rule that was proposed for NFL adoption, where a team could opt to try a fourth and 15 from its own 25-yard line. In the last five years, 21 percent of fourth and 15s have been converted, according to Pro Football Reference’s database.
That’s about the right percentage, don’t you think?
My assumption is the onside kick replacement would be a little more successful since some of those attempted fourth and 15s could’ve been panicked plays with the clock running down.
I understand Andy Reid’s opposition to the change, which is basically that it’s gimmicky and not real football. My counter to that is if we agree the onside kick was real football, then it was artificially killed by the NFL’s rules change on kickoffs. Replacing it with something that carries a similar success rate is the best option.
I literally could not care less about the royal family. There’s a chance I’m supposed to capitalize that, like Royal family, but I want to make a point about how little I care and show you that I do not care enough to even do a quick Google and find out.
It sounds like a wicked soap opera in real life, with high stakes and (much) higher visibility. There is apparently racism involved, which is clearly terrible, and perhaps a high profile case like this can open eyes. That would be objectively wonderful.
But we don’t need to cross the Atlantic to find racism, and I don’t have space in my brain to care enough about a ceremonial family in another country to spend a few hours watching an interview.
Now, maybe you’re sitting there screaming at your screen: That’s three paragraphs of effort to tell us how little you care, idiot.
Which is a good point!
But I’m including this question to say that every once in a while — usually it’s during the Oscars or Emmys or whatever, but this fits too — I’m reminded of what people who don’t care about sports must feel like every year around the Super Bowl or March Madness.
It’s a good reminder, really. I’m happy to have it.
But since we’re here, if I can shut off the professional side of me, as a Kansas Citian who loves baseball I really don’t care who owns the team as long as they care, will keep the team in Kansas City, and continue to serve brisket nachos in a plastic batting helmet.
I’m in your age range and — trust tree, right? With the nest? — had to Google it.
But I will tell you at least two things about me: I cannot reserve a car rental without saying out loud, “That’s really the most important part of the reservation, the holding...” .... and I’m incapable of using a stud finder to hang something without going OUT OF MY WAY* to find my wife and run the thing across my chest.
* If she’s not home, I will wait until she gets home to hang the picture just to make this absurdly stupid joke that I know with 100 percent certainty will annoy her and lead to internal questions about whether she made a big mistake. But I’ll laugh.
What I’m saying here is that I’m not the most credible person about who you should trust.
Waterworld, and it’s not close.
Just an objectively terrible movie that made up for it’s craptastic plot with awful production, and complemented its unwatchable existence by lasting something like 45 minutes longer than even the most generous person would find reasonable.
It’s been 25 years since I watched it and I’m still angry about how awful it was. It’s still the only movie I’ve ever walked out early on. Everyone involved in that movie should be ashamed of themselves, and offer personal written apologies to everyone they harmed, starting with me.
So, like I said at the top, I was lucky enough to get the first shot of vaccine last week so let me answer in a different way:
I would pay quadruple the price to watch Waterworld twice in a row with nothing to eat but Famous Dave’s and nothing to drink except flat Diet Tab if it meant we lived in a world in which we could sit in a crowded movie theater for seven hours — DID I MENTION THAT WATERWORLD IS WWWAAAAYYYYY TOO LONG?!?!?!? — without masks.
Oh, man, well first congrats. That is quite a life achievement.
I have a friend with a big whiskey collection that includes a bottle of Pappy he bought online empty, then filled with Jack or something like that and will pour for guests to see if they notice.
Don’t do that, but that’s one idea. People will want to see a Blanton’s, or a Japanese whiskey.
My general at-home whiskey setup is to have a big bottle of house, and then maybe two or three more expensive bottles. At the moment, the house whiskey is Maker’s because Costco sells is dirt cheap. The more expensive bottles are a Weller special reserve that my wife gave me for Christmas, and George Remus, which dollar for dollar might be my absolute favorite.
Other winners: Four Roses single barrel, Angel Envy, WhistlePig, Weller 12 year, Willett small batch, and Pikesville Rye.
Also, not for nothing, but if you’re like me and like old fashioneds but don’t always want to go through the hassle some of those mixes are pretty good. Give ‘em a try.
This week, I’m particularly grateful for my health, the opportunity to do a volunteer shift last week, and the good fortune to get a first dose. A literal life-changing thing, which doesn’t happen often.
This story was originally published March 9, 2021 at 8:19 AM.