Mellinger Minutes: Let’s have an honest conversation about the Royals. Also: nonsense
The Royals are strug-a-ling, so of course a lot of the questions this week came with an edge. That’s expected, and justified. The Royals — and we’ll talk a lot about this — should be better.
There are a lot of things we can fairly criticize the Royals on and, again: We’ll get to that.
But one specific criticism is popular enough and off-base enough that I wanted to get to it here at the top.
It’s the one that says the Royals aren’t trying anything different.
That they’re doing the same things, and expecting different results.
The Royals have already used 22 pitchers, including 10 starters, including a few openers. They have debuted six rookies, including Emmanuel Rivera last night. They have used 62 different batting orders in 77 games, and none more than four times.
They have drastically changed the way they’ve used their pitchers. They deployed a forward thinking bullpen approach that prioritizes a specific situation’s leverage and spot in the order over a predetermined inning assignment.
They are now using Danny Duffy and others as a sort of hybrid starter/reliever thingy, where they’ll pitch more often than a starter but for fewer innings, but also not REALLY be a reliever because their days of work will be coordinated.
I want to be as clear as possible here. The Royals stink right now. If you are a Royals fan you should not be happy with the results. The players and coaches aren’t.
And I’m not even saying these approaches will work.
On Monday, the Royals elevated Jorge Soler (statistically one of baseball’s least productive hitters) to the No. 2 spot (statistically one of the most important spots).
The move was met with (understandable) sarcasm online, but Royals manager Mike Matheny gave an interesting explanation.
I’m paraphrasing here, but the hope runs on two tracks:
- that hitting in front of Carlos Santana and Sal Perez will influence opposing pitchers to throw Soler more strikes, and specifically fewer of the sliders and curves outside the zone that have been so many of his strikeouts
- That the change will shift Soler’s mind away from trying to hit three home runs on every pitch — and all of them to left field — and back toward good plate appearances that end in a walk or solid contact to any part of the field.
Will it work?
Maybe!
Is it easy to make fun of?
Absolutely!
Is there logic and thought and a willingness to try something different here?
Also absolutely.
I’m trying hard here not to get on a soapbox about how we’re in this place where everything needs to be the best or the worst, and that we can’t try to understand things we don’t agree with, so let’s just move on to the next paragraph.
We can criticize the Royals for a lot. Teams that expected to compete and find themselves toward the bottom of the standings are open for criticism.
But let’s stop with the idea that they’re not trying anything different. It’s objectively false, and keeps the conversation from being productive.
This week’s reading recommendation is Nicole Santa Cruz with What covering hundreds of homicides taught me, and the eating recommendation is the loaded curly fries at The Bar (sour cream on the side).
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Him and Soler both. They’re like a tandem. But you asked about Dozier, so let’s stay there.
He’s a mess right now.
It used to be true that Dozier was buried in significant bad luck. That is less true now.
His exit velocities and barrel percentages remain strong, but he’s chasing bad pitches, swinging and missing far too much, and sort of tunneling himself into a dead-pull guy.
The clearest way to see it is to just watch him against fastballs. Dozier has always hit fastballs well. Two years ago, when everything seemed to click with him, he was 12.2 runs above average against four-seam fastballs, according to FanGraphs.
So far this season, he’s 6.4 runs below average on all fastballs. That ranks 329th of 341 hitters with 100 or more plate appearances.
I’m not smart enough to break down his mechanics. My hunch has been that Dozier puts too much pressure on himself, and I’ve wondered if that’s been compounded by the extension he signed.
Dozier is one of the most liked and respected guys on that team. It’s why he has Alex Gordon’s locker, and part of why the front office offered the contract. His work ethic and focus are beyond reproach. Baseball is a game of odds, and the odds are usually in favor of people who put the work in when nobody’s watching.
That’s Dozier, but it’s not happening this year, and it’s not happening to a shocking degree — just three batters with more plate appearances than Dozier have been worse by FanGraphs’ offensive metric.
The answer to the question — why is he always in the lineup? — is not satisfying, because the reason is the Royals don’t have a lot of great options right now.
I’m not ignoring what’s going on a half season of struggles here, but Dozier (and Soler) have track records that say they’re better than this.
The Royals called up Emmanuel Rivera on Monday. Rivera had 14 home runs in 44 games in Omaha, and has a strong reputation as a defender. He’s an interesting player. He’s 25 years old, a former 19th round pick, and a .642 OPS in 2019. Triple-A pitching is generally un-good this year, but results matter, and if nothing else he can play the position.
One tweak I’d make is to make sure Dozier and Soler aren’t in the outfield together. They’re both below average defenders, and with neither hitting, it just pulls the whole thing down a bit.
The Royals have had some bad luck this season. With the notable exceptions of Whit Merrifield, Salvador Perez and Scott Barlow, the guys they needed the most from this season have been injured or unproductive.
We’re all trying to find answers here, and I know the popular thing is to go for the coaches, and it might get to that point. The chances of next opening day coming with the same coaching staff and front office structure are low.
But one of the best parts of baseball is that it’s a team game made up of individual successes or failures, and right now those individuals are simply not performing well enough.
I won’t claim to know John Sherman well. But I will tell you that I know a lot of people well who know Sherman well and what they say unprompted and in separate conversations lines up.
He is deeply involved, consistently present, and always engaged. You can often spot him at the stadium, during games, talking with fans.
He obviously bought in at an awkward moment in history, and there’s no way to know exactly how that altered his plans, but the Royals have steadily if subtly changed under his watch. Departments have been shuffled, some employees let go, some reassigned or promoted, and others hired.
Sherman hasn’t talked a lot publicly — the most recent interview I’m aware of came before the season, with me — which is how most owners do it. But don’t take that as complacency.
There was never an expectation that the Royals would win a championship this year. But there was an expectation that they’d be going better than this. They’ve lost 17 of their last 21, which is simply unacceptable for a group with the chops of this one, no matter the injuries.
Baseball is a wild game. Each game can feel like a daily referendum on coaches, players and the vision of an organization. But we also know that each season contains drastic mood swings, and that things are rarely as good or bad as they feel in the moment.
I know I bring these things up a lot, but the examples are just too relevant and too local to ignore:
- In 2013, the Royals went 8-20 in May and fired the hitting coach. Many fans wanted more people fired. That team finished 86-76, remaining in contention until the final week, and posting the franchise’s best record since The Great Fluke Of 2003.
- In 2014, the Royals were four games under .500 on June 1, below .500 after the All-Star break, and roasted by many when they did not make a major move at the trade deadline. Many fans wanted many people fired. That team came within a Bumgarner of a world championship.
I am not telling you that this group will win a World Series. I am not telling you that some coaches or executives won’t be gone or in different roles this time next year.
What I am telling you is that the owner is involved, watching and listening. He led an investment group that bought a baseball team for $1 billion a few months before the world shut down, and his response was to invest even more.
What I’m telling you is that any changes that come from Sherman will come by thinking about one or three or five years in the future, not a rotten three weeks.
Look, I’m not here to squash anyone’s gallows humor. Sports wouldn’t be as fun if we couldn’t ride the highs and the lows a little too hard. Life wouldn’t be as fun if we couldn’t laugh at ourselves. So, yeah. I get it.
But please do not disrespect the specific and relentless suck of the 2000-06-or-so like this.
I’m talking about an organization that was literally still running on Lotus Notes. I’m talking about an organization that did not give scouts cell phones. I’m talking about an organization so bad that one year they skipped the team picture, on purpose, because let’s be honest ain’t nobody wanting to remember.
Losing 11 games in a row is brutal. The 2005 Royals did that, and then lost EIGHT MORE IN A ROW. The 2006 Royals lost 11 games in a row in April, and a month later followed up with 13 in a row.
The 2004 Royals once batted Ruben Mateo cleanup. They scored one run that day, which was actually pretty sweet, because they scored zero in each of the next three. Mike Sweeney led the Royals with 79 RBIs that year. The team ERA was 5.15.
I could do this all day, and it could be fun, but I will add something somewhat serious:
People like me had a better feel for these things when we could be in the clubhouse before and after games. That does not mean we were ever perfect But there are things you can see and feel and hear when you’re in the clubhouse a few hours before first pitch, and a few minutes after the last out.
So I’m not as confident in my answer here as I normally would be, and you should be skeptical of anyone who thinks they know exactly what’s going on.
But I’ll tell you my sense. My sense is that these guys are some combination of frustrated, surprised, and a little angry about where the season is right now. This is not what anyone had in mind.
Following baseball in Kansas City for a certain period of time means developing an advanced palate for different flavors of bad baseball, and for me this is a long way from those “never say it can’t get worse days.”
This team has good players, at the right ages, with the right attitudes. They are supported by an organization making advances in behavioral and sports sciences. This group believes in each other.
None of that changes the record, or is presented to tell you they’ll turn this around. I don’t know how this will go.
I just know this team should be playing better than it is right now.
They have some pieces that would interest a contender. Carlos Santana gets on base. Whit Merrifield does everything. Danny Duffy, Scott Barlow, Jake Brentz and Kyle Zimmer could help anyone.
The Royals were open to trading Merrifield at one point, but didn’t receive the interest they wanted, so they signed him to an extension that runs through next season with a team option for $10.5 million in 2023.
The market for relievers is always finicky, and the Royals would be trading from a spot on the roster where they need more depth.
Duffy is interesting. He recently passed 10 years of service time which, among other things, gives the man who made “bury me a Royal” famous the right to veto any trade. Duffy is making $15.5 million in the last year of his extension, so the Royals would stand to save some money with a trade.
But the trade partner would have to make sense for Duffy, too. JP Morosi, who is very good at his job, recently floated the idea of the Padres being interested.
I don’t know what the return would be. There are so many moving parts in trades that I stopped speculating on these things long ago.
Dayton Moore has been consistent on these situations. He’ll trade if he feels like it’ll help the future without taking away from the present.
This is just me speculating, but I would think the Royals would be particularly open on Duffy. A deal at the July 31 deadline would save about $5 million, which isn’t nothing, and if he was leaving after the season anyway you might as well get a return.
I do not have a lot of uniform takes.
My only Chiefs uniform take — and Terez used to crush me for this — is that the white-on-white is soft and should not be worn.
But, anyway, I do think this is interesting: Clark Hunt is VERY old-school on this stuff.
You’d probably expect that, right? He’s conservative by nature, and the son of the team’s founder. He’s very protective of the Chiefs’ history.
I forgot the exact game, but at least in my memory it was shortly after the renovations. The Chiefs had a prime-time game and the players pushed to wear all red.
He resisted at first, and then was talked into it, and it became such A Thing that it was the primary talking point out of the locker room. And this was just to wear a pants-and-jersey combination that the team already had in house.
What I’m saying here is that the Chiefs have a lot of talented people on staff and a lot of material to work with in creating new uniforms.
This all comes up because the NFL is loosening some of the restrictions on alternate jerseys. The change isn’t quite as drastic as it’s been made in some places, and because this is the NFL the deadline for 2022 uniform proposals passed before the league approved the use of an alternate helmet.
But the point here is that the Chiefs are going to have a thousand looks to choose from, and a lot of them are going to look objectively sweet.
But I’m curious how drastic a change the owner would approve.
This ends the fashion section of the Minutes.
Ned and I had what I think is a fairly typical manager/local sports columnist relationship. I don’t remember having any screaming matches with him, but there were times he made it clear he wasn’t a fan.
Once — and I can’t remember the column, so maybe he had a point — he went like two months where any question I asked he wouldn’t look at me and would give a two-word answer.
From about 2017 to 2019 I often referenced that some around the team — and I agreed with them, whatever that’s worth — believed Ned had lost some fire, and that the team was a little too comfortable. Ned didn’t like that.
But I think for the most part we had a respect for each other, or in the rough times at least a tolerance for each other. I always thought the calls for firing him were silly, and wrote that. I don’t know if he knew that, or cared.
More than anything else, Ned is a fascinating guy. He’s got a sort of Forrest Gump life story, these brushes and relationships with everybody from Dale Earnhardt to Jeff Foxworthy to Andre The Giant. I don’t know how well it would sell, but he could write one hell of an autobiography.
All of which is a long way of saying this: I was desperately hoping I missed Ned on Jeopardy or something — he’d kill on anything about deer hunting, outer space or NASCAR.
But I’m telling you: Ned needs more than a half hour game show. He’s lived a ridiculously interesting life. I’d listen to a 10-part podcast of nothing but Ned answering questions about his life and some of the stuff he’s seen and heard.
I haven’t asked specifically about this in a while, but at this point I’m not sure there’s a fit.
My understanding was that the back injury was the kind where being able to have a normal and healthy and active life would be the first goal, and a return to the NFL somewhere after that.
Schwartz is a terrific player with a relentless competitiveness that people sometimes miss, so it would surprise me if he didn’t put the work in to play again.
But actions speak loudly, and the Chiefs have made it clear they’re moving on. Remember that they drafted Lucas Niang two years ago, when Eric Fisher and Schwartz were still healthy, with the idea that eventually he would kick out and play tackle.
The Chiefs would love for Niang to win the right tackle job, but if he can’t they’ve given themselves a safety net with Mike Remmers and Kyle Long*.
* Long’s injury is a bummer, but it’s not a season ender.
There is a lot of mutual love and respect between the Chiefs and Schwartz, and if he returned he’d walk into a locker room thrilled to have him back.
But I would think he could find a place where he’d have a clearer path to playing time. The Chiefs appear to have moved on.
It’s a good question.
There are a million reasons that comparisons to FC Kansas City are useless, but it was a team in the same league not too long ago, so, in general, here goes:
The professionalism and credibility from ownership is light years ahead of FC Kansas City’s best day, and the roster quality is significantly behind.
We know the obvious explanations: the club was a bit of a mess in Utah, moved here in a pandemic with four months’ notice, and that’s nobody’s idea of solid base for a winning team.
KC NWSL owners Angie and Chris Long and COO Amber Cox were nice enough to spend some time with me at a game last week, and I brought this up.
Honestly, the question I asked is similar enough to yours here that you might as well have been the one asking.
Angie pushed back on that a bit, (correctly) pointing out that the team was competitive. They’re not taking 5-1 beatdowns or anything. They’ve yet to lose by more than two goals. Five of their eight losses are by one goal.
It’s a fine point to make, but there is simply no way the Longs are satisfied with the results so far. They’re one third of the way through a season with no wins, and two points.
My expectations for the club off the field were fairly high, and they are exceeding them.
My expectations for the club on the field were fairly low, and they are not meeting them.
The former is far more important than the latter, at least this season.
Everything the Longs talk about is long-term. They talk about being player-first, and of building the sort of reputation and infrastructure to make theirs the most desired destination for talent. They seem to be doing that — we’re still at the very beginning, but still — and if that continues this will have been a productive debut season.
But the question you ask is a smart one, because at some point, the results on the field affect what the Longs are trying to do off the field. You can be as player-centric as you want, but if you’re 2-18-4 nobody’s going to want to play for you.
Look, people are smart. I can’t imagine anyone was expecting a championship in the first year. Soccer generally and women’s soccer specifically has a hardcore group of fans that aren’t going anywhere. KC NWSL is well positioned in that way.
But the Longs are taking a big swing with this team, and their ambitions are high enough that they need more than just that passionate base. And drawing in more than that passionate base will require results.
This Friday will be KC NWSL’s first game broadcast through the local deal with KCTV. That kind of exposure will help, and if the fans who’ve been to games so far can serve as word-of-mouth advertising then the team can begin to grow that base.
But the results have to come. Not this year, but soon.
This is going to make me NO friends, but our kids have loved travel from the very beginning. Like, if they sold airplane tickets like amusement park rides — for enjoyment, not travel — that’s what our kids would want for their birthdays. The only thing they’re sort of hardcore about is they each want window seats, so my wife and I split up.
That’s most of why we didn’t have a third kid, actually. I’m mostly joking.
There was one flight when our first — still a baby at the time — was crying. Not terribly. This isn’t one of those nightmare stories you hear from some parents, but still. We were new parents, convinced we were screwing everything up, and I’m telling you when your baby is crying on a plane you feel like 130 people are shooting daggers at you and judging everything you do.
We happened to be sitting next to an saint of an angel who did the unthinkable — she chose to sit next to us because she loves babies. And not in a weird, creepy way. She was just really happy to see a baby.
That shouldn’t have been necessary, but I’m telling you: it helped. The baby cried for a bit, we felt like it was no big deal, and we dealt with it.
Before we flew with a baby for the first time, a friend told me that when the baby cries, make sure it’s me — not my wife — who walks up and down the aisle.
When it’s a dad, everybody on the plane is all, Awww, look at that great dad, he’s doing the best he can, good for him.
But when it’s a mom, everybody is all, Good gawd, what a terrible mom, can’t even take care of a baby.
He was joking, I think, but when we still follow that advice and I’m passing it along here as a reminder to all of us to stop judging other parents. We’re all guessing, and all doing the best we can.
Except for the parents who put their kids on leashes. Those people can be judged.
Every year it’s the same dang thing.
Step 1: Whoa, really? They’re selling fireworks already?
Step 2: OK, fine, the 4th is tomorrow, let’s see what they have.
Step 3: Everything in here is either 75 percent off or 8 For The Price Of 1. How do these places make any money?
Step 4: You know, at these prices, I might as well get a little more.
Step 5: A HUNDRED DOLLARS?!?!?!? I DON’T EVEN REALLY LIKE FIREWORKS!!!
The. Best.
And I should also say this: I. Hate. When people do that obnoxious punctuation thing. Hate. It.
Now, as I understand it, for traditional work purposes the day off is Monday, right?
And — again, as I understand it — most of you with Monday-through-Friday jobs are going to say screw it and AT BEST work a half-day on Friday, right?
Which means you’re going to have a three-or-four-day weekend, with the holiday buffered by a day off on the back end, I mean, what’s not to like here?
It’s the best of all worlds. I cannot think of a single negative here.
Which reminds me: no Minutes next week. Family vacation. Later, suckers.
This week I’m particularly grateful for our seven year old coming downstairs this morning and the first thing he said was that he couldn’t wait to hear if his little brother would like his first day of camp. I mean, come on. Watching their relationship is straight up one of my favorite things.
This story was originally published June 29, 2021 at 5:00 AM.