May nemesis no longer dictates Royals’ season

During the lost generation of Royals’ baseball, maybe nothing punctured the psyche of fans like the month of May.

The season was always about over by then, emotionally if not mathematically.

The toll was particularly demoralizing in the new millennium, when the Royals would lose 100 games four times in five years and have a jarring overall record of 148-245 in May.

Even the enchanted 2014 season wasn’t immune to the May swoon.

The Royals went 12-17, and the cursed month loomed ominously.

There was the demotion of third baseman Mike Moustakas to Class AAA Omaha, yet another hitting coach shuffle and an increasingly imminent “if-not-now-when?” sense that Dayton Moore and Ned Yost’s days at the helm were numbered if progress-as-promised didn’t finally tangibly take.

But virtually everything that has happened since May 2014 fundamentally altered the dynamics of the equation between the Royals and their fans at the end of May 2015.

They went 63-44 the rest of the 2014 season, stormed to game seven of the World Series and peeled out to a 7-0 start this season.

In the process, the entire context for following the Royals morphed from one of exasperation to one of exhilaration, from one of wondering why to why not, from suspicion and pessimism to trust and faith.

Which is why the Royals could lose four games in a row and five out of six games to end May and could only have induced here-we-go-again eye-rolls in the most cynical and defeatist.

Even after that funk capped a tepid 14-12 May, it’s worth remembering the Royals navigated a rash of suspensions and injuries early in the month … and were left lagging a mere half-game out of first place at its end.

Ever after that slide, a few days later they continued to lure an average of about 30,000 fans — including a substantial walkup crowd on weeknights — in their next few games at Kauffman Stadium.

Even amid that dip, on June 1 the Royals would enjoy the preposterous phenomenon of having five players voted first in the most recent American League All-Star balloting.

Whatever that might say about the flaws and curiosities of the balloting, one way or another it reinforces a bigger picture:

Despite some legitimate cause for concern, particularly the inconsistency that has afflicted the starting rotation, people believe in the Royals now.

So you look at this team and think this slump is a trifling speed-bump, because why should you doubt them now?

So their words carry more currency when they talk about how their bats gone cold are just part of the ebb and flow of the season.

So you nod when they say that maybe they’ve been thrown out of sync by a two-week period (including June 1) during which they were idled by four scheduled off-days and a rainout.

“Sometimes, too many off-days is the same as not having enough off-days,” Yost said in one interview last week.

“It might be hogwash,” he said in another, “but we’ve had a lot of off-days.”

Sure it might be hogwash, but the burden of proof has changed.

Considering that from June 1, 2013, to May 1, 2015 (including the playoffs) the Royals were 179-130, the surprise now would be if there isn’t more of the same coming.

Considering from where they’ve come, generally staying the course (albeit with tweaks) sounds not like wishful thinking but apparently credible strategy.

“You don’t freak out; you don’t go crazy,” Yost said. “You just stay steady, continue to work through it, and it works itself out.”

Or as first baseman Eric Hosmer put it: “We’ve got a lot of experience under our belt now, and I think we all realize that throughout the course of a Major League season … that you’re going to have little bumps in the road like this. …

“I think we’ve all learned how to handle situations like this, and the biggest thing as a team is continue to play your game and not panic.

“If you panic, you dig the hole deeper.”

Nothing is assured for the Royals, of course, and they reside in a highly competitive division.

But there’s plenty to embrace, starting with the steadfast standard-bearers of defense and the bullpen and a lineup whose production has receded but still projects to be more potent than last year.

The rotation has earned some disbelief, and Danny Duffy’s struggles with command and, now, biceps tendinitis are a major concern coming out of May.

Still, Edinson Volquez largely has been a rock, and spot-starter Chris Young has been a revelation.

Yordano Ventura appears to have recovered and largely found himself after a disconcerting start to the season, and uneven Jeremy Guthrie and Jason Vargas recovered and acquitted themselves well in their first starts of June.

And why shouldn’t they all be looking forward, anyway?

The season is just beginning, not ending, like it had by the end of so many Mays before.

This story was originally published June 5, 2015 at 12:35 PM with the headline "May nemesis no longer dictates Royals’ season."