Surreal Royals’ home opener “doesn’t look normal” but still is baseball in Kansas City
For the peculiar home opener like no other on Friday at Kauffman Stadium, the pomp largely was absent because of the circumstance — the surging COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic.
“Honestly, there’s no extra juice for today …,” versatile star Whit Merrifield said before the game, noting the void without fans on hand. “It’s kind of business as usual today. It’s like a July 31st game, frankly.”
Only less so, really.
Or maybe more like surrealistically so on a night the Royals lost 3-2 to the White Sox to fall to 3-5 on the season.
In a sight seldom seen at the virtually always open Truman Sports Complex, half the entry gates were down completely and most of the booths at the Gate 5 entrance were blocked off.
The better to keep out anyone inclined to tailgate for a game they couldn’t have entered.
All of 35 masked media members were allowed in, after the obligatory two temperature checks. And if you entered when I did, you bumped into a longtime Royals front office man who was eager to see Kris Bubic make his major-league debut on the mound but hadn’t been in the stadium for so long he wasn’t even sure where he was allowed to sit.
Approaching game time inside, the White Sox were casually introduced on the third-base side. Before hundreds of plastic cutouts of fans, and cheering families of players piped in via Zoom, the Royals took their place on the first-base line to an upbeat video and animated announcement: “Ladies and gentlemen, it’s time to meet your 2020 Kansas City Royals!”
That was followed with a moment of silence. That was perhaps redundant given the sparse number of people within but nonetheless a nice touch, honoring “those who have lost their lives to COVID-19 as well as racial injustice.”
And then … play ball?
“It doesn’t look normal,” Royals manager Mike Matheny said. “But it’s baseball in Kansas City right now, which is a great thing.”
Indeed: Wacky as it all feels, especially with sights like Sluggerrr the mascot roaming the stands with a “FOOD” sign and evidently trying to engage with the plastic cutouts, and fraught as it absolutely is, haven’t the Royals been must-see TV and must-hear radio these last couple weeks?
Seems worth enjoying while we can, especially since it may not be for much longer.
The halting start (with four losses by a total of five runs) notwithstanding, this is an intriguing and potentially compelling team to watch at a time fresh storylines are in short supply in many ways.
And we’re not just damning with faint praise because, hey, they’re only two games under .500 as of Aug. 1 as opposed to 30 under at this time last year and 40 under in 2018.
After back-to-back 100-loss seasons, it’s a team seizing the moment to offer a sneak peek at a presumably brighter future by accelerating the careers of starting pitchers Brady Singer and Bubic — the first set of Royals from the same draft class to debut as starting pitchers two years after being drafted. They’re the most advanced of a young wave the Royals expect to become pillars of the team.
If this isn’t quite a repeat of general manager Dayton Moore’s “Operation Flip The Switch” of 2011 with a series of pivotal callups that became instrumental in the 2014-2015 World Series seasons, it’s certainly a concerted message about priorities to try to win now regardless of the service time/contractual implications that are tempting to manipulate otherwise.
Then there’s a vastly improved bullpen, the energizing return of Sal Perez, development of the likes of Ryan McBroom (first big-league home run on Friday) and an urgency instilled by Matheny.
“Not only from the moves he makes, but you can just see it in his eyes, in the way he talks, every day when we’re at the field,” Merrifield said. “He expects to win every day. I love playing for the man.”
The season is disorienting and distorted, of course. You could even call it gimmicky with the extra-inning rules and seven-inning doubleheaders put in place.
And the potential for an abrupt closing day lurks after the fiasco last week with the Miami Marlins. Their name hovered over the game, and not just because Marlins Man was in constant view behind home plate after paying a reported $1,000 to have a cutout of his likeness there.
“It’s pretty clear how quickly this can get out of hand,” said Matheny, whose own team has had eight known COVID cases but none reported since July 22.
So even as new protocols are in motion, Matheny also is practicing and calling for heightened awareness and ongoing adjustments in real time.
“Basically just trying to make sure that what we’re learning we’re implementing and keeping the conversation going,” he said, adding that they can never think “we’ve got this taken care of.”
So Miami’s mess potentially — potentially — is a call to action instead of a harbinger of this all ending before it even really begins. Trouble is, it depends on many, many, many people.
“If you go out and do one thing selfishly and expose yourself to this thing, it could spread like wildfire like you saw with Miami,” Merrifield said. “I hope that if guys weren’t aware of the severity of the situation (before), after the whole Miami deal, I hope guys got their eyes opened a little bit.”
Because, he added, “I think it goes without saying” that it will be hard to continue the season if there’s another such episode.
So they’re clinging to this the best they can.
Even if you can’t have much fanfare without the fans. Even if it’s not exactly a genuine season. Even if it might inevitably be folly. Even if you can make a case that it doesn’t serve the greater good overall.
Because, Merrifield said, baseball this year “is what it is.”
And you just try to make the best of it — which is about the most inspiring way any of us can try to look at 2020.