KC Royals - August

[ShockerFever]

Too bad they Royals can play the Yankees every game...The Royals would have a much better record.

Yep, they'd make it all the way up to .500. Now that's an accomplishment.

It's easier to get up to playing the best than it is to playing the worst.

[martymoose]

Too bad they Royals can play the Yankees every game...The Royals would have a much better record.

Yep, they'd make it all the way up to .500. Now that's an accomplishment.

It's easier to get up to playing the best than it is to playing the worst.

You're right; the Royals did suck against Baltimore. So I guess you're saying the Yankees might be in trouble in their 5 game series next weekend?

[SubGod22]

Report is that Frenchy signed for a total of 13.5! Not sure what Dayton and company are thinking there. He's not that valuable to the team over the next couple of years. Not when you have Cain and Lough sitting there waiting and Cabrera for another year.

I guess at this point I hope they can trade Cabrera for something of value in the offseason, make Cain the CF and let Lough be the 4th or platoon him with Frenchy.

[ShockerGorilla]

It's easier to get up to playing the best than it is to playing the worst.

You act like a KU fan on here when it comes to the Royals. That's exactly what they said when they got beat by UNI, VCU, Bradley, etc.....

[SubGod22]

The flight of the Closer

I’ll admit that when talk of trading Soria came up during the offseason I cringed. I remember all the arguments, and they made some sense, but at the same time trading the best pitcher remaining on the team seemed like such a bad idea. I get that a bad team doesn’t need an elite closer to close out the few leads they have, but I made the argument that you need someone to actually win the games the team is capable of winning. And over the last few seasons, the Royals were a bad team. Sometimes they were a horrible team, though they haven’t been egregiously bad since Soria became a Royal, but they most certainly would have been worse without him. This year, though, Soria is one of the main reasons the Royals are underperforming their pythagorean record by five full games*. He’s a big reason why the Royals run differential is drastically better than the Twins yet they are four full games behind them in the standings.

*I haven’t done one of these pozterisks in awhile. It feels good. Pythagorean record is a formula devised by Bill James to determine what a team’s record should be based on the number of runs scored and the number of runs allowed. The formula is:

(Runs Scored)^1.83
———————————————————————–
(Runs scored)^1.83+(Runs Allowed)^1.83

So the Royals had a pretty hot commodity in the offseason that they could have dealt for any number of packages. Rumor had it that a few teams were in on Soria and of course there is the famous proposed deal with the Yankees where they would have given up Jesus Montero for him. Of course, that’s nothing more than a rumor. And at the time I said that the Royals had to keep Soria because while a bad team doesn’t need an elite closer, a young team does. Losing leads late is not a recipe for instilling confidence in a team and letting a team grow together. In my estimation, a great closer has more value than just the number of saves he has or anything else. He gives a team confidence in the late innings.

[martymoose]

It's easier to get up to playing the best than it is to playing the worst.

You act like a KU fan on here when it comes to the Royals. That's exactly what they said when they got beat by UNI, VCU, Bradley, etc.....

That's been said by many-a-people... but if you haven't noticed he likes to be a D-bag to everyone, even to his fellow Shocker fans... :(

[ShockerFever]

Too bad they Royals can play the Yankees every game...The Royals would have a much better record.

Yep, they'd make it all the way up to .500. Now that's an accomplishment.

It's easier to get up to playing the best than it is to playing the worst.

You're right; the Royals did suck against Baltimore. So I guess you're saying the Yankees might be in trouble in their 5 game series next weekend?

No, what I'm really saying is you're putting a lot of stock into salvaging one game of a three game series in which frankly you were lucky to even get that.

[ShockerFever]

It's easier to get up to playing the best than it is to playing the worst.

You act like a KU fan on here when it comes to the Royals. That's exactly what they said when they got beat by UNI, VCU, Bradley, etc.....

Trust me buddy, the Royals are no VCU or UNI.

That was a baaaaad comparison.

[ShockerFever]

It's easier to get up to playing the best than it is to playing the worst.

You act like a KU fan on here when it comes to the Royals. That's exactly what they said when they got beat by UNI, VCU, Bradley, etc.....

That's been said by many-a-people... but if you haven't noticed he likes to be a D-bag to everyone, even to his fellow Shocker fans... :(

lollllll, you act like you're sitting at the right hand of the Father and have never talked down on any Shocker fan on here... Easy where you throw those stones from glass houses..

And besides, you aren't innocent on this. You haven't posted in months about the Royals and the second they barely hang on to avoid being swept by the Yankees, you come on here and start the baiting. It happens every year. Not to mention the fact that your baiting remark made little to no sense.

[SubGod22]

Gordon goes deep, but Hochevar suffers 10th loss in series opener - Sounds as though Hoch pitched pretty well last night even in the loss.

[SubGod22]

Finding Meaning In Francoeur Extension

Ready for more thoughts on the Jeff Francoeur extension? Perfect!

– Bringing back Francoeur for next season means the Royals outfield you will see tonight against the Red Sox is the exact same outfield you will see on Opening Day 2012. The Frenchman is going to cash a hefty check, the Royals will certainly tender a contract to Melky Cabrera and there is talk of an Alex Gordon extension. Hell, there’s a decent chance that this is the outfield we will see on Opening Day 2013. This has to be an indictment of Lorenzo Cain. Cain, who is hitting .306/.376/.506 in Omaha, after tonight, has more than 600 plate appearances in his career at the Triple-A level. It would seem he doesn’t have much left to prove.

However, I’ve heard the rumblings… A hole in his swing, the lack of the necessary skill set that would ease a transition from the high minors to the big league level, and so on. I haven’t seen Cain all that much, so I’m not qualified to comment on his skills (or lack thereof). What I can comment on is that it is fairly obvious that the organization doesn’t believe he’s part of the future.

Think about it… We have seen a tremendous influx of young talent. Nearly every position player who was regarded as a prospect and opened the 2011 season in Omaha is with the big club. Except Cain. It’s also worth noting, the Royals were quick to pull the trigger on Kila Ka’aihue earlier this year. I may be reading too much between the lines here, but I’m thinking the Royals regard Cain as another flavor of Hawaiian Punch. Good for Triple-A, not so good in the majors.

– There was a tweet from Greg Schaum that this move says more about the (lack of) development of Wil Myers than anything and I’m inclined to agree. Myers was moved to the outfield in order to fast track his bat to the major leagues. However injuries and a lackluster season (.254/.354/.373 in 348 plate appearances) have pushed his timetable back at least a full year. Most troublesome has been the lack of power development. If Myers repeats Double-A next year, it’s possible he won’t arrive in Kansas City until 2014. Francoeur gives the Royals cover. It’s expensive cover, but it’s still cover.

– I understand that with the season Francoeur is having, he was going to shop for a two year deal. That doesn’t mean the Royals had to give it to him.

He is hitting for a higher slugging percentage, which is nice. But that’s because he’s already set a career high for doubles with 35 while maintaining his home run rate of one long ball roughly every 31 at bats.

Let’s talk about value for a moment. Here are his fWAR values going back to 2006 which was his first full season in the majors.

2006: 1.1
2007: 3.8
2008: -0.8
2009: 0.3
2010: 0.6
2011: 2.3

[SubGod22]

A few articles from the weekend. Eight-run sixth helps Royals cruise past Sox

The Royals began their half of the sixth inning down, 4-1, and would end up sending 12 men to the plate.

Billy Butler led off with a strikeout, but Eric Hosmer followed with a single against Boston knuckleballer Tim Wakefield. Jeff Francoeur doubled to cut the lead in half and then scored on a double by Moustakas to end Wakefield's night.

Matt Albers came on in relief and gave up a walk and a single, which tied it at 4, before getting a flyout from Alcides Escobar. Albers then gave up a double and single to make it 7-4. Butler was walked so Boston could bring in left-hander Franklin Morales to face Hosmer, but he responded by lacing a triple to right-center field to score two more runs before Francoeur struck out to finally end the inning.

Boston's 4-1 lead quickly became a 9-4 Kansas City advantage.

"That sixth inning was pretty special to watch," manager Ned Yost said. "A lot of action in that inning. I guess Hoz, getting the two hits, he won the prize for the inning."

Moustakas heating up after working with Seitzer

Moustakas said his work with hitting coach Kevin Seitzer is helping him both swing and see the ball better.

"It's a little combination of everything," he said. "Me and Seitz have been down in the cage a lot. He's been helping me get back to my normal swing. If I get into a good position to hit, naturally it affects how I see the ball. If I'm able to get into a good position, I'm able to see pitches better."

Moustakas tallied 15 hits in 16 games in June, and another 15 hits in 24 games in July. He has 13 hits through 17 games in August, with nine still to play in the month.

The biggest thing for the rookie, though, is being able to help out his teammates.

"If you're not producing, it feels terrible," Moustakas said. "If you're not getting hits in timely times when we need them. There's been a bunch of times I've come up this year already with runners in scoring position, two outs, we needed a big hit and I wasn't able to produce.

"Now I feel comfortable and I feel good when I step in the box like I'm able to help us out, able to help us win ballgames."

KC's loss a learning experience for Duffy

KANSAS CITY -- Danny Duffy, the Royals' prize rookie left-hander, wrangled through eight pitches before he walked Boston's first batter in the game, Marco Scutaro. By the time the first inning ended on a strikeout and Scutaro was picked off by catcher Salvador Perez, Duffy had thrown 17 pitches to three batters.

When Duffy reached the Royals' dugout, manager Ned Yost cornered him for a talk. Duffy ended up losing pitcher as the Red Sox won on Sunday, 6-1, but it was an upturn on his learning curve.

"When he came in that inning, I got him down in that tunnel down there and I said, 'Danny, let everybody play today. You don't have to strike everybody out. You've got a great defense behind you. Get ahead of the count, keep the ball down and let everybody play,'" Yost said. "And he got it. I just thought he pitched a really good game today."

He did pitch pretty well. I do wonder how many more starts he'll get before they shut him down.

[SubGod22]

Francoeur Forever.

We can argue the merits of the deal all day long. But I think we can all agree one thing: it was inevitable.

Having landed his white whale last winter, Dayton Moore wasn’t about to let Jeff Francoeur go. One year turned into three; after paying just $2.5 million (with some incentives) to secure Francoeur’s services for 2011, the Royals will be paying him $13.5 million to keep him in town for 2012 and 2013.

And like almost every move Moore makes, I’m deeply ambivalent about the signing. In the first 24 hours after the deal, I probably changed my position a half-dozen times. Ultimately, though, I have decided I am against the extension. I’m not vociferously against it, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it works out, but I think the odds are against it. But the reasons why I’m against the extension are probably not what you think.

There are two questions that have to be asked of the extension:

1) Is Jeff Francoeur worth $13.5 million over the next two years?
2) Is Jeff Francoeur a good fit for the Kansas City Royals over the next two years?

My answer to the first question is decidedly more neutral than most members of the sabermetric community. But then, I’ve been out of lock-step with the sabermetric community on Francoeur for over two years now, ever since I advocated that the Royals acquire him. Francoeur is a flashpoint in the still-simmering battle between scouts and stats. He is a player with undeniable skills – he was on the cover of Sports Illustrated at the age of 21 for a reason – and equally undeniable flaws.

From 2008 to 2010, from the ages of 24 to 26, Francoeur hit .256/.301/.389 and was one of the worst everyday players in baseball. His 2008 season, when he hit .239/.294/.359 with bad defense in right field, ranks (according to Baseball Reference) as one of the ten worst seasons by any hitter in the last 50 years. It was worse than Neifi Perez’s 2002 season, which seems hard to believe.

Nonetheless, Francoeur has been an everyday player for virtually his entire career, in part because teams still see his underlying tools, and in part because of his vivacious personality. Francoeur clearly got more opportunities than his performance has warranted – but just as clearly, the sabermetric establishment has tried to overcorrect for his reputation. I have no argument with the way analysts have consistently portrayed his performance over the last five years as beyond wretched – I agree with it.

But it’s one thing to say Francoeur is wretched – it’s another to say he is beyond redemption. Players aren’t static creatures, and they are capable of improvement, particularly when they are still in their mid-20s. Francoeur is no exception to that rule, but at times he has been treated that way, as when the Royals signed him this winter. Most – certainly not all – analysts thought it was a terrible move for the Royals, even though it was just a one-year commitment, and it wasn’t a lot of money, and the Royals had no better internal options.

Even when Francoeur got off to a great start this season, it was written off as typical Frenchy, always hitting well in his first month with his new team before reverting back to form. (Which is true, but in lieu of an actual explanation for why he would choose to suck after his first month, I failed to see why we should assume Francoeur was just baiting us.) And when Francoeur slumped in May and June, the conventional wisdom was that he was returning to his true talent level.

But since July 1st, Francoeur has disrupted the narrative. Here’s his monthly splits:

April: .314/.357/.569
May: .233/.287/.388
June: .235/.280/.367
July: .306/.377/.531
August: .306/.351/.458

For the season, he’s hitting .277/.330/.463, good for an OPS+ of 119, in a non-trivial sample size of 123 games. And I would submit that if someone named “Jeff Spainoeur” were a 27-year-old rightfielder with a cannon arm, and was hitting .277/.330/.463, and was an impending free agent, and his team signed him to a 2-year, $13.5 million extension…the reaction from most analysts wouldn’t be nearly so negative. It might, in fact, be positive.

That’s a red herring of sorts, because Jeff Spainoeur wasn’t one of the worst players in the game from 2008 to 2010, and Jeff Francoeur was, and past performance matters. By giving him a two-year extension, the Royals are basically gambling $13.5 million that, in this case, past performance doesn’t matter.

And that’s really the question here. If Francoeur plays as well in 2012 and 2013 as he has in 2011 – no better – he will justify this contract and then some. If he regresses even a little towards his performance the last three years, he’ll be an overpriced albatross.

So let’s break down his performance this year. What stands out to me is that – with the notable exception of his steals (he has 19 already, after having never stolen more than eight in any previous season) – Francoeur isn’t doing anything that out of character for him. He’s hitting .277; his career average is .269. He’s on pace for 19 homers, matching the number he hit as a 23-year-old in 2007; as a 22-year-old, he hit 29 homers. He’s hit 37 doubles and is on pace for about 45, which would be a career high; on the other hand, he’s hit over 30 doubles in three of the last four years.

He is on pace for 45 walks – breaking his career high of 42 – and 124 strikeouts, close to his career high of 132. He hasn’t struck out over 100 times in a season since 2008. If anything, it appears Francoeur made too much contact the last few years, or at least too much weak contact. His strikeout rate is back where it was from 2005 to 2007, when he was a decent player. Overall, he has the best strikeout-to-walk ratio of his career, but it’s not dramatically out of line with his past.

Aside from his steals, there’s nothing in Francoeur’s performance that seems unsustainable – and the Royals aren’t paying him $13.5 million because of his ability to steal bases. His improvements are subtle, but they’re across-the-board, and they’re made more impressive by the fact we’ve entered a low-offense era. Consider this:

2007: .293/.338/.444, 102 OPS+
2011: .277/.330/.463, 119 OPS+

In terms of raw offensive numbers, Francoeur is hitting almost exactly the same this year as he did four years ago – he’s traded eight points of OBP for 19 points of slugging. But the value of his performance is dramatically different – in 2007 he was essentially a league-average hitter, while in 2011 the same numbers are well above-average.

If you’re looking for numbers that will support the conclusion that he’s having a fluke season, your best bet is to look at his platoon splits. Most of the improvement Francoeur has shown this season has come against left-handed pitching – he is crushing them to the tune of .315/.378/.604. His OPS against southpaws this season is 141 points higher than his career numbers of .300/.347/.494. Against right-handed pitching, he’s only slightly better this season (.265/.314/.420) than his career line (.257/.299/.405).

On the other hand, hits against left-handed pitchers still count on the scoreboard. I’d be more concerned if his numbers this year were skewed by facing more left-handed pitchers than he normally does, but he’s actually faced left-handed pitching slightly less often (24% of the time) in 2011 than for his career (28%) as a whole. Basically, Francoeur is a league-average hitter against right-handed pitching, and an All-Star against left-handers.

Looking at Fangraphs’ pitch data, one thing stands out about Francoeur’s performance this season. While he swings at pitches outside the strike zone as much as always – he’s taken a hack at 40% of pitches outside the zone, a little higher than his career average of 38% – he has swung at pitches inside the strike zone at the lowest rate of his career. Francoeur has tried his luck against just 72% of pitches inside the zone, compared to a career average of 80%.

He’s still more aggressive than the average hitter – the typical batter swings at only 65% of pitches in the strike zone. But this fits with the theory that Francoeur isn’t succeeding by making more contact – he’s succeeding by making better contact, or more precisely, by not swinging at pitches that he can’t do anything with other than pop up or ground out weakly.

I don’t know if his performance is sustainable – but there is nothing about his performance that suggests it isn’t. And, again: he’s 27 years old. Alex Gordon is 27 years old, and he’s having a season that’s more out of character with his previous career than Francoeur is. (Last year, both Gordon and Francoeur had an OPS+ of 84 – but this year, Gordon’s OPS+ is 139.) Few people think Gordon’s improvement is a fluke. Sure, that’s because Gordon was a stud in the minor leagues – but it was just one season, and if we’re going to talk about just one season, then Francoeur was a stud in the major leagues at an age when Gordon was still a college junior. Gordon showed promise as a sophomore in the majors – but there’s hardly any difference between Gordon’s 2008 and Francoeur’s 2007.

The main reason people take Gordon’s performance more seriously than Francoeur’s is because Gordon knows the strike zone. That’s a valuable skill, but there are players who can succeed without plate discipline, and we shouldn’t discount Francoeur’s performance simply because he’s swing-happy. And the other reason why we take Gordon’s performance more seriously is that it’s coming on the heels of only two bad seasons, while Francoeur has had three in a row. But again: they’re both 27 years old. I don’t think it’s fair to penalize Francoeur because he was an above-average player in the majors at a younger age than Gordon was.

With all that said, I think the Royals overpaid a little. Francoeur’s having a good season at the plate, but he’s a rightfielder; most of them have. Of the 30 rightfielders in baseball who have played in 80 or more games, Francoeur ranks just 12th in OPS+. His defense is good but overrated – his arm, which is legitimately great, is not matched by his range, which is average or maybe a tick below.

He gets points for his durability; I don’t think Francoeur has ever been on the DL. Add it all up, though, and I thought Francoeur was likely to earn somewhere between $10 and $12 million over the next two years. He got $13.5 million instead. That’s not a huge overpay, but the Royals didn’t get any kind of Dayton Moore discount either. If Francoeur continues to play at the level he has sustained over the last four months, he’ll earn his money and more. But at this salary, I think the upside is limited. The downside, given Francoeur’s history, is considerable.

The downside is limited by one thing: it’s only a two-year deal. Francoeur will not have turned 30 by the time he’s a free agent. It’s nearly impossible to hand out a bad one-year deal, and even with a two-year contract it’s pretty difficult. The most overpriced part of any contract is the final year of the deal. I was worried that Moore would go three years or even longer in order to keep Francoeur in tow, particularly with Wil Myers struggling in Double-A. By signing Francoeur for just two years, Moore keeps the Royals from paying for his decline, and sets up a graceful transition to Wil Myers in late 2013 or at the beginning of 2014.

Add up all the pros and cons, and I come to the conclusion that it’s a fair deal for both sides. The Royals paid Francoeur his market value, more or less.

And with all that, I don’t like the deal.

I actually agree with Rany on this one.

[SubGod22]

And the days grow shorter when you reach September

With the season winding down and the Royals continuing to spiral farther into the basement of the American League Central, it’s time to take a look at some things we’d like to see moving forward that can potentially be carried over into next year. I know what you’re thinking. But David, I’ve been told that September statistics don’t matter. To that I say that you’re right to some extent, but not entirely. See, the reason that people don’t look at September statistics with the same critical eye as they do the other five months is that there are teams like the Royals out there who are trying to see certain players and determine what they might have that is usable in the future. With that comes a lot of scrubs playing and watering down the talent level of the league. It’s why things like the Kyle Davies September of 2008 was something the Royals shouldn’t have counted.

For the Royals, there are quite a few things that I’d personally like to see in the final 34 games of the season. There’s not a ton from the pitching side that we’re going to be looking for, but it begins in the bullpen where I’d like to see Joakim Soria have a strong finish to the season. He has looked like his old self a few times this season, but more often than not I’m actually a little concerned when he enters a game. That’s not a feeling that I am used to after years of him being about as automatic as they come. It’d be nice to see him reel off 20 or so innings with 25 strikeouts and just three or four walks or something insane like that to make us feel a lot better about him moving forward. Plus, it might increase his off-season trade value. But that’s a post for another day.

I’d also like to see how Aaron Crow handles the last month plus of the season after some of his struggles the last few weeks. He gave up a long homer to Carl Crawford yesterday, but outside of that he has looked much better in his last couple of outings. This will be the first time he’s pitched through September, so it’s something to watch out for. That goes for the rest of the bullpen as well as most of the guys are those who haven’t seen a season last this long in their entire lives. Guys like Louis Coleman and Tim Collins will be interesting to watch as this season wraps up to see how their arms handle the pressures of the 162 game season. The only other guy out of the bullpen who I really want to see some results from is Everett Teaford because I think he has an opportunity to start for the Royals next year, and I want to see what he can do.

Offensively, I’m learning that the team rises and falls with Eric Hosmer. That’s a lot to put on a rookie, but when he’s going well the offense seems to click and when he’s struggling, the offense tends to struggle. He’s been in a bit of a slump lately, so I’d like to see him get hot for the final month or so of the season and put the team on his back for a strong finish. What I’ve noticed more than anything lately is that the power that we were somewhat surprised by when he first came up has evaporated lately. He’s been stuck on ten homers for awhile. While I’m not so concerned with the home run numbers, I’d like to see him hitting the ball and into the gap for doubles. At Kauffman Stadium, there’s no reason that Hosmer can’t be a 50 double guy before he develops into a 30 homer guy. As good as Hosmer has been at times, and he’s shown that he can be a special player, I need to see something out of him in the final month of the season.

[SubGod22]

Gordon’s alive, now lock up A1

I haven’t talked a ton about Alex Gordon this year, which is weird because of how great a season he is having for the Royals. Of course when I say I haven’t talked about him a ton, I mean that relative to how much I probably should have been talking about him. I think a lot of that is the fact that I’m almost afraid to jinx him which is weird. Of course, this is coming from the guy who wore the same undershirt to every game I played in seventh grade. To be fair, it was a pretty awesome shirt with an arm in a glove and it read, “Addicted to Glove” across the top. Anyway, now that I’ve sufficiently converted anybody who didn’t previously think I was a huge nerd, I want to really talk about Alex Gordon today.

Let’s take a journey back to last season when Alex Gordon was struggling mightily. He had just made a position switch to left field, which the team claims was brought up by Gordon himself. He had hit like gangbusters at AAA, but was struggling yet again in the big leagues. Somebody (I forgot who, but I assume it was Bob Dutton) asked him what he was planning to do next season that was different or something along those lines and Gordon said that he planned to dominate in 2011. The jokes were endless and, quite frankly, pretty easy to make. This player who came to the Royals with so much hype that George Brett said he was honored to be compared to him had struggled so much in the early going that for him to dominate was laughable. And many people did laugh.