2012 Kansas City Royals Repository Thread

[alnorth]

2012 Slogan: Our Time

A better, more accurate 2012 Slogan: It is Finally Next Year
(from Great Expectations)

An alternative slogan if you don't like that one: Someone has to win this crappy division
(from alnorth)

With the beginning of a new year, it is time for the 2012 version of the Royals Repository Thread. We've got Hosmer, we've got a 2011-dominating Gordon, we've got Moose, we've got hopefully a killer bullpen, we've got a stereotypical slow slugging DH, we've got easily one of the best defensive shortstops in the AL, we've got a promising catcher in Salvador Perez. Hell, we've got offense and promising prospects galore.

We do not have starting pitching.

Oh yeah, we've also got this:



Get ready for, (as of January 2012 anyway), one of the most confusing puzzles of a baseball season in recent Royals history. Will they suck? Maybe, I don't know. Will we be given a year of 0.500 baseball? Possibly, I don't know. Will they win the division and go to the playoffs for the first time in 27 years? For the first time in a long time, it could happen, I don't know. 92 losses, 92 wins, or anything in between would not surprise a lot of us.

Everything goes here except Gameday threads and really big news. If a giant story breaks, the Royals achieve some awesome milestone, or we sign/lose a highly significant player/coach/mascot/whatever, then it might also deserve its own thread. This being Chiefs Planet, please do not clutter the board with new threads about trivial Royals news or you will only annoy those who come here for just Chiefs football. If you aren't sure and its not a Gameday thread, it goes here.

What sort of stuff often goes here? SPchief explained it well, so I'll just copy that:

If you locate something of interest.. ANYTHING.. deals on apparel, best ways in/out of the stadium, giveaways, great stories from this season or from seasons gone by, rumors, trades, anything.... feel free to post it here.

[Sure-Oz]

Chen is still Bruce effing Chen. If he gives you an era in the 4's thats his ultimate game

Frenchy is dogshit, period. He has the worst plate discipline. He could be traded if his name was Hunter Pence.

[Nightfyre]

The KC@DET game today is MLB.tv's free game. It starts at noon. Someone with a better record than me should start a gamethread. I take responsibility for yesterday's loss. In fairness, Frenchy deserves at least a quarter of the blame, however.

[duncan_idaho]

Originally Posted by Laz

Chen,frenchy and Hos have all turned to shit this year

still not a clutch gene to be found on the team ... although Moose looks like he might be building towards it. Brox gets it done in clutch time but only after an 'almost disaster' every time.

Clutch? Clutch? Clutch?

Most overrated and overused phrase in baseball. But if you want to talk close and late situations, Butler, Moose and even Yunicorn have all been pretty good (defined by hitting at normal ability or better in those situations).

Hosmer had an OK June (even from a power perspective - 3 HR and 6 2B is not great but is OK) and has been OK in July in a small sample size.

I see that his approach has changed and improved drastically from the bad days in April and May. He's being much more selective, taking better pitches, and swinging at pitches he can drive effectively. He also is getting into better counts, which is going to lead to more success.

He's walking 40 percent more often than a year ago (good). He's striking out about 1 percent less often. He just had terrible luck to start the year and fell into an awful slump.

I'm encouraged by what we see from Hos and think his second half is going to be really strong.

As for Frenchy... I expected some regression from him, but not this much. He's the worst everyday player in MLB. And it seems like they're FINALLY seeing that (dropping him in the lineup - though they need to drop him one more spot).

Chen is interesting. He's actually striking out more hitters and walking fewer than the past two seasons, when he was a very solid 3/4 type starter. He's only giving up one more hit per game. His FIP is right in line with where it's been the past two years. The only major thing is that his BABIP - which has usually been below league average throughout his career - and his strand rate, which is about 10 percent lower.

You can look at that two ways. You can look at it as Chen having bad luck with strand rates and his BABIP normalizing (which leads to the conclusion this is the real Bruce Chen). Or you can look at it as a trend that is likely to reverse at some point (and he'll return to production similar to 2010 and 2011).

Personally, I think it's a combination of some bad luck AND Yost leaving him out there too long in a few situations (recent game against Minnesota, he gave up 4 runs in 2/3 in the 6th inning, and similar things have happened a few times earlier in the year).

That's a product, though, of the dogshit performance of the rest of the starting rotation. In some of those cases, they've NEEDED more innings from Chen to rest the pen.

[Great Expectations]

Signing Frenchy for two years was worse than the Sanchez trade. Our offense is dead with two outs and either Dyson or Frenchy up. Might as well let our pitchers hit and DH one of them.

[Ceej]

Originally Posted by Nightfyre

The KC@DET game today is MLB.tv's free game. It starts at noon. Someone with a better record than me should start a gamethread. I take responsibility for yesterday's loss. In fairness, Frenchy deserves at least a quarter of the blame, however.

We are the game thread starting beating sticks.

[Sure-Oz]

Pretty sure Myers wasn't expected to come up until mid next year at the earliest. He should be up now.

[duncan_idaho]

Originally Posted by Sure-Oz

Pretty sure Myers wasn't expected to come up until mid next year at the earliest. He should be up now.

Yeah, when Frenchy was signed to a two-year deal (they offered an identical deal to Melky Cabrera), Myers was coming off of a .250ish campaign at NWA. He played great in the Arizona Fall League, but it remained to be seen how he would react to failing for the first time as baseball player.

I would imagine he was expected to spend at least the first half of 2012 at NWA, with a stint in Omaha to close the year and possibly some more time in Omaha to start 2013. That was logical and reasonable at the time.

it's better to have this problem than the other way around (see: 2B position and the meh performances of Christian Colon and Johnny Giavotella).

[Jenson71]

Originally Posted by Nightfyre

The KC@DET game today is MLB.tv's free game. It starts at noon. Someone with a better record than me should start a gamethread. I take responsibility for yesterday's loss. In fairness, Frenchy deserves at least a quarter of the blame, however.

Although most of my teachers told me I would never amount to anything significant in life, I'm pleased to report that my gamethread-starting record is 4-1 (and one rainout) this year.

[KCUnited]

Apparently, Myers is hitting a cool .733 on Wii Baseball at Fan Fest this morning.

[Jenson71]

Originally Posted by KCUnited

Apparently, Myers is hitting a cool .733 on Wii Baseball at Fan Fest this morning.

BRING HIM UP NOW

[Raiderhater]

Originally Posted by Great Expectations

Signing Frenchy for two years was worse than the Sanchez trade. Our offense is dead with two outs and either Dyson or Frenchy up. Might as well let our pitchers hit and DH one of them.

Don't think I would go that far. But yeah, I am over him. Yesterday sealed the deal for me.

[Bowser]

Originally Posted by KCUnited

Apparently, Myers is hitting a cool .733 on Wii Baseball at Fan Fest this morning.

I've seen Francouer hit .750 before. [/Dayton]

[cabletech94]

i'll be heading up to the hrd tomorrow. i've got 2 extra tix to fanfest. i'd be willing to sell both @ half price. 30 bucks and they're yours (face value 60). pm me if your interested. i'll be up that way around 11:30am.

[Raiderhater]

Originally Posted by cabletech94

i'll be heading up to the hrd tomorrow. i've got 2 extra tix to fanfest. i'd be willing to sell both @ half price. 30 bucks and they're yours (face value 60). pm me if your interested. i'll be up that way around 11:30am.

By selling both do you mean you are not willing to sell them individually?

[cabletech94]

Originally Posted by Raiderhader

By selling both do you mean you are not willing to sell them individually?

someone had to be the comedian, right?

if someone wants to buy 1 @ 15 dollars, then they can have 1 @ 15 dollars.

if you are a midget, or little person, it's still 15 mother effing dollars!!!!