O'Hearn is looking good.

Not that it matters much, but Seuly Matias is out for the rest of the season after cutting his thumb loading his bag in the cargo area on the team bus. What is it with this team and stupid freak injuries?

I can't wait for Hammel to be OFF of this team. He's just been awful in every role this year.

Am I wrong to think we can't get up to 500 a little quicker than is being projected?

We could have a decent young and fun team next year.

1st Ohearn
2nd Lopez
SS Mondesi
3rd Who the hell knows (Hopefully not Cuthbert or Dozier)
C Salvy
RF Soler
CF Whit
LF Gordo(last damn year/ Maybe platoon with Goodwin)
DH Boni

Pitching is a huge question mark all around. Keller looks like a huge rule 5 steal and hopefully some of those college arms are ready in a year or 2.

We'll have a good idea by the end of May.

Perhaps the funniest post I have ever read on CP.

Phillips should be the CF. Whit will probably be at 2B or possibly traded. 3B Kelvin Gutierrez that we got for Herrera is playing well, so there's a chance he could make it up at some point next year and be at third. But remember Cuthbert is only 25. There are plenty of cases of guys not figuring it out until 26 or 27, especially with the Royals. Moose got sent to the minor leagues when he was 25 and people thought he was a bust.

I wouldn't expect .500 baseball... but I also think some of these people saying the Royals have nothing to look forward to for 5-6 years isn't quite right either. A lot of these young guys coming up will be here in a couple years, so at least we'll have guys to watch. The real trick will be fixing the bullpen. This year's team is no doubt horrible but we'd probably have a decent lead over the Orioles if we weren't sabotaging every other lead we do get with guys like Boyer and Maurer.

Ideally line-up for opening day:

Whit - 2B
Mondesi - SS
Soler - RF
O' Hearn - 1B
Salvy - C
Boni - DH
Phillips - CF
Gordo - LF
Cutty - 3B

I don't think GMDM would do this, but honestly, if Soler has the start he has this year, I'd look to flip him right away (especially with his team-control). I don't think we'll have Soler by the time we're competitive, and his age and potential has the chance to net quite a return for the Royals.

Once Soler is flipped, that can allow Whit to move to RF and Lopez to move to 2B. If Cutty does not have it figured out by June/July, that's when the Royals can move to Guiterrez. I'm not high on Dozier, but if we have the injuries/steroids busts we had thisyear, that'll give him a chance for AB's too.

Why waste our time keeping valuable assets on a 90 loss team (at best)? Trade Whit.

Everyone talks about Whit but Soler is the guy who won't be under team control when this team is supposed to be competitive. There's at least a chance that Whit will be. And there's no reason to think he's going to drop off suddenly at 30. He's a very versatile player.

The dumbest thing you can do is trade Whit just because. You're basically trading 4 years of team control for 6, so it better be good. Really good. I do think they'll trade him if they get a nice package of prospects though. Question is will anyone offer it?

He won't drop off at 30, but he very well could at 33-34 at the age he'll be when we can reasonably expect to play above .500 baseball.

He'll be a FA at 34.

We basically have an all-star caliber player under control from those 28-32 years. You're an idiot if you trade him for lottery tickets, or even a Brett Phillips/Lopez type package... and I loved that trade. But that was for a half season of Moose. Not 4 years of an AS player who can play any position on the field. I'm totally on board with trading him, but saying we "have" to trade him is a terrible idea.

Why do you think that's all we'd get for Whit? We got that for Moose because he was a rental. A competent GM could definitely pull off a nice package for Whit. The question then is if Moore is actually competent enough to do so. Whit will likely finish the year with the following stats (my guess):

.300+ AVG
.375+ OBP
4.5 WAR
35 steals
12-13 HR
38-40 2B
Excellent defense and versatility

If we were trading for that type of player, don't you think we'd have to give up multiple top 100 prospects? Of course you don't just give him away. Any GM worth a damn can negotiate a good return for that type of player.

A competent GM? Dayton probably did as well as any GM at this trade deadline. He got two potential ML players for Moose and three players for Herrera.

The Rangers traded Cole Hamels for nothing and now he's going to be the Cubs ace in the playoffs. The Mets traded Familia for next to nothing. The Tigers got nothing for JD Martinez last year and he's an MVP caliber player. Teams don't give up prospects anymore like they used to.

The best prospect traded might have been the Indians prospect Mejia... and the Padres had to actually give up two controllable good players for him, not the other way around. Where are all the GMs negotiating trades for multiple top 100 prospects at the deadline? I do agree if someone offers multiple top 100 prospects for Whit you take it in a second.

Phillips has looked like shit at the plate.Id rather see Lopez up as a middle infielder. I'd rather see Goodwin start in the OF.