Royals are aiming for dynasty - even if no one's paying attention
By Joel Sherman
SURPRISE, Ariz. — Ninety feet.
In the next 10 days, the Royals will raise a championship banner, be presented rings and begin their title defense at Kauffman Stadium against the Mets.
But Ned Yost still is fixated on Alex Gordon standing on third as the tying run as Game 7 and the 2014 World Series against the Giants concluded.
“We were 90 feet away from going for a three-peat this year,” the Royals’ manager said. “Do we still think about it? Yes.”
Yost is explaining how conscious his club is of what is possible. The frustration of being so close to a title fueled the championship run last year, and now the potential to be the best Royals era ever, and perhaps even a dynasty, sits out there if Kansas City can go AL pennant, championship, championship.
“I talk to them and they want to make history,” Yost said. “Last year, we had unfinished business. This year, our thought is, ‘Let’s make history.’ ”
They do this in baseball anonymity. The 24-hour shock of going from the camp of the Cubs — the darlings of 2016 — to the Royals — the, you know, actual champs of 2015 — isn’t the difference between night and day, it is the difference between night and spaghetti. The Cubs are a zoo — they literally had cubs scampering on their backfield Friday. The attention from media and constant spring home sellouts of 15,000 has brought a rock star, party sense about the franchise.
Meanwhile, on a Saturday morning, Kansas City pitching coach Dave Eiland spread his arms to take in the wide expanse at the Royals complex that contained just the two of us and a slight breeze and said: “Look at the media coverage we have here today.”
To raise the pulse rate and focus much around the Royals, a new computer simulation or oddsmaker has to again forecast seventy-something wins. Such is small-city life.
The aspirations, though, are Main Street.
“Do we think we have a chance to continue to win World Series down the road?” Yost said. “We do.”
No club has repeated since the 1998-2000 Yankees did three-peat, and these Royals have commonality with that group. In a baseball age awash with analytics, I hesitate to use an ambiguous term such as “it,” but those Yankees had “it,” and I think these Royals do, too. Let’s see if I can explain.
That Yankees core essentially blossomed as one and stuck together. The Yanks stopped winning titles to some degree when they brought in the Jason Giambis and Alex Rodriguezes and Randy Johnsons. There was such pressure on the big-salary/addition mercenary to succeed that when he didn’t, it deflated the whole group. On the championship clubs, there was this collective belief that if Derek Jeter did not get a hit, Bernie Williams would; and if not him, then Paul O’Neill; and if not him, then Tino Martinez, and so on. By believing the next guy would succeed, the individual pressure shrunk and some of the coin-flip aspects of who wins in October actually became advantage Yankees.
The Royals have gained that edge with a lineup and rotation essentially filled with very good players bonded by trust that the next guy will succeed. This leads to a fearless, bold and loose style that has been their signature the past two postseasons. They believe they will find a way to win, especially close games late because — like those great Yankees — they have a group confidence and a dynamic bullpen.
And regardless of those seventy-something predictions again, Yost thinks this is his best roster yet. Eiland and Dayton Moore agree it is the best pitching staff, with Joakim Soria joining the pen and Ian Kennedy the rotation. Edinson Volquez will start the opener against Matt Harvey — the duo who started last year’s World Series finale — but there is sentiment that Yordano Ventura is better at harnessing his emotions and might yet emerge an ace. The indomitable Wade Davis anchors a pen that will contain Dillon Gee and Chien-Ming Wang — a revelation this spring, back throwing 94 mph sinkers like his vintage Yankee days.
There are questions at second (no one would be surprised if athletic Raul Mondesi Jr. unseated fading Omar Infante this year), and right field, where KC already was seeing if fourth outfielder Jarrod Dyson could be a full-timer before being lost for a few weeks with an oblique injury. But the “it” factor revolves around the contact-oriented, defensively excellent, aggressive-to-the-hilt lineup headed by Lorenzo Cain, Eric Hosmer and Mike Moustakas.
That trio plus Davis are free agents after next season, and the symbols of urgency to maximize this moment showed in trading prospects for Johnny Cueto and Ben Zobrist last July, and re-signing core piece Alex Gordon as part of getting to a team-record payroll for 2016. You don’t want to squander “it.”
“I don’t like using words like family or brotherhood or goofy clichés,” Eiland said. “But there is something special going on here.”
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