****Royals@Tigers Official GDT 8/4/15****

[Rasputin]

Kansas City Royals (62-42) VS Detroit Tigers (51-54)

Scheduled starting pitchers: LHP Danny Duffy (4-5, 4.28 ERA) vs. RHP Justin Verlander (1-3, 4.86 ERA).

First pitch 6:08 central time

It's going be motor city mayhem with cat scratch fever beat the Tigers


Go Royals

[ReynardMuldrake]

Originally Posted by bricks

I'm trying to help you guys out

Get ****ed, troll. You have no reason to stalk us in threads that have nothing to do with the Boo-Hoo Jays. Nobody wants you here. You're that dude that shows up uninvited to a party, drinks other peoples' beer and refuses to leave. Who the **** invited you?

Oh wait, if I call you "buddy" and add a bunch of smilies, that means we're still cool, right buddy?

lol lol

[bricks]

Originally Posted by LoneWolf

You're trolling and doing it poorly. As soon as the Jays are back below .500 you'll be gone like you were for most of the season.

The Toronto Bluejays are one of the top teams in the American League. I highly doubt it bud that they'll be below .500.

[ReynardMuldrake]

Originally Posted by bricks

I'm trying to help you guys out

lol lol we're friends guys right lol

**** yourself.

[okcchief]

Originally Posted by duncan_idaho

He and Infante have both been bad at the plate over the course of the whole season. They've been equally bad, in my mind.

Rios at least is in a spot where you look at his season, look at what he did in July after getting healthy, and can logically reason that "Hey, maybe it took him that long to recover from the injury, get his hand right and get his timing back, and now he's producing."

Infante has been steadily this awful at the plate all season, with no real moves up or down and nothing to give you reason to expect a jump in production.

That's why I keep saying: If Rios hits from now until Gordon's return like he did in July, it makes sense to start him and bench Infante.

If Rios slides back down, then Zobrist in RF makes sense and you play Infante because of his slight addition defensively.

I'm not happy with Rios' production overall, but I'm very happy with the production in July, which would have him on pace for a .750 OPS and an above-average offensive season.

Don't know why you continue to be stubborn about admitting that Rios was a quality contributor in July. The Royals bottom third was really productive in that month, and a big piece of that was Alex Rios' production.

Because you act like he did something special. The last 30 games Rios had 5 more hits and the same RBI and HR as Infante. He's scored 2 more runs. You are saying he's trending so much better and it's just not true. They are both bad but one plays his position well. Again it doesn't matter that much Either way but if Rios turns it around it's based on nothing I've seen so far including the last month. You ask did Rios bang my mom? I should ask if he blew you after a game if you think that was a great month. I was excited about the potential of the acquisition, but he's been bad. Morales aces, Rios craps. It's all good, but he's done less than a 10 year minor league guy even with his scorching July. If he needs the hand to heal even more reason to rest him with a big lead. We might be able to survive without his production.

[bricks]

Originally Posted by ReynardMuldrake

Get ****ed, troll. You have no reason to stalk us in threads that have nothing to do with the Boo-Hoo Jays. Nobody wants you here. You're that dude that shows up uninvited to a party, drinks other peoples' beer and refuses to leave. Who the **** invited you?

Oh wait, if I call you "buddy" and add a bunch of smilies, that means we're still cool, right buddy?

lol lol

Dude you're talking to guy who is a lover not a fighter.

But yeah I would drink all your beer and leave very little for you.

And I wouldn't even say "thank you" after I leave.

[C3HIEF3S]

Bricks makes me want to leave CP forever.

[ReynardMuldrake]

Originally Posted by bricks

Dude you're talking to guy who is a lover not a fighter.

But yeah I would drink all your beer and leave very little for you.

And I wouldn't even say "thank you" after I leave.

A++++ trolling, prompt delivery, would troll again

[duncan_idaho]

Originally Posted by okcchief

Because you act like he did something special. The last 30 games Rios had 5 more hits and the same RBI and HR as Infante. He's scored 2 more runs. You are saying he's trending so much better and it's just not true. They are both bad but one plays his position well. Again it doesn't matter that much Either way but if Rios turns it around it's based on nothing I've seen so far including the last month. You ask did Rios bang my mom? I should ask if he blew you after a game if you think that was a great month. I was excited about the potential of the acquisition, but he's been bad. Morales aces, Rios craps. It's all good, but he's done less than a 10 year minor league guy even with his scorching July. If he needs the hand to heal even more reason to rest him with a big lead. We might be able to survive without his production.

It's like this:

It absolutely true that Rios was a much better offensive player in July than Infante. There's literally no stat you can look at to say otherwise, unless you're looking at it incorrectly.

5 hits over a month is the difference between a guy who hits .300 and a guy who hits .240. That's 30 hits over the course of a year. That is a significant difference. (And hits are an antiquated way to evaluate a player, anyway).

Omar Infante posted a sub-.600 OPS in July, just like he has in every month except April (when he put up a whopping .621).

Alex Rios posted a .736 in July. I don't think that's a great month, but that type of performance would create a significant increase in offensive production over a sample size of a few months or a full season, when compared with who Infante was then and of late.

150 points of OPS difference is a significant improvement. That IS "trending so much better."

They're both going to play a lot between now and when Gordon returns. If Rios continues to produce at the solid, slightly above average rate he did in July, he should continue to play. If he slides back and his production looks more like the aggregate of his season, then Infante should play due to his defensive value.

[Pitt Gorilla]

Originally Posted by bricks

I'm trying to help you guys out

Help us with what?

[Great Expectations]

What is our combined fwar with Zobrist at 2b and Rios in RF vs the fwar of infante at 2b and Zobrist in RF?

The platoon is the obvious best play, but I doubt we go all in with it.

[Three7s]

Originally Posted by bricks

The Toronto Bluejays are one of the top teams in the American League. I highly doubt it bud that they'll be below .500.

No, they're not. They have the top offense in the league. Their pitching is average. Your team is a very bad match-up for the Royals because your team can score at will. Ours is more reliant on pitching, defense, and timely hitting. If there's a game where our pitching can't hold your lineup down, we'll probably lose, as you already know. That won't be the case against most other teams.

[duncan_idaho]

Originally Posted by Great Expectations

What is our combined fwar with Zobrist at 2b and Rios in RF vs the fwar of infante at 2b and Zobrist in RF?

The platoon is the obvious best play, but I doubt we go all in with it.

It's hard to break it down because WAR is an aggregate stat that needs larger samples ... but over the course of a season in which Infante hits like he has this year, Rios hits at his July level, and Zobrist is his usual self, you'd be talking about picking up maybe 2-3 wins over the course of a season (2 WAR from a .740 OPS Rios, 4-5 WAR from Zobrist, 0-1 WAR from Infante).

Over the course of a half-season, obviously, the totals are going to be lower. You're probably only talking about a 1-1.5 win difference.

[bricks]

Originally Posted by Three7s

No, they're not. They have the top offense in the league. Their pitching is average. Your team is a very bad match-up for the Royals because your team can score at will. Ours is more reliant on pitching, defense, and timely hitting. If there's a game where our pitching can't hold your lineup down, we'll probably lose, as you already know. That won't be the case against most other teams.

The Jays pitching is significantly better.

David Price y'all know is an ace. RA Dickey is pitching as good as a Cy Young pitcher right now. His last 11 of 12 starts, he has given up 3 runs or less in a game.

Buerhle is just Buerhle. An innings eater that will give you quality starts and take you deep in games. And Marco Estrada has been a pleasant surprise. The bullpen is leaps and bounds better. You guys don't know Sanchez and Osuna very well do you? These guys are money so far in the pen and I anticipate that they will be for the rest of the season. In addition, Jays picked up Mark Lowe who is one of the best relief pitchers in baseball and let's not forget LaTroy Hawkins who is no slouch.

Pitching is not going to be a problem anymore.

[Nightfyre]

I didn't realize KnowMo was a Blue Jays fan. Gag.

[duncan_idaho]

Originally Posted by Three7s

No, they're not. They have the top offense in the league. Their pitching is average. Your team is a very bad match-up for the Royals because your team can score at will. Ours is more reliant on pitching, defense, and timely hitting. If there's a game where our pitching can't hold your lineup down, we'll probably lose, as you already know. That won't be the case against most other teams.

That team is a very bad matchup for the Royals when playing games at the Rogers Centre. At the K, that factor is mitigated. The odds of the Royals NOT playing another game at the Rogers Centre are better than the odds they DO.

The Blue Jays are in the second wildcard now and could make a run from that spot if they hang on to it. But they also still trail the Yankees by 5.5 games (and have picked up only 1/2 game in the past week despite being white hot) for the division. That makes the playoff road tough, even with the Yankees problems of late.

Price and Tulowitzki should give the Blue Jays a 4 game bump by themselves, for the upgrades from Reyes and Doubront. Is that enough, by itself, to get them into the playoffs and make up ground?

Toronto has 54 games left. 28 of those are on the road, where Toronto has been a .415 team. Let's say the additions make them good enough to split those games (a 2.5 win swing). That's 14-14 the rest of the way and puts Toronto at 70-66.

26 home games remaining and a .618 winning percentage in those. That would work out to 16-10, putting them at 86-76. Bump a few more wins on with the additions, and you're still only at 88-74. That might be enough to get in the wildcard, but the Yankees would need to go sub .500 for the Blue Jays to overtake them for the division with that type of record.

The Blue Jays have a much better chance to make the playoffs now that they added those guys, but there still is significant work to do. They need to go 37-21 the rest of the way to reasonably have a chance to overtake the Yankees, unless that team just collapses the rest of the way.

That's .640 baseball. Possible, but a definite challenge.