*** Official 2018 Royals Offseason Repository ***

[duncan_idaho]

It's the end of the world as we know it... and we feel... fine?

2018 is a season of transition for the Royals, or at least it is at this point. Dayton Moore is back. Will he swing full into THE PROCESS 2.0? Or will he try to load up again and make some reload magic happen?

Pending Free Agents:
1B | Eric Hosmer | San Diego Padres, 8 years, $144 million ($5 million signing bonus; $20 million/year in Yrs 1-5; $13 million/year in Yrs 6-8 wth player opt out)

Spoiler!

(DI's Guess: Texas Rangers, 6, $118 million)

3B | Mike Moustaskas | Kansas City Royas, 1, $6.5 million

Spoiler!

(DI's Guess: Los Angeles Angels, 5, $98 million)

CF | Lorenzo Cain | Milwaukee Brewers, 5 years, $80 million

Spoiler!

(DI's Guess: San Francisco Giants, 4, $68 million)

RP | Mike Minor | Texas Rangers, 3, $28 million

Spoiler!

(DI's Guess: Los Angeles Angels, 3, $35 million+ $12 million team option

SP | Jason Vargas | New York Mets, 2, $16 million

Spoiler!

(DI's Guess: Baltimore Orioles, 2, $29 million)

SS | Alcides Escobar | Kansas City Royals, 1, $2.5 million

Spoiler!

(DI's Guess: San Diego Padres, 1, $6.5 million)

2018 MLB Draft Picks
#18
#33 - Compensation (Eric Hosmer)
#34 - Compensation (Lorenzo Cain)
#40 (Competitive Balance Round A)

Comp picks explanation:

Spoiler!

In case I, picks would be #32, 33, and 34, if Alex Cobb of Rays signs for $50 million guaranteed.

Kansas City will likely have 5 of the top 40-45 picks in the draft, and the bonus pool money should rival that of the teams drafting 1-3 in the 2017 draft. This should give KC tremendous flexibility in acquiring talent that otherwise might slip or not be "signable."

2018 Draft Names to Watch

RHP Kumar Rocker, N Oconnee HS, Georgia.

Spoiler!

Possibly goes top 10 but is a big, physical SP with ace potential. Moore and co. will be all over him if he slips a bit and could offer top 10 money at No. 16

OF Jarred Kelenic, Waukasha West HS, WI

Spoiler!

Kelenic is the top prep bat, toolsy OF. Royals would be ecstatic to have shot at him.

1B Triston Casas, American Heritage HS (FL).

Spoiler!

Tremendous raw power, best in HS bats. Royals typically like HS arms or HS bats with "special" tools. He qualifies.

RHP Carter Stewart, Eau de Gallie HS (Ga).

Spoiler!

Another big, physical specimen with huge upside. More likely to be available mid-first than Rocker.

ANY Any, Any (Any). Any current top projected pick who slides for injury concerns. Includes current top prospect prospect SP Brady Singer, U of Florida.

[suzzer99]

No offense, but I feel like anyone who still thinks Soria is worth a shit didn't actually watch most of the games in 2016 and 2017. It was obvious he was choking in high-leverage situations. If I wasn't traveling I would literally look up every high leverage appearance of the last two years and summarize the results when Soria was brought in.

And it's not just statistical leverage - it's stuff like when we had made some miraculous comeback to take a small lead - while trying to end a losing streak or extend a winning streak where we were trying for a playoff push late in the season. Soria shit the bed in that spot. Every. Single. Time.

Here's the exact game I had in mind 9/4/16: https://www.baseball-reference.com/b...01609040.shtml

Royals score 4 runs in the bottom of the 7th to take a 1-run lead on the Tigers in a game we absolutely had to have if we were gonna keep playoff hopes alive. Soria promptly gives up a two-out 2-run dinger to Upton. It pretty much killed our season.

I remember Dyson just slumping after Soria gave up the dinger to Upton. Only time I've ever seen Dyson show bad body language or discouragement. These guys are only human. We got incredibly lucky not to have those kinds of crushing losses for a couple of years and it led to an Amazing 2 WS run with 1 win. Soria just killed us so many times though in the absolute worst spots.

[petegz28]

Soria sucked. Now they need to trade Kelvin or glue him to the 7th inning. Moore has made some bad decisions, imo, as of late.

Traded Davis for dick
Let Morales walk
Let Minor walk
Traded Alexander
Signed Gordon, never mind we overpaid

This is the bad Dayton Moore.

[tk13]

Originally Posted by petegz28

Soria sucked. Now they need to trade Kelvin or glue him to the 7th inning. Moore has made some bad decisions, imo, as of late.

Traded Davis for dick
Let Morales walk
Let Minor walk
Traded Alexander
Signed Gordon, never mind we overpaid

This is the bad Dayton Moore.

A lot of this is all hindsight.

The book is still out on Soler. You can't give up on a 25 year old guy, especially after what we saw from Hos, Moose and Gordon. He has monster power. I'd be much more worried about Soler if he didn't tear up AAA last year. I wasn't thrilled with the trade but we still have Soler, and the Cubs did not win a World Series with Davis.

Morales posted a negative WAR last year and he's only getting older. Dayton would've been hammered if he signed a mid-30's DH to an 11 million a year contract.

We have no idea about the Minor or Alexander moves yet. I have a bad feeling we're going to regret the Alexander move. But you never know with relievers. The Minor one I'm not as sure about, just because he has a long injury history. There is a risk there in giving a guy like that $30 million.

I don't think Dayton has made any "great" moves the last couple years, but two years ago we were probably a playoff team that got off track because we lost Moose and Cain, two of our best players. This past year Dayton was in a real tough spot. Free agency was basically over and we lost one of our best starters. There's just no way to replace Ventura. Dayton had it set up to have a 1-2 punch with him and Duffy for years. Duffy got hurt and then a DUI, and you can't blame DM for Ventura's death. It's not like he didn't try to put a band aid on it... people thought we weren't going to sign Hammel or Wood, and he ended up signing them both, and they were probably the two best guys left out there. It just wasn't good enough.

[tk13]

I would add that the Kennedy signing definitely looks bad now. But how can you know they're going to juice the balls? Not that Kennedy has pitched well but Dayton built a fly ball pitching staff to play in our park and then the game would completely flip so that the balls are all wound up with rocket fuel. That's the scary part of the Alexander trade. You aren't going to find a ground ball pitcher much better than him.

Dayton's biggest issue has been drafting poorly. He hasn't been able to get over the hump in this era where we can't game the draft and overpay slot like we did when he built the championship team.

[Great Expectations]

Soria hasn’t been worth $8mil per year in his most recent stint. If you look at his 2 years here he is worth about $1.5mil. I’m sure you can cherry pick some stats/timelines to make him worth $8mil, but if you look at his full body of work over the 2 years the trade was worth it.

I also don’t see an old reliever with two tommy john surguries getting better. Especially if the flatter seam baseball theory is true.

[mr. tegu]

Originally Posted by suzzer99

No offense, but I feel like anyone who still thinks Soria is worth a shit didn't actually watch most of the games in 2016 and 2017. It was obvious he was choking in high-leverage situations. If I wasn't traveling I would literally look up every high leverage appearance of the last two years and summarize the results when Soria was brought in.

And it's not just statistical leverage - it's stuff like when we had made some miraculous comeback to take a small lead - while trying to end a losing streak or extend a winning streak where we were trying for a playoff push late in the season. Soria shit the bed in that spot. Every. Single. Time.

Here's the exact game I had in mind 9/4/16: https://www.baseball-reference.com/b...01609040.shtml

Royals score 4 runs in the bottom of the 7th to take a 1-run lead on the Tigers in a game we absolutely had to have if we were gonna keep playoff hopes alive. Soria promptly gives up a two-out 2-run dinger to Upton. It pretty much killed our season.

I remember Dyson just slumping after Soria gave up the dinger to Upton. Only time I've ever seen Dyson show bad body language or discouragement. These guys are only human. We got incredibly lucky not to have those kinds of crushing losses for a couple of years and it led to an Amazing 2 WS run with 1 win. Soria just killed us so many times though in the absolute worst spots.

I tend to agree with this. He never looked comfortable or confident out there for two straight seasons.

Soria also didn’t seem to be very well liked in the clubhouse which is likely something that Moore factored in.

I don’t enjoy losing Alexander but I also don’t care all that much and to me it’s a price I’m fine with paying to get rid of Soria.

[suzzer99]

"You can never go home again" - wise words.

Trying to think of someone in any major sport who's had success with a team, then left for a few years or more, then come back and had a championship run with their original team.

[carlos3652]

Originally Posted by suzzer99

"You can never go home again" - wise words.

Trying to think of someone in any major sport who's had success with a team, then left for a few years or more, then come back and had a championship run with their original team.

Jordan?
Lebron?

Happens in soccer quite a bit too. Carlos Tevez who played for Boca juniors in Argentina before he went on to play for west ham, man united, man city, Juventus then returned to Boca like 10 years later and won championships

[Great Expectations]

To be fair nobody cares about soccer and Lebron didn’t win in his first run with the Cavs. Also, everyone in the world who isn’t connected would like to know why Mike left.

Finally, futbol doesn’t equal soccer, or vice versa.

[carlos3652]

Originally Posted by Great Expectations

To be fair nobody cares about soccer and Lebron didn’t win in his first run with the Cavs. Also, everyone in the world who isn’t connected would like to know why Mike left.

Finally, futbol doesn’t equal soccer, or vice versa.

Lebron had success with the Cavs in his first stint though...
5 playoff appearances, finished 1st in their division twice, won their conference once and lost in the NBA finals... he was also league mvp, rookie of the year, scoring leader etc etc... he left... he came back... and has that team at the top of the eastern year in and year out with a chance at a championship every year...

[carlos3652]

I’ll ignore the soccer bashing. “Nobody cares about soccer” is untrue but you are just trolling. Not worth it.

[Canofbier]

Originally Posted by carlos3652

I’ll ignore the soccer bashing. “Nobody cares about soccer” is untrue but you are just trolling. Not worth it.

I was about to say something like this...there was one time in a music-related thread on this board that I said something along the lines of "Nobody likes country music anyway", and was quickly called out on it. I did a quick Google search and discovered that I was wrong, and this feels similar.

[suzzer99]

I'd count LaBron for sure. Jordan is a little different imo because he wasn't playing basketball.

Any examples in football or baseball?

[Ron Swanson]

Originally Posted by suzzer99

No offense, but I feel like anyone who still thinks Soria is worth a shit didn't actually watch most of the games in 2016 and 2017. It was obvious he was choking in high-leverage situations. If I wasn't traveling I would literally look up every high leverage appearance of the last two years and summarize the results when Soria was brought in.

And it's not just statistical leverage - it's stuff like when we had made some miraculous comeback to take a small lead - while trying to end a losing streak or extend a winning streak where we were trying for a playoff push late in the season. Soria shit the bed in that spot. Every. Single. Time.

Here's the exact game I had in mind 9/4/16: https://www.baseball-reference.com/b...01609040.shtml

Royals score 4 runs in the bottom of the 7th to take a 1-run lead on the Tigers in a game we absolutely had to have if we were gonna keep playoff hopes alive. Soria promptly gives up a two-out 2-run dinger to Upton. It pretty much killed our season.

I remember Dyson just slumping after Soria gave up the dinger to Upton. Only time I've ever seen Dyson show bad body language or discouragement. These guys are only human. We got incredibly lucky not to have those kinds of crushing losses for a couple of years and it led to an Amazing 2 WS run with 1 win. Soria just killed us so many times though in the absolute worst spots.

He was awful, and Ned kept putting him out there when everyone (Soria included) knew he was going to blow up. I appreciate what he did in his first stint, but his signing was nothing short of a disaster.

[carlos3652]

Originally Posted by suzzer99

I'd count LaBron for sure. Jordan is a little different imo because he wasn't playing basketball.

Any examples in football or baseball?

Eh, I bet you won’t find a lot or any... just because most stayed with their original teams... if they were good, they were legends and lifers or had long stints with their clubs...