Greinke goes for another win...

Zack takes the hill again this afternoon with a shot to get win number 16. This is significant, because no one has ever won the Cy Young with less than 16 wins. While I think wins is not a very good stat to judge how good a pitcher is, a lot of a voters put some weight on it. Also significant is that if Greinke throws 9 more scoreless innings, his ERA will drop to 1.99. It would be really tough to vote for anyone else if Greinke's ERA was that good.

Greinke now leads the Cy Young Predictor

The Bill James Cy Young predictor has correctly picked the Cy Young winner 8 of the last 12 years in the AL. In 3 of the other 4, the winner picked by the predictor finished 2nd. After six more innings of scoreless ball on Tuesday, Greinke took the AL league in the predictor. Let's be honest, if Zack doesn't win, the whole voting process is a joke. But more on that in a future post. For now, check out the predictor.

Aaron Crow signs!

Yesterday, Aaron Crow officially signed with the Royals ending a year and a half hold out from MLB. I'll keep my thoughts on this brief, but I think this was crucial for the Royals. Crow signed for 3 years, $4.5 million. While that might seem like a lot for a guy who has never pitched in the bigs, it could end up being a big value based on Crow's potential. The Royals desperately need him in the bigs, and they need him now.

The thing about front office strategy is 2009 is that Moneyball is more or less dead. It's not the concept of Moneyball, valuing things other don't, that is dead. That is still important. I mean the actualy things in Moneyball such as OBP that you used to be able to get on the cheap that are dead. When the A's were winning early in the decade, it's because they valued OBP and could get it cheap because no one else did. But the cat's out of the bag. Now everyone knows OBP is important. The next "Moneyball" idea is not yet out there.

So for now, smaller market teams have to take risks on unproven players, and hope they hit big. They can't compete for big name free agents. As Royals fans, we need to hope Crow is as good as advirtised and that he gets to the bigs soon. Sitting out a year is definitely concerning. Hopefully it's not a big deal.

On a side note, I was thrilled that the Royals went for the Mizzou guy. I've seen Crow pitch live more than once, and he was dominate in college. Let's hope that translates to the bigs.

Another win...

It's now 7 of the last 8. If anyone can tell me where Robinson Tejeda came from, I would appreciate it. And by that I mean I know he's been on the team all year, but why is he all of a sudden good?

And that's what we call a winning streak. It has happened before.

Don't look now, but the Royals have won 6 of their last 7 games. For the moment, we will ignore the fact that they were still mathematically eliminated from the playoffs during this streak anyways. Something about September has seemed to bring the best out in the Royals the last two years. Unfortunately, it has been too little, too late. But lets look at the last 7 game stretch a little closer to see what the team has been doing differently.

David Dejesus slides into home to help the Royals get their 6th win in the last 7 games

In the last 7 games, we have averaged 5.71 runs per game, compared to their 4.10 runs per game on the season as a whole. How significant is this extra 1.6 runs per game? The Yankees, the highest scoring team in baseball, averages 5.75 runs per game. I should mention that the Yanks currently have the best record too. It's easy to say "score more runs though." Have the Royals done anything else different during the last 7?

The easy answer is we have been hitting better, with splits of .303/.374/.442 over the last 7 (BA/OBP/SLG). This is much better than the .257/.315/.404 clip the team has hit over the course of the season. But is this sustainable? I would say yes and no. Part of the higher OBP has been due to better plate discipline. Our team walk % has been 10.0% over the past 7 games, as opposed to 7.4% on the season. However, this walking spike seems a little bit strange for a couple reasons. First of all, the Royals have actually been worse at swinging at balls outside of the zone over the last 7 (30.3% compared to 27.5% for the full season). The first strike percentage has been nearly equal what we have been seeing over the course of the season. So basically, the increased number of walks doesn't have a whole lot to do with better plate discipline as a team.

Billy Butler has hit .419/.441/.774 over the last 7 games

So what else can we attribute this increase in output to? Lets try luck. The Royals batting average for balls in play (BABIP) over the last 7 games has been .361. This is completely unsustainable. This compares to .297 for the season. The current league leader in this stat is at .319. This is a very significant stat to those who study advanced stats. Basically, over the course of a season, you can expect all luck on where balls fall to basically even out. Since the place where a ball lands in relation to fielders can be considered random, an unusually high BABIP over a short period of time suggests that you've gotten lucky.

As much as I'd like to believe we've turned a corner with our hitting, it may just be blind luck.

But hitting hasn't been the only reason we've been winning. We have seen some really good pitching performances as of late too. Especially by Zack Greinke, Robinson Tejeda and Kyle Davies. I will look into the pitching side more later this week.

I think Miguel Olivo just swung at another bad pitch.

A few days ago, I mentioned how the Royals don't appreciate the power of on-base percentage and used Miguel Olivo as one of my examples of how bad they are. I knew 110 Ks and 10 BBs was terrible. But the below article on Fangraphs illustrates just how historically bad is plate discipline is.

Olivo is possibly the worst free swinger of all time.

Good Call, Trey. Wait...I mean good call, John.

One of the most vital roles a manager plays during the game is how to manage his bullpen. Putting in specific pitchers in different situations is vital for success. In my opinion, this is one of Trey Hillman's biggest weaknesses. Specifically, I'm referring to his reluctance to use Joakim Soria, our best reliever, outside of the 9th inning.

This is a part of modern baseball wisdom that most sabermatricians disagree with. For some reason, managers in today's game will not bring out their closer if it is not the 9th inning. In reality, you should use your best reliever whenever the situation dictates. When you need a critical out in the 7th or 8th, why keep your best guy in your pocket?

To totally illustrate my point, I'd like to point to the series the Royals played against the Rays from July 17th to July 19th, shortly after I started my boycott. The Royals led each of the 3 games in the series going into the 8th inning. However, in each of the games, they blew the lead in the 8th. And, in each game, they did not bring in Soria to try to hold the lead in the 8th. So we blew every game that weekend without using our best reliever at all. He was then brought in 3 days later against the Angels late in a 10-2 blowout loss. The point is, since we blew the lead in the 8th, there was no lead for Soria to hold in the 9th. Put him in the game in the 8th, and maybe we win one or more of those games.


So I was shocked last night when I saw the Royals bring in Soria in the 8th inning last night holding a 4-2 lead with 2 runners on and 0 outs. I immediately thought, "Maybe Trey finally gets it." Then I remembered, Trey Hillman was not managing the team last night. He was away from the team with a family matter. Bench Coach John Gibbons was the man who made the call. Soria came in the game, and while he did allow 1 inherited runner to score, he got us out of the 8th with a lead. We won the game 4-3. But the point is not even that we won. It is that Gibbons made the correct strategic move and put in the pitcher that gave us the best chance to win in that situation. Big props.

I hope Trey Hillman will learn something from John Gibbons in managing this type of situation. Don't waste your closer by keeping him on your bench if he can get you a win.

What exactly does a boycott entail?

That's the real question. What do I mean by boycott. Here are the rules I've come up with so far, but I'd be willing to listen to any more suggestions:

-- I won't go to any games
-- I will watch the team on TV
-- I won't buy any Royals gear (shirts, hats, ect.)
-- I won't wear the gear I currently have
-- I will go to tailgate, if I want to
-- I won't pay for parking to tailgate (I will park across the street and walk over)
-- I will listen to critiques on the team
-- I will continue to read about the team, and watch the moves they make
-- I will comment on what I see the team do
-- I won't believe banter from the front office that is not backed up by action

Basically, the boycott entails cutting off any revenue I might produce for the Royals. Anything where I directly give the Royals money is off limits. I realize, that in a round about way, watching a game on TV helps produce revenue. However, this is necessary if I am to give the team a fair shake to show me they have changed their losing ways.

But like I said before, it's not the losing that really that cause the boycott. It is the terrible management by the front office. So what I really need is to come up with metrics for when to end the boycott.

The first, in my opinion, would be for the Royals to show that they actually understand the concept of on base percentage. This stat, above all others, is the most closely linked to run production. Now I'm aware it doesn't come as cheap as it did back when Moneyball first came out, but having a lineup that includes Guillen, Jacobs, Olivo and Betancourt shows that they Royals are completely ignoring the impact of OBP.

Miguel Olivo has 110 K's this year and only 10 walks

Second, the Royals have to show me they know what they are doing in the draft. It's only been 3 years, but picking Hochaver number 1 overall already looks terrible. As does taking Gordon number 2 overall in 2005 (although I have to admit everyone liked this pick at the time). Then in 2007 and 2008, we took players who are no where near big league ready, so it's hard to judge. Since 1988, the Royals only have 1 player taken in the first round who could be considered a great pick out of our 26 1st round picks. That player is Zack Greinke (2002), who is obviously amazing (and should win the Cy Young--but that's another post). Billy Butler (2004) does look like he's finally getting a hang of things, and could be considered a good pick as well soon. This year's pick, Aaron Crow, looks like he may not even sign.

Colt Griffin (2001 1st round pick) never made it to the majors

But I'm looking for more than just these two metrics. I'm just not sure what solid metrics to put with this. If you have any suggestions, let me know.