SB Nation User Blog: BHWick

Similarity Scores through 2009

BHWick — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 02:12:57 -0000

Because it's amusing to figure out who is similar to who.

Batters	is most similar to	or	In 2008, he was most similar to
Alberto Callaspo	Smoky Burgess	Don Slaught
Alex Gordon	Howard Johnson	Darnell Coles	Joe Foy
Billy Butler	Kent Hrbek	John Olerud	Keith Hernandez
David DeJesus	Tony Gonzalez	Coco Crisp	Roy Weatherly
Jose Guillen	Kevin McReynolds	Joe Rudi	Kevin McReynolds
Mike Aviles	Tony Eusebio	John Baker
Mike Jacobs	Andre Thornton	Fred Whitfield	Fred Whitfield
Willie Bloomquist	Don Ross	Bob Jones	Don Ross
Yuniesky Betancourt	Deivi Cruz	Lonny Frey	Aaron Hill

Encouraging: Butler's comps (even if his current #1 means that he'll be hosting a fishing show after retiring at 34).

Discouraging: $12M for a Kevin McReynolds comp.

How about pitchers?

Pitchers	is most similar to	or	Last year, he was most similar to
Zack Greinke	Ralph Terry	Ben Sheets	Ben Sheets
Brian Bannister	Shawn Boskie	Sean Bergman	Rodrigo Lopez
Luke Hochevar	Brian Rose	Chad Durbin	Seth Greisinger
Kyle Davies	Brian Meadows	Frank Rodriguez	Jamey Wright
Gil Meche	Todd Stottlemyre	Matt Clement	Jason Marquis
Joakim Soria	Rod Beck	Rawly Eastwick	Bruce Sutter
Kyle Farnsworth	Dan Miceli	Mike Trombley	Jay Witasick

Brian Meadows was traded for Dan Miceli and Jay Witasick in under a year. Both Miceli and Witasick were Royals although Miceli was traded for Stan Belinda. Meadows also comped by age to Kyle Davies, Joe Mays, Albie Lopez, and former 2003 Omaha Royal James Baldwin in four separate years. Making Meadows the ultimate Robinson/Baird-era Royals pitcher.

So, what are the surprises and the signs of concern here?

Confidential sources forward this photo of Dayton Moore hard at work making the Royals better for...

BHWick — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 08:55:36 -0000

Confidential sources forward this photo of Dayton Moore hard at work making the Royals better for the 2010 season

Word on the street (or 610) is that the Royals have declined options on Olivo, Yabuta, and...

BHWick — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 18:34:03 -0000

Word on the street (or 610) is that the Royals have declined options on Olivo, Yabuta, and Crisp.

But how will this team survive in 2010 without 3 catchers on the 25 man roster?

The Royals Offense is the #1 problem

BHWick — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 02:20:21 -0000

Plain and simple. The defense has deep flaws, The relief pitching became far worse when DM thought "Inexpensive relievers were good, therefore expensive ones will be better", and the starting pitching fell apart due to the stretching out of most of the rotation.

But the offense put up the following stats in 2009: .318 OBP, .259 BA, .405 SLG, .452 Expected bases.

The Royals were 13th in runs (ahead of the Mariners), 13th in home runs (ahead of the Athletics), 13th in walks (ahead of the Mariners), 13th in OBP (ahead of the Mariners), 13th in OPS (ahead of the Mariners), 12th in OPS+ (ahead of the Mariners and White Sox). But the Royals are 1st in triples and they're 7th in sac bunts (Ryan must be shocked that being 7th in sac bunts isn't enough to make our offense more dynamic).

So why is Offense so important?

4 of the top 5 OBP teams are in the AL playoffs, or in contention. The worst OBP team in playoff contention is Detroit (.330). The top three OPS teams are the Yankees, Red Sox, and Angels. The top three AL teams are the Yankees, Red Sox, and Angels. The top 4 OPS+ teams are 4 teams in playoff contention (New York, Boston, Los Angeles, and Minnesota).

To have even a remote shot at the playoffs, your offense needs to be average. You cannot continue to rely exclusively on patching up the pitching and defense while ignoring the deficiency that places too much pressure on pitching and defense.

So why did our offense fail so often this year? We did not get any production out of the DH spot or the cleanup spot.

Here's the bloody numbers based on batting order position

Split	PA	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
Batting 1st	737	642	100	178	31	11	13	69	77	96	0.277	0.359	0.421	0.780
Batting 2nd	722	673	71	160	22	10	7	54	37	127	0.238	0.279	0.331	0.610
Batting 3rd	705	639	78	188	47	3	24	100	54	109	0.294	0.352	0.490	0.842
Batting 4th	691	626	71	132	23	2	13	71	54	157	0.211	0.281	0.316	0.597
Batting 5th	678	608	79	180	37	3	16	79	59	111	0.296	0.361	0.446	0.807
Batting 6th	661	605	77	154	29	3	29	82	53	125	0.255	0.317	0.456	0.773
Batting 7th	641	587	73	164	36	6	16	77	43	129	0.279	0.329	0.443	0.772
Batting 8th	624	568	67	138	28	8	20	82	43	127	0.243	0.300	0.426	0.726
Batting 9th	600	545	66	126	19	4	5	39	35	101	0.231	0.277	0.308	0.585

With a .279 OBP batting 2nd and a .281 OBP batting third, it's a miracle that we got 100 RBI out of the three-hole. If having three of the worst offensive spots directly in front of three of the best spots isn't enough of a sign of how awful this offense was, what is a way to get that point across?

How about a breakdown of various spots of the lineup to summarize what went right and what went wrong.

	PA	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
David DeJesus	426	376	56	115	19	4	10	50	40	53	0.306	0.378	0.457	0.835
Coco Crisp	208	173	30	39	8	5	3	14	29	22	0.225	0.338	0.382	0.720

Apologies to people who think that Crisp having 3 times as many stolen bases makes him better than DeJesus despite DeJesus being much much better at things that help the team out. Also gotta love that DeJesus scraped together 50 RBI hitting in the leadoff spot.

So, who hit 2nd for most of this year?

	PA	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
Mitch Maier	130	115	16	30	3	1	2	14	11	29	0.261	0.336	0.357	0.692
Willie Bloomquist	326	306	38	80	7	7	4	25	17	48	0.261	0.299	0.369	0.669
David DeJesus	106	102	6	21	6	2	1	8	2	23	0.206	0.221	0.333	0.554

Good thing that we chose to have Bloomy anchor our offense (along with getting DDJ through the slump portion of his season in the 2 hole). Can't wait to see DeJesus shoehorned into the 2 spot next year as Scott Podsednik hits leadoff.

The 3 spot is a story of Billy Butler, outside of the random time given to Mark Teahen in the 3 hole for a reason that I can't remember.

But the cleanup spot is another great tale of fail.

	PA	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
Jose Guillen	199	181	19	38	5	0	6	21	13	29	0.210	0.281	0.337	0.618
Mike Jacobs	249	224	22	47	5	1	4	24	23	65	0.210	0.285	0.295	0.580
Mark Teahen	112	104	16	22	8	0	0	9	5	37	0.212	0.259	0.288	0.547

I can't wait to see Designated Hitter Jose Guillen batting cleanup next year. Mike Jacobs' year is pretty obviously bad. He only got 249 PA in the cleanup spot, so if he returns, expect Trey to give him 249 more. And Mark Teahen somehow did not live up to his reputation for clutch hitting in the cleanup spot.

And here is how the lineup looks if you plug the most frequent hitter into that spot

		PA	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
1st	DeJesus	426	376	56	115	19	4	10	50	40	53	0.306	0.378	0.457	0.835
2nd	Bloomquist	326	306	38	80	7	7	4	25	17	48	0.261	0.299	0.369	0.669
3rd	Butler	547	499	62	154	42	1	19	81	42	81	0.309	0.362	0.511	0.873
4th	Jacobs	249	224	22	47	5	1	4	24	23	65	0.210	0.285	0.295	0.580
5th	Callaspo	274	246	32	74	15	3	5	32	25	26	0.301	0.361	0.447	0.808
6th	Teahen	208	191	24	48	8	0	7	21	15	33	0.251	0.309	0.403	0.712
7th	Callaspo	154	139	19	46	10	2	3	21	12	13	0.331	0.383	0.496	0.880
8th	Olivo	144	137	15	33	3	1	7	17	2	51	0.241	0.273	0.431	0.703
9th	Yuni	152	141	16	35	5	4	1	11	6	16	0.248	0.273	0.362	0.635

Can't understand how the offense has problems with that group of players.

In an ideal world

the Royals would dump Jacobs, Guillen, and Olivo. But Guillen is stuck here due to the idiocy of Dayton Moore. Jacobs should be gone (if DM actually consults with Trey on roster moves, Trey has given up on Jacobs), and Olivo should be gone, especially due to his glaring flaws. Then we need to sign or acquire a proven catcher just to strengthen our team if Brayan Pena turns out to be a fluke.

This team should

1. Either let DeJesus bat leadoff, or trade him for actual useful players. The next centerfielder to get a payday by this team is gonna bat leadoff due to the 1970s mentality of the braintrust.

2. Groom Gordon to hit in the 2 spot if he can prove that this year was a fluke. If DeJesus stays, then the top 3 should be DeJesus, Gordon, Butler. If DeJesus goes, then the top 3 should be Callaspo, Gordon, Butler.

3. Consider the possibility of transitioning Billy Butler into the cleanup spot. Batting Jose Guillen cleanup next year will likely fail to help this team's offense. As well, the team needs a good cleanup spot option for when Guillen is injured. So possibly, the top 4 could be DeJesus, Gordon, Callaspo, Butler.

4. Realize that they traded for a guy who will bad 9th and not contribute much on offense or defense. Not that they can do much with Yuni.

5. Commit themselves to keeping Alberto Callaspo. Trading/Demoting one of your best hitters after this disaster of an offensive year sends the message of "Another 2009". Callaspo hits the ball on a team where there's not enough of that. Perhaps Callaspo can be the next Royals DH when Guillen is hurt. YES DAYTON, YOU CAN HAVE A DESIGNATED HITTER WHO ISN'T CONSIDERED A POWER HITTER.

6. Consider the offers for Mark Teahen and make a move if we can improve the team down the road. Teahen has peaked and it's time to go another direction.

7. Get serious about Brayan Pena. If he has such obvious defensive problems, either work on the problems or trade him. Pena has been good in small doses, provided that he's not batting left-handed or playing DH.

8. Not bat Willie Bloomquist in the top of the order. If you insist on using Willie's speed, put him 9th and hope that he can move Yuniesky over a base.

The Royals should not

1. Bring back Josh Anderson. It's one thing to be fast and useful. But Anderson is only slightly faster than the usual player and not too useful.

2. Expect Willie Bloomquist to be a top of the order hitter. Use him in the role he played in Seattle, not the one he played this year. He does not have enough pop in his bat to be successful in the K.

Plain and simple, the 2009 Royals offense was one of the worst in Royals history and probably the worst when compared to the times we live in.

You could have Seaver, Ryan, The Big Unit, Clemens, and Pedro playing, with 9 gold glovers, and if your offense is 13th in the league, you will not contend.

It's time that this team's braintrust realize what plays well in this ballpark and in modern-day baseball. Because if they do not, then they will continue to lose.

The Craptacular Mr. Farnsworth. A moment in history

BHWick — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 03:40:10 -0000

An account of History from the Sports Argument Stadium on SomethingAwful

settes: Yessssssssssssss

Captain Charisma: ROWDY KYLE

humpthewind: Have the yankees ever seen this lerew guy before? ROWDY IN TO CLOSE IT!

Nodoze: did kyle farnsworth just throw a changeup

leokitty: no his fastball speed is just crappy now

Nodoze: No it was definitely a changeup, it was slower and actually moved

Mikeraskol: Don't let Rowdy Kyle get a save against us please

Attorney At Funk: what the gently caress is that kyle farnsworth

RalphTheWonderLlama: I have never been happier to be part of The Kyle Farnsworth Experience

RalphTheWonderLlama: yankees win just because he gave up hits to cervelli and hinske.

Help The Hogs!: haha this is the Farnsworth I've missed

Captain Charisma: ROWDY KYLE DOES IT AGAIN

AbsentLife: hahah Farnsworth's worst nightmare is coming true

Haud: I didn't know Hinske was capable of stealing bases.

Scoobi: LOL royals IBB Damon

RalphTheWonderLlama: Kyle Farnsworth three step process:

1. Throw fastball for ball one

2. Throw fastball harder to fix problem. Ball two.

3. Clearly the problem is not enough heat. Leave fastball belt high, give up home run.

lol Hinske

Leokitty: farnsworth status: THROWING HARDER

will probably work versus miranda

Leokitty: kyle farnsworth is the best kyle farnsworth ever

Settes: True Yankee Kyle Farnsworth

and an unrelated post:

Detroit_Dogg: Man, this team is really missing Josh Anderson's speed and grit.

Luke Hochevar has a lot in common with Chris Carpenter

BHWick — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 17:48:48 -0000

Luke Hochevar has a lot in common with Chris Carpenter

Provided that you ignore Carpenter's age 24/25 seasons being significantly better than Hochevar's age 24/25 seasons (Carpenter's ERA+ was over 100 in 1999, Hochevar's highest ERA+ was 77 in 2008). Just because Carpenter had a rollercoaster time in Toronto and Hochevar has a rollercoaster time in Kansas City doesn't mean that Hochevar is going to turn out like Carpenter, especially when Carpenter is clearly performing better.

Not to mention that Carpenter's age 23 was better than average and that he was in the Toronto system since 1993.

I'd add more, if the Play Index was working

Hillman and the Pen: Part 1 of a series

BHWick — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 04:47:26 -0000

One of the things we learn repeatedly watching this team is that Trey Hillman is awful at handling pitchers. It's likely to be a problem that didn't just occur this year. Future installments of this series will go over the Torquemada-esque usage of starting pitchers on this team and we can look back at 2008.

Another thing we learn repeatedly watching this team is that the bullpen is awful. The bullpen ERA is 5.05, and that's counting Soria. But what about a more haunting possibility, that the bullpen, while craptacular, has been misused by Trey Hillman?

First, a primer on the chart that is under the fold. Only Royals with 10 appearances in relief were included. RA is relief appearances. MI-RA is multiple inning relief appearances (keeping in mind that some of the MIRAs were 3 outs over 2 innings or attempting to pitch over 2 innings), BODwn is the number of games entered with the Royals down 4 or more. CGDwn is when the Royals were down by 1, 2 or 3. CGUp is when the Royals were up by 1, 2, or 3. BOUp is when the Royals were up by 4 or more. And there is a Misc column for the 3 saves Soria registered despite entering with a 4+ run lead. DTU are the percentages. The rest should be clear.

	RA	MI		IP	pit	P/RA	IP/RA	P/IP	BODn	CGDn	Tie	CGUp	BOUp	m	D	T	U
Wright	64	31	48%	77.0	1325	20.70	1.20	17.21	8	19	12	14	11		42%	19%	39%
Soria	46	10	22%	52.0	881	19.15	1.13	16.94	5	0	5	29	4	3	11%	11%	78%
Colon	41	18	44%	48.7	771	18.80	1.19	15.84	15	11	5	8	2		63%	12%	24%
Cruz	44	14	32%	48.3	935	21.25	1.10	19.34	12	13	4	12	3		57%	9%	34%
Tejeda	29	19	66%	42.0	815	28.10	1.45	19.40	12	11	1	4	1		79%	3%	17%
Mahay	41	18	44%	41.3	750	18.29	1.01	18.15	16	11	6	4	4		66%	15%	20%
Farnsworth	40	7	18%	40.0	648	16.20	1.00	16.20	12	11	5	5	7		58%	13%	30%
Bale	42	6	14%	27.3	525	12.50	0.65	19.21	6	13	4	16	2		45%	10%	43%
Ramirez	18	8	44%	18.3	299	16.61	1.02	16.31	6	6	1	3	2		67%	6%	28%
Yabuta	10	3	30%	11.0	275	27.50	1.10	25.00	3	4	2	1	0		70%	20%	10%

Now it's time for a reliever by reliever assessment.

We start with the Royals most prolific reliever of 2009, Jamey Wright. Before making history with the 2009 Royals, Jamey was the 51st starting pitcher on the memorable 2003 Kansas City Royals, and the Royals chose to let Eduardo Villacis start a game in 2004 instead of calling up Jamey from Omaha. Of the regular relievers, Jamey was the most called upon in a tie game. Only 1 of Jamey's 5 losses game when he entered in a tie game. Although another entry in a tie situation was the game vs the Angels in July when he entered, loaded the bases with 2 walks, and then Soria let the runs score.

Jamey Wright threw 49 pitches in 3 innings over 2 days vs. Toronto in late April. He got a day off. Although he did get 4 days off after 43 pitches vs the White Sox. He followed 24 pitches on June 18th with 55 pitches on June 19th after a gruesome Kyle Davies meltdown. He received one day off, then threw 25 pitches on June 21st. He threw 32 pitches on July 11th, followed by 26 on July 12th. He also threw both ends of a doubleheader because when you pay for one game and get two, you demand two times the Jamey Wright. Wright has been consistently regular in his usage, with between 9 1/3 to 15 innings per month, which suggests that he is either the toughest man living, due for Tommy John in the offseason, or proof that the "sinkerball pitchers work better when tired" saying is slightly true.

Next to the only reliever who you could depend upon. In the good ol' days of Baseball where you could only see one game a week on TV and park on some guy's lawn when going to the park, the best relief pitcher might be used whenever there was a tough relief spot. But nowadays, we let that reliever sit on his butt until the 8th and pitch the 9th if we're up by 3 or less. Although after multiple 8th inning failures, Trey Hillman told us he would not use Joakim Soria for more than 4 outs due to concerns over his arm, before using him multiple times for 6 outs. The quirk in Soria's usage is him never entering with the Royals down by 3 or less. But with our talented offense, we don't need our best reliever to keep us in games.

Joakim Soria started the year as an orthodox closer, then somewhere around late April, he was held back for a week. He returned to pitch multiple innings in extra-innings (19 pitches). Followed by another 19 pitch outing the next day for a save. After a few days on the downlow, Soria threw 29 pitches in an inning, went on the DL, and the Royals season went down the commode. When Joakim returned, the Royals deteriorated into a scene out of Mad Max where Mike Jacobs and Miguel Olivo were feuding over the usage of the go-cart and Jose Guillen declared himself Lord Humungous.

Ok, it didn't get that bad, but Soria was used a bit more carefully in June (although the lack of save opportunities kind of made that easy). Soria pitched in 3 games with the Royals down 7 or more in June. Soria's July started with 4 saves and a random appearance in mopup duty. Then he didn't show up for 10 days as the Royals pen repeatedly blew the game in the 8th inning. He made his return from the Fortress of Solitude to pitch in a game that the Royals were down by 8 (the Ponson/Chen doubleheader). Soria made his first 2-inning save on July 25th after assuring Trey that his arm was not in immiment danger of falling off. Soria has saved 6 games after entering in the 8th, with only his save vereus Texas and the last save vereus Minnesota coming with the Royals up 3 and Soria notching 6 outs. Soria's last appearance was his hardest, with 46 pitches. His save against Boston was the first time this year he came out to pitch on the day after throwing 20 or more pitches in his last appearance.

Maybe those of you who predicted that Roman Colon would register the third most relief innings in this season are going to Vegas this October. But Colon's usage is proof that if you stay healthy and the team is losing often enough, you will pitch. Roman Colon did mainly pitch in games that the Royals were losing, making his bad habit of strikeout celebrations a bit more annoying than usual. But Roman Colon is the pitcher who would not go away on this team, because of the Major League demand for 30 year old relievers with ERAs in the 5s.

Roman Colon's usage pattern is more a pattern of random disappearances. Colon threw 4 2/3 IP in his first 5 games, which spanned a period of 2 weeks (including Colon resting 5 days after a 4 pitch outing). Trey's ability to randomly forget that Colon was on the team helped Colon avoid bizarre overuse (that, and Colon's inability to pitch good). If Roman Colon is pitching 40 times for your team, it's a sign that your team sucks.

More expensive does not always equal better, such is the case with Juan Cruz. Juan Cruz was the one relief acquisition that didn't induce protectile vomiting, proving that transaction analysis is not an exact science. What in the hell happened to Juan Cruz is still a bit of a mystery, although the results we see here show that Juan threw lots of pitches per appearance, made a few multiple inning appearances, and quickly worked his way out of a position of trust with Trey Hillman.

Cruz's usage has some quirks. Such as 27 pitches on June 26th after throwing on June 25th. Or 33 pitches on July 9th after pitching on July 8th. But after the all-star break, Cruz's season pretty much went in the tank. He gave up 14 earned runs in the span of 7 innings in 8 appearances (after giving up 18 ER in 39 2/3 IP before the break). He blew saves in two straight games (22 pitches on July 17th followed by 12 on July 18th). Hillman exiled him to mopup duty. Then he went on the DL after throwing 40 pitches in 2 innings. Bizarrely enough, Cruz returned from the DL and threw 41 pitches in 1 1/2 innings pitched. Typically, running a guy out fresh off his DL stint for his second-highest pitch count of the year is weird, at best. How much of the Cruz situation involves him refusing to disclose problems with health or undisclosed flaws/tips in his delivery is unknown.

It was through determination that Robinson Tejeda made it this high on the list. Tejeda's success as a starter has been surprising (but one must abide by the Lima rule and wait for 8 starts or so before declaring the success as real or not). But his usage before then suggests a man being stretched for work as a starter, or a happy coincidence. Tejeda threw the most pitches per appearance. But he also entered with the Royals down almost 4 out of 5 appearances.

Tejada's debut was a 52 pitch relief outing. Followed by 11 pitches in the next 10 days. Tejeda threw 53 pitches in late April, rested 2 days, threw 29 pitches, rested 3 days, and threw 41 pitches. Then he rested for a week, threw 11 pitches, rested a day, threw 43 pitches. Tejeda threw 43 and 31 pitches before going on the DL for a month. That surprised me at the time, because I didn't notice how much work Tejeda got, pitch-wise. After a month-long DL stint, Tejeda threw 18 pitches and rested for 9 days. Credit to Tejeda for his 3 inning, 25 pitch outing in Baltimore, although he rested one day after that and got shelled in his next outing. Generally, Tejeda's usage was in long relief, while allocating more crucial innings to lousier relievers. If Tejeda returns to the pen in 2010, he would be much more useful throwing multiple innings with a Royals lead.

How Ron Mahay got 40 innings of work with the Royals is a mystery. Mahay's April and May were normal, in regards to how often he got the ball. It can be argued that his injury last year was the number one factor in his problems this year (then again, why we sign relievers for 2 years is another problem altogether, we should have traded him last year). But Ron Mahay once had a 3.45 ERA after throwing 45 pitches in 1 2/3 innings.

Then he gave up 2 runs against Detroit and John Bale took Mahay's place in Trey Hillman's heart. Ron Mahay threw 33 pitches on June 3rd, took a week off, threw 7 pitches on June 10th, took a week off, threw 10 pitches on June 17th, and was finally able to convince Trey Hillman that he was still on the roster. Mahay had several more week long rest periods as he recharged in the revitalization pod that he bought from Michael Jackson. Ron Mahay was released into the wild in late August and found a new home with the Minnesota Twins. The Mahay release was unfortunate because Mahay is probably better than John Bale, and the release of Mahay brought the return of Yabuta. That, and we managed to turn down offers of actual players for Mahay in 2008 only to release him in 2009. Dayton Moore is not good at blackjack.

Did you ever go to a garage sale and buy some useless junk? Do you realize that fast food drinks cost around $1.35 when you could pay 75 cents for the same thing from a vending machine? Did you notice that overpaying relief pitchers didn't help this team? The story of Kyle Farnsworth is one of stat padding and repeated epic fail when he was most needed. Smoking at the gas pump is smarter than putting Kyle Farnsworth in a game with a tie or 1 run lead. Farnsworth wasn't used too much in multiple innings, although he recently pitched multiple innings despite having health concerns. There's not usually much pitch count abuse to worry about with Farnsworth since he'll either blow the game open or mop things up without throwing many pitches.

It's a crucial situation, time for the Royals lead dependable guy when it comes to inherited runners! John Bale returned from the disabled list with an awesome outing 2 days after turning 35, which made people forget that he was a 35 year old journeyman. In situations where there was a tie or lead, Bale has either blown the lead or put the Royals behind on 7 occasions. Bale threw 27 pitches in an outing once, but most of the time, he doesn't even pitch an inning. Trey Hillman doesn't believe in LOOGYs but if he did, he'd realize that John Bale is one. Bale has been unspeakably awful against RH batters this year and Trey basically exposes how awful he is with strategy by not realizing this. Extra note: The Royals once carried 3 LH relievers and 3 catchers while only carrying 3 bench players (2 of which were usually catchers).

Actually, I almost overlooked that HoRam qualified for this list. Ramirez is currently ~~pitching a team to the pennant~~ surfing. The overuse of Horacio Ramirez was also the inspiration for my first rant on relief pitching, which did not pinpoint that Tejeda was being worked hard and was going to be on the DL soon. The only insane thing about the usage of Horacio Ramirez is that he was kept around for 2 months. If you don't recall, Moore released Ramirez after finding that no team wished to give us a toolsy South American outfielder in exchange for an overpaid crappy reliever.

And last but not least, Yasuhiko "Shake'n'bake" Yabuta. For some bizarre reason, Trey Hillman decided to try out a guy who is an obvious one-inning guy in spots where he pitched multiple innings or was expected to pitch multiple innings. Yabuta blew the Oakland game wide open after Brian Bannister broke down. He lost the game to the Angels in the 11th. He somehow won a freaking game vs. Detroit. Then he blew a lead against them 2 days later. He mopped up and surrendered a run 2 days later. Then he disappeared for a week. He returned to pitch the 5th after Dusty Hughes' season-ending injury (BTW, yes he also surrendered a lot of runs there). He gave up a run to Boston on the 21st but received a win, then he surrended another run to Boston on the 24th. Yabuta then pitched the 8th inning on September 26th and gave up 4 runs. Yabuta has given up 18 earned runs in 11 innings, after giving up 20 in 37 2/3 IP in 2008.

Joakim Soria has given up 13 earned runs all year and Yabuta has given up 18 earned runs in a month.

When you have the perfect storm of a mediocre pen and a manager who is awful at handling a bullpen, you get the 2009 Kansas City Royals bullpen. It's a bullpen where everybody must randomly pitch 2 innings. It's a bullpen so distrusted that the closer has to come out to pitch 2 innings with a 3 run lead. It's a bullpen that has freaking Roman Benedicto Colon pitching in it for 4 months straight.

The Royals bullpen is an Amtrak train of suck handled by a lousy conductor.

And that is a look at the 2009 Royals bullpen and how they have been used this year.

The Kauffman Effect

BHWick — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 00:27:57 -0000

.248/.303/.386. That's not Willie Bloomquist's hitting line. That's Billy Butler's line on the road. Billy Butler hits .355/.404/.586 at home. He has 13 HRs in 306 home PA. He has 25 doubles at home and 20 on the road.

The Royals hit .274/.337/.418 at home and .237/.287/.384 on the road.

So how does the team break down?

Their home stats before today's game (for players with 100+ PAs at home):

	G	PA	AB	H	2B	3B	HR	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
Billy Butler	71	301	273	97	25	0	13	24	40	0.355	0.405	0.590	0.995
Alberto Callaspo	68	275	246	82	16	3	4	26	10	0.333	0.396	0.472	0.868
David DeJesus	70	307	272	82	16	7	4	22	33	0.301	0.362	0.456	0.818
Mike Jacobs	59	230	202	54	15	1	7	27	53	0.267	0.357	0.455	0.812
Mark Teahen	70	290	260	74	13	1	6	25	51	0.285	0.352	0.412	0.763
Miguel Olivo	50	185	176	42	7	2	10	7	61	0.239	0.272	0.472	0.743
Jose Guillen	43	162	140	36	3	0	4	16	22	0.257	0.358	0.364	0.722
Mitch Maier	58	160	137	36	8	2	1	14	28	0.263	0.342	0.372	0.714
Coco Crisp	25	108	88	18	3	5	0	18	13	0.205	0.346	0.352	0.698
Yuniesky Betancourt	27	106	99	24	6	2	0	4	11	0.242	0.267	0.343	0.610
Willie Bloomquist	57	209	191	46	3	2	0	13	25	0.241	0.286	0.277	0.564

So we see that the usual subjects are in the top 3. But that Mike Jacobs hits like a respectable player at home. Olivo hits like Olivo. And Willie Bloomquist hasn't figured out the hitting background yet but he has an impressive 41 singles in 46 hits.

How about some road hitting stats?

	G	PA	AB	H	2B	3B	HR	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
Miguel Olivo	48	168	162	41	7	2	8	3	51	0.253	0.280	0.469	0.749
Coco Crisp	24	107	92	23	5	0	3	11	10	0.250	0.327	0.402	0.729
Willie Bloomquist	51	190	179	48	4	5	4	10	36	0.268	0.307	0.413	0.720
David DeJesus	63	276	248	61	11	2	8	24	48	0.246	0.314	0.403	0.717
Mark Teahen	63	236	225	59	19	0	5	8	65	0.262	0.297	0.413	0.710
Alberto Callaspo	64	257	241	63	15	3	4	15	23	0.261	0.304	0.398	0.702
Billy Butler	65	267	246	61	20	1	4	20	48	0.248	0.303	0.386	0.690
Mitch Maier	46	131	113	26	6	1	2	16	28	0.230	0.323	0.354	0.677
Jose Guillen	38	150	141	32	5	0	5	6	28	0.227	0.267	0.369	0.635
Yuniesky Betancourt	24	81	74	14	1	2	3	6	8	0.189	0.250	0.378	0.628
Mike Jacobs	52	181	173	35	1	0	10	7	57	0.202	0.238	0.382	0.619

Who is #1 on this list should tell you what you need to know about our hitting on the road. Essentially this team is tolerable on offense at home, and awful on the road. Also got to love that Willie Bloomquist has 13 XBHs on the road, as opposed to 5 at home. And the total lack of ability of most of this team to draw walks when they're not dealing with the hitting background at the K. Example: Teahen having 25 of 33 walks at home. Jacobs having 27 of 34 walks at home. Olivo having 7 of 10 walks at home.

The Royals' OPS split between Home and Road for the last 15 years

	H-OPS	A-OPS	diff
2009	0.755	0.670	0.085
2008	0.722	0.713	0.009
2007	0.731	0.689	0.042
2006	0.788	0.699	0.089
2005	0.724	0.708	0.016
2004	0.703	0.734	-0.031
2003	0.774	0.754	0.020
2002	0.790	0.652	0.138
2001	0.742	0.713	0.029
2000	0.817	0.730	0.087
1999	0.802	0.760	0.042
1998	0.733	0.715	0.018
1997	0.771	0.710	0.061
1996	0.726	0.735	-0.009
1995	0.728	0.721	0.007

So basically this team is hitting like a lousy version of the 1999-2003 dynasty at home, and hitting a lot worse on the road. The only splits larger were 2000, 2002, and 2006. 2000 had Johnny Damon hitting .361 at home and .292 on the road. Beltran put up a .596 OPS on the road and .755 OPS at home in 2000.

Michael Tucker was the 2nd best hitter at home in 2002 (.328/.408/.542) while being the second worst hitter on the road (.169/.250/.270).

In 2006, Doug Mientkiewicz hit .333/.400/.471 at home to be the Royals second best hitter at home and he hit .236/321/.354 on the road.

There is a Kauffman Effect. Some hitters hit much better here, some hit much worse. But for the sake of not sucking for half of the games, we could use good hitters who are good for all 162 games. Kauffman Stadium is a hitter friendly ballpark. Building this team around players who can only hit there is not going to work. Building this team around glove-first players (Hitting and Defense) forgets that this team's offense has been the biggest drag on its success this year. Players who can fit into this park and hit outside of it are players that will make this team a lot better.

TPJ is the Clutch God at pitching

BHWick — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 03:03:44 -0000

TPJ is the Clutch God at pitching

The summary from Omaha. 2-2 game in the 11th. TPJ comes in to pitch. Allows a single. Bunt moves the runner. Then two outs. TPJ struck out 2 in the 12th. Two groundouts in the 13th, a single, then with a runner in scoring position, another strikeout. 3 IP, 3 K, 2 H. 34 pitches, 24 strikes.

Then he left the game and the next guy blew it in the 15th.

TPJ NOW

Luis Hernandez called up, starts Sunday

BHWick — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 17:41:52 -0000

Luis Hernandez called up, starts Sunday

Fun fact: Luis Hernandez's MLEs have him hitting better than Willie Bloomquist. Just something that you TPJJ chanters should know. If Luis is TPJJ, Willie Bloomquist would have to be the White TPJ, right? (or Bloomquist might be JME, Joe McEwing)