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I’ve been away… did you miss me? I missed you.
Unfortunately, October has been a great time for Royals fans to escape for the last 24 or so years. I can cut myself off from baseball for a week or so and the only thing I’ll miss is a Steve Phillips Slumpbuster or a Mariano Rivera spitball. Unless either of those things matter to you, it’s just about the best time of the year to take a vacation.
Anyway, here are a couple of Royal tidbits from the last week or so with a little commentary thrown in.
ITEM: The Royals name Nick Kenney as their new head trainer.
Kenney was an assistant trainer with the Cincinnati Reds from 2003 to 2004 and has been with the Indians in the same capacity since 2005. The Cleveland training staff was named the best in baseball by Baseball Prospectus and the Professional Baseball Athletic Trainers Association in 2007.
A positive from this: The Royals wisely went outside the organization to fill this position. When you have a training staff that couldn’t remove a band-aid, you need to think about going in a different direction.
And Cleveland does seem to be doing mostly the correct things when it comes to injury. I mean, somehow Kerry Wood avoided the DL last year. Hopefully, Kenney had something to do with that.
ITEM: Zack Greinke was named the Sporting News AL Pitcher of the Year.
It’s not the big award, but still…
This award was voted on by GMs and assistant GMs around the game. While awards such as this don’t carry the same kind of publicity as some of the other hardware that will be handed out next month, it has to be extremely gratifying that the guys who are supposed to be the game’s top talent evaulators recognize Greinke’s outstanding year.
My colleagues at Baseball Daily Digest did a vote in a format similar to the one used for the Cy Young and Greinke finished first with 14 out of 15 first place votes. Somehow, he was third on one ballot. CC Sabathia was the only other pitcher to earn a first place vote. That’s embarrassing.
The Cy Young will be announced on November 17th.
ITEM: Hal McRae was let go as the hitting coach for the St. Louis Cardinals and was replaced by Mark McGwire.
As far as McRae goes, I’m sure this is of interest to a number of fans, but there’s nothing to see here. Kevin Seitzer is your hitting coach for 2010 and Trey Hillman is your manager. You are certainly free to dream, but I’m just trying to caution you to not get too worked up over this.
No, Seitzer didn’t have a great first year as the Royals hitting coach, but again, he’s not dealing with major league caliber hitters. Sure, there are some, but there are too many guys who have no business being in the big leagues on this club. I’m not sure anyone can deal with this crew. For now, I’ll buy into Dayton Moore’s mantra that patience is necessary. For now.
And if you want (or are hoping) McRae would return to KC to manage… Please. I have no clue if he’s still bitter about his time here and the way it ended, but he doesn’t strike me as someone who let’s things like this go away easily. Even though there is a total new regime in place, I don’t think he’ll ever return. Besides, I think I saw somewhere that he’s not interested in managing again.
Actually, I’m more interested in the sideshow that’s going to happen in the big top in St. Louis now that Mark McGwire is back with the team. I can’t wait for that first confrontation in spring training when McGwire is asked about steroids, because you just know he’ll say something about not talking about the past. This will be high comedy that has potential to devolve into a large distraction for the Cardinals. I’m fine with that.
ITEM: AFL Update
A few minor leaguers of note are toiling in Arizona. Jerrod Dyson is hitting .333/.333/.467 in 15 at bats. Jeff Bianchi is .313/.378/.438 in 32 at bats. And Mike Moustakas is .276/.313/.483 in 29 at bats. Moustakas is tied for second on the team with 9 RBI.
Blake Wood has thrown five innings in two starts and has a 3.60 ERA. All players are on the Surprise Rafters.
Following the Facebook Fiasco, I wonder how strange things are for the Royals minor league department when they watch Danny Gutierrez pitch for the Rafters. He hasn’t allowed a run in 6.2 innings spanning a pair of starts.
I don't know about you guys, but I can't wait until the World Series is over and the first bone headed move by our General Manager to announce the off season.
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Comments
I'm not asking for much of GMDM, but is offering Jose Guillen for Milton Bradley that hard?? Sure the Cubs would be crazy to take you up on that, but you never know unless you ask. Heck, Seattle was able to unload Yuniesky Betanacourt for two live humans because they were willing to ask.