Winless in Seattle
The Royals are spurned in their attempt to collect a win in the Pacific Northwest. Another Meg Ryan rom-com? Sadly, no.
Well, that’s as forgettable a baseball weekend that I can remember.
A quick recap of the lowlights:
Twice on Friday, the Royals had a runner on second with one out. They got no further. The only time a Royal batter touched third all evening was when Salvador Perez hit it while circling the bases on his home run.
On Saturday, the Royals exploded for seven runs—tying their season-high—yet missed chances continued to be the theme. In this contest, the Royals had a runner on third with less than two outs in the first and the fifth they failed to bring home. (Those followed where they actually cashed in with a runner on third and less than two outs, but still…a missed opportunity is a missed opportunity.)
Sunday…Sunday was just painful.
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Inside Outside Upside Down
The title of a children’s book seems an apt description of this team’s production.
Let’s just lay it out, because there’s no use sugarcoating it.
The Royals have played 14 games. They have scored four or more runs in a game just five times. That alone…not great. (They are averaging 3.1 runs per game.)
Of those games where they have scored four or more runs, they’ve won one time. Yep. When the Royals score runs, they can’t win. Their record is 1-4 when they score four or more runs.
They are actually 4-5 when scoring three or fewer runs.
We are barely into the third week of 2022 and nothing makes sense.
A whiff that turns into a stench
Royals batters don’t strike out much. It’s about the only thing you can say about the offense that counts as praise. Even after striking out a season-high 13 times on Sunday, their total of 102 whiffs on the year still is the fewest in the majors.
Bobby Witt Jr. has swung and missed on just under 15 percent of his swings. Not great, but maybe what we should have expected in his first month in the big leagues. A look at his pitch chart on the swings and misses can be illuminating. (Note: All of the following whiff rates and charts are through Saturday’s games.)
He’s having a tough time with the slider down and away. He’ll also miss on some offerings up in the zone, but it’s mostly about those sliders on the edge or just outside of the strike zone.
The next two Royals with a bit of swing and miss in their game, have similar difficulties with the slider. Salvador Perez misses on just over 16 percent of his swings.
We’ve watched Salvy swing and miss enough over the last decade or so, we don’t really need a pitch chart to tell us where he’s going to miss. Sliders down and away and elevated fastballs. He just can’t help himself.
Hunter Dozier misses on 17 percent of his swings. Again…it’s all about that slider.
I kind of dig the cutters mixed in that group down and off the plate. It feels like he’s super consistent that way.
I’m not pointing out the swing and miss to dog on these guys. Perez and Dozier are the thunder in the Royals lineup. There’s traditionally going to be some whiffs to go along with the dingers. That’s a tradeoff that’s been accepted for decades. It’s now more accepted than ever. It kind of is what it is. As for Witt, he’ll figure it out. I remain confident of that.
Now I haven’t even gotten to the leader on the Royals in whiff rate. That would be Adalberto Mondesi, who struck out four times on Sunday and seven times in the series. He misses on a whopping 22.6 percent of all swings he takes. Here, you try and find something…
Changeups down. Sliders off the plate. Curves below the zone. Elevated cutters. Four-seamers…down the chute?
Lordy.
The last time Mondesi didn’t strike out in a game was back on April 14 in the first game of the last homestand. In the eight games since then, he’s gone 3-27 with 14 strikeouts. Get this…TWO OF THOSE HITS CAME ON BUNTS.
Sure, the defense still plays and the speed, as they say, does not slump. Hell, he managed to swipe two bags on Sunday despite striking out in four of his five plate appearances. (Thank you, Mr. Manfred, for that stupid free runner rule.) But it’s just insane we are talking about a 26-year-old who has spent parts of seven different seasons in the big leagues and it’s just not working. At all.
I’m looking at his Baseball-Reference page and thinking that if he somehow plays through May and doesn’t spontaneously combust, that would be the third-most games he’s ever played in a major league season. So on one hand, you can still bank on potential and the fact he had a difficult time staying healthy or that the Royals didn’t do him any favors earlier in his career with how they handled him. But on the other hand…THERE’S EVERYTHING ELSE.
I’ve spent the last four years name-checking Mondesi as my “key” Royal hitter. If he could catch fire, the potential is there for him to carry this ballclub. At least that’s how my line of thinking went. In retrospect, that’s…wrong.
I think I’ve seen enough.
Give him a break
Every day, the Royals game notes include this blurb about Whit Merrifield, updated for number of consecutive games played:
IRON MAN MERRIFIELD: Whit Merrifield will play in his 483rd consecutive game today, which will extend his franchise record and continue the longest streak in the Majors, according to Elias, since Prince Fielder played in 547 consecutive games from Sept. 14, 2010-May 16, 2014...including today, Merrifield is 2,149 games shy of Cal Ripken Jr.’s Major League record of 2,632 consecutive games played...to catch Ripken, the 33-year-old Merrifield would have to play another 13-plus full seasons without missing a game...Merrifield’s streak began almost four years ago, on June 25, 2018, and he’s appeared at six different positions during this streak, including first base, second base, left field, center field, right field and designated hitter.
Merrifield isn’t going to catch Ripken, who is mentioned only as an insane yardstick by which all consecutive game streaks will be measured. But the question needs to be asked…what’s the point? Merrifield has already set a franchise record for consecutive games played. He’s not catching Ripken. (No one is.) So…the target is Fielder? Someone else down the road? That seems…misguided.
Merrifield is off to a horrible start at the plate. Sure, he’s fine in the field but the season is a grind and even though we’re just getting started, it certainly seems like he could use a day off. Yes, already.
Merrifield has never been a Statcast kind of guy. His hard-hit rates and average exit velocities have generally ranked in the lower quarter of all hitters. But he’s still managed to hit line drives and, as we know, about 75 percent of those are going to drop in for base hits. He’s also been a spray hitter, with most of his batted balls going up the middle with the remaining percentage evenly divided between his pull side and the opposite field.
In the early goings of 2022, Merrifield’s line drive rate is way down. It’s currently at 20 percent, well off his career rate of 29 percent. In addition to that, he’s pulling the ball 45 percent of the time.
Ground ball and fly ball rates generally stabilize at around 80 balls in play. Through Sunday, Merrifield has 51 balls in play, so we’re not at the point where we can point and say this is who he is. Only we can look at the above and sort that’s how we got to the point where Merrifield is hitting .136/.164/.169 through the season’s first 14 games.
Merrifield was dropped to second in the order starting on Thursday, which was notable because it was the first time (other than Alex Gordon’s final game in 2020) that Merrifield didn’t hit at the top of the order since Mike Matheny became manager. He was back leading off on Sunday with Nicky Lopez getting the day off. Speaking of which…If Lopez can get a day off this early in the season, why not Merrifield?
The Royals seem to fall into this trap where they really don’t want to give their key guys a day off here or there but then deal with extended slumps or general periods of poor productivity. They look short-term for some reason and completely fail to see the long-term benefits. With him struggling now, why not give Merrifield a day or two off in April and May so you have him fresh for the majority of the season?
To err is not Royal
I’m not a fan of using errors as a measure of defensive quality. No, we don’t have a perfect defensive metric, but errors are just antiquated. We can do better than that.
With that rant out of the way, it’s my duty to note the Royals’ errorless streak to open the season came to an end on Friday when Brad Keller couldn’t field a potential double play ground ball.
Just a strange play that wasn’t made. It happens. You just have to wonder what the alternate universe looks like where Keller starts a double play and gets out of the inning.
The hits that came following this play to bring home all four Mariner runs were on fastballs. The first was an elevated one out of the zone that Julio Rodriguez was able to barrel on a 3-2 count. The second was a first-pitch meatball down the chute to Jarred Kelenic. An error, two fastballs and four runs. Baseball!
Up next
So much about baseball is timing. Even the schedule. Keeping that in mind, the Royals head to the South Side this week for a set against the scuffling White Sox.
Monday - Off
Tuesday - Daniel Lynch vs Dallas Keuchel at 6:10 CDT
Wednesday - Zack Greinke vs Dylan Cease at 6:10 CDT
Thursday - Brad Keller vs Michael Kopech at 1:10 CDT
The Royals are looking for their first road victory of 2022.
Thanks for reading. We will get through this together!