The Royals end April with a thud

Off to an awful start, this team is invoking memories of 2005 and 2006. You never want to invoke memories of 2005 and 2006.

If the Royals finish last in the AL Central, will they make a sound?

With an 8-4 loss to the Minnesota Twins on Sunday afternoon, the book has mercifully closed on the first month of the 2023 season. To say it wasn’t hasn’t been a good start to the season would be a gross understatement.

They are 7-22, which works out to a .241 winning percentage. Over the course of 162 games, that’s a 39-123 record. It’s the third time in franchise history they have seven wins in their first 29 games. The other times? 2005 and 2006. Woof.

The Oakland A’s—a team actively trying to lose because they detest their fanbase and want to leave the city for the bright lights of Las Vegas—is 6-23. One game worse than the Royals.

When I write that the first month of the season was absolutely grim, it is without a trace of hyperbole. In fact, I may be underselling it.

As the first pitch of the year was fired back on Opening Day, expectations were modest. The “It takes time to turn a ship around” trope was most definitely in play. It wasn’t as much the Royals were a ship running in the wrong direction, rather in the years since the World Championship they were rudderless, simply set adrift by a general manager who was tied to loyalty and forging iron or some such nonsense and an absentee owner who was more than happy to live off that title. Not only would the ship have to be pointed in the right direction, the damn thing would need to be switched on to even get the motor working.

Somewhere along the way, the keys were lost.

The difficult part of this is there needs to be someone to absorb the blame. That’s what happens in sports. A team underperforms and someone has to take the heat. Changes to the roster should be made. Jobs lost. Accountability.

Except what if there are no obvious changes to be made at this moment? What if the people previously responsible for the malaise have already lost their jobs? What if there’s no one to hold accountable?

We can point the finger at ownership. Sure. John Sherman initiated these changes after his third season in charge. I never like to make excuses for the owners, but he really bought the team at the absolute worst time. Covid truncated his first season and in his second, many restrictions were still in place. It was difficult to evaluate those two years. By the third, he had seen enough. He acted. Probably a little too late, but he still made the moves that were necessary.

JJ Picollo was picked by Sherman to be the new general manager. For some, that wasn’t enough because Picollo was often seen as Dayton Moore’s right-hand man. The second in command. While that may have been the case, I continue to feel confident in my assessment that Picollo is his own GM. He’s not GMDM 2.0. Although he is currently playing the hand dealt to him by his old boss. This is not the same as when Moore replaced Allard Baird. Back in 2006, the institutional rot was so deep, even the foundation needed replacing. Yet in 2023 there’s plenty of peeling paint and the roof is leaking. There’s a lot of work to do to get this organization back in shape.

I’ve already seen some questions in the media about Matt Quatraro and his suitability to lead the Royals. As someone who’s been writing about this team for over 15 years, I get the need to generate content, but that’s just absurd. One month doesn’t define a manager. He deserves time to establish himself. He hasn’t lost the clubhouse and seems to have the right temperament to guide the team through these rough patches. He showed fire over the weekend for the “he needs to go off” crowd. Other than the Kris Bubic debacle (which was going to happen no matter what Quatraro did) I can’t think of a move that just seemed wrong at the time. The daily lineup variety (29 batting orders in 29 games—Quatraro broke the Boone O’Meter) doesn’t bother me, either. His mission was clear from the beginning which was to keep the entire roster engaged.

I like that Quatraro will play someone like Nick Pratto…That he’s played Matt Duffy enough to keep him going with the bat…That Nicky Lopez gets time in the field. It feels like too often we’ve seen a young player come up to ride the pine for a few days, get thrown into a game, fail to perform (because, you know, baseball is difficult) and then rot away for a few more games before getting shipped back down. That’s not how Quatraro operates. It’s a small thing, but damn it’s refreshing.

I have plenty of fingers and they’re all ready for me to point at someone…at anyone. I am so ready to assign blame. I just can’t find anyone to single out.

Meanwhile, the Royals are sleepwalking through the season. Their crime isn’t just that they’re bad at baseball, but they’re boring. It’s limp, lifeless, waving the white flag, baseball. It’s dreadfully dull.

The Royals need help. And it’s not coming. Yeah, there are a few players in Triple-A the Royals could—and probably should—promote, but those guys project as bit players. There doesn’t look to be a true impact guy in the bunch and that’s exactly what this team needs. Impact.

If we’ve learned anything from April it’s that the team was in much worse shape than perhaps any of us believed. New leadership deserves time and will get that. However, patience is thin. Someone damn well better find those keys and kick this rebuild into overdrive.

Let’s focus on a couple of positive developments.

We should all be thanking the Baseball Gods that Vinnie Pasquantino plays in Kansas City. I certainly wouldn’t want to imagine this offense without him hitting somewhere near the top of the order. He’s the only guy on this team who is performing to expectation. The dude who is supposed to rake is indeed raking. There’s some comfort in that.

Pasquantino, after going 3-4 on Sunday with another walk thrown in, is hitting .279/.375/.500 with a 140 wRC+. We are still in the territory where one hot series can completely skew the numbers (his wRC+ went up 11 points on Sunday alone), but the consistency that Pasquantino brings to the lineup is chicken soup for the shredded baseball soul.

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention Edward Oliveras who had himself quite the road trip. He’s currently riding a nine-game hitting streak and for the season is now hitting .289/.344/.482 with a 125 wRC+. He’s challenging Vincenzo for offensive supremacy. He doesn’t belong anywhere near the field on a regular (or semi-regular) basis, but we’re seeing someone who is locked-in at the plate.

I’ve made it this far without really mentioning the pitching. It’s because it’s so damn depressing.

Daniel Lynch was supposed to take the step this season. Then he opened the year on the IL. Kris Bubic took his spot and actually showed that progress to the point where everyone was incredibly optimistic. Then he hurt his elbow and we’ll see him around the All-Star break in 2024. Brady Singer had a start where he deployed a reinvented slider that had me enthusiastic that he was overcoming a wobbly start to the year. Then he was tagged for seven runs in the third inning on Sunday.

Other than a great Bubic start in San Francisco, that fun Singer start against Arizona and a random Keller start against the Rangers, there’s been little to praise on the starting pitching front.

The starter’s ERA is 5.64, fifth-worst in the majors. Their strikeout rate of 7.3 SO/9 is third-worst. You get that with Zack Greinke (6.39 SO/9) the collective whiffs will be down, but this is a staff with Jordan Lyles (6.88 SO/9) and Brad Keller (7.12 SO/9). Out of 74 pitchers who have currently thrown enough innings to qualify for the ERA title, they rank 60th, 65th and 66th in strikeout rate. I don’t need to point out that this is three-fifths of the rotation.

The one bright spot on the mound for the Royals is Aroldis Chapman. I don’t think anyone saw that coming. Now we get to spend the next couple of months sweating a trade and hoping that Picollo is able to wrangle maximum value. The last time Chapman was flipped at the deadline as a rental, the Yankees were able to net a four-player return with one of those Gleyber Torres. Of course that was seven years ago, but a power arm rental is a power arm rental. Chapman is at least pitching like it’s 2016.

How about an interlude to appreciate Michael Massey’s walk? Massey closed out the ’22 season by not walking in his final 55 PAs. He drew his first walk of 2023 in his 77th PA of the season.

Yes, Massey went 131 plate appearances between walks. In that stretch, he hit .172/.174/.234 with 47 strikeouts.

The walk came against the fireballing Twins closer Jhoan Duran. I know for a stone-cold fact that I would not want to stand in the box against that dude. He was throwing 103 MPH gas up in the zone to go along with a dirty curveball. Here’s the pitch chart for the monumental plate appearance.

You’ll notice that while there are four pitches out of the zone, one of those was fouled off. So only three off the plate. Yes, Massey’s first walk of the season came on a pitch clock violation.

It’s a fine line between farce and tragedy.

Changes have to be made and should be coming soon.

Franmil Reyes just finished the road trip without a hit, going 0-17. Reyes is exactly the kind of guy I thought the Royals should give a chance to, just to see if he could get back on track. Low risk, high reward and all of that.

Part of an acquisition like that is knowing when the low-risk part is involved. It’s probably time to move on.

Massey, who looked like he was approaching “locked-in” status after stringing together three consecutive games with two hits is now one for his last 14 with eight strikeouts. He probably needs a reset in Omaha.

Jackie Bradley Jr. was brought in as cover for the early spring loss of Drew Waters. The glove still absolutely plays. I enjoy watching outfielders who glide and Bradley can glide. But the defense doesn’t provide enough cover for an OPS+ of 28. With Waters starting a rehab assignment this week in Omaha, the clock is ticking for Bradley.

Yes, Hunter Dozier on this roster is less than ideal. At least his 66 plate appearances are the third-fewest among players who started the season in Kansas City. Despite the club insisting in the spring that he was their everyday third baseman, the evidence is pointing toward the possibility that we are moving toward the end.

Let’s end it there for today. The Royals return home on Tuesday for a 10-game homestand against the Orioles, A’s and White Sox. There are some winnable games in that bunch. It might be a good idea if this team were to capitalize on those opportunities.