2015 ROYALS—What Have You Done for Me Lately?

September 18, 2015—Tigers

In the ninth inning with two outs and the game tied 3-3, Alex Rios singles and Jarrod Dyson comes out to pinch run. Jarrod tries a delayed steal that’s unsuccessful and Twitter immediately blows up with Dyson critics: why did Jarrod try a delayed steal?

Never let the fact that you don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about stop you from being critical.

First off, it wasn’t Dyson’s idea.

The signal for a delayed steal comes from everyone’s favorite base coach; Rusty Kuntz. If you’re pissed off about a delayed steal, Rusty’s responsible, not Dyson. And Rusty Kuntz has forgotten more baseball than the rest of us will ever know. I’m fairly confident that most of the Twitter critics don’t know what a delayed steal is or when you try one.

A while back Rusty and I went over the necessary conditions for a delayed steal and Number One on the list is a pitcher that’s too quick to home plate to attempt a straight steal.

Detroit reliever Alex Wilson is using a slide step and getting the ball to catcher James McCann in a hurry. Wilson is also quick to first base and comes close to picking off Dyson a couple times, so Jarrod can’t get a huge lead.

Number Two on the list of delayed steal requirements is a catcher who likes to stick the pitch. That’s when a catcher receives the pitch, holds the mitt in place and stares down at it; it’s a pitch-framing technique designed to make a pitch look more like a strike—“Look, ump, my mitt didn’t even move!”—and that’s what McCann is doing.

The Number Three thing Rusty looks for is a middle infielder who keeps his head down after the pitch is delivered.

Now here’s why all this matters:

As the pitcher delivers the ball to home plate, everyone takes a quick glance at the baserunner. If the runner is attempting a straight steal someone will yell to let the catcher know and the middle infielder responsible for covering second base will start to move in that direction.

If the base runner does a delayed steal he takes a couple crow hops toward second base—his secondary lead—just like he would if he wasn’t planning on going anywhere. Everybody sees that the runner isn’t going, then turns their attention back to home plate; that’s when the runner breaks.

If the catcher is keeping his head down to stick the pitch and the middle infielder does not check the runner again after the pitch, the catcher will be late getting the ball down to second base and the middle infielder will be late covering the bag.

In this case a delayed steal didn’t work, but if Dyson could have been successful using a straight steal, that’s what he would have tried.

And…

The batters coming up are a combined 1-for-13, so if Dyson stays at first base the Royals probably need two hits to score a run which doesn’t look very likely. The Royals thought a delayed steal and one hit had a better chance of happening.

Just because something doesn’t work (and remember, nothing works 100% of the time) it doesn’t mean you were wrong to try.

September 20, 2015—Tigers

So now we know; if you want to break out of a losing streak, just have your DH hit three home runs, a triple and set a team record for total bases. Against the Detroit Tigers Kendrys Morales has three home runs, a triple, a walk, five runs scored, three driven in and a team record of 15 total bases.

• Kendrys is hitting .293 with 21 home runs and 105 RBIs.

• Out in Oakland Billy Butler is hitting .252 with 13 home runs and 62 RBIs.

The Royals seem to have gotten the dry end of the stick on this deal.

The Royals beat the Tigers 10-3, the Minnesota Twins beat the Los Angeles Angels 8-1 and Kansas City has a magic number of three.

Danny Duffy throws four innings out of the pen and gets his first save. He also sounds a lot less confused: “Every time I’ve pitched out of the pen, I feel like I can let it go. I throw everything with more conviction, it seems like. It’s like a subconscious thing. You go out there and empty the tank.”

As Crash Davis told Nuke LaLoosh: “Don’t think, it can only hurt the team.”

September 22, 2015—Mariners

Barring another outbreak of chicken pox, a swine flu epidemic or a tornado hitting their clubhouse, the Kansas City Royals will clinch the division. They have a 10-game lead over the Minnesota Twins and stand a very good chance of having home field advantage during the playoffs.

But the Royals are scuffling down the stretch. They lose 11-2 to the Seattle Mariners and the game is even worse than the score indicates; Jeremy Guthrie gives up nine runs in two and a third innings and the Royals play lousy defense behind him.

The Royals are now 7-13 in the month of September and things have gotten a bit out of whack.

Having a huge lead in the division race sounds like a good deal and I don’t think anybody wishes the Royals had a smaller lead over the Twins. But that huge lead has led to giving players days off and those days off have led to some makeshift lineups. Baseball rewards routine like no other sport and lately the Royals have gotten out of their routine.

Besides giving starters days off, the Royals have:

• Switched their closer; Greg Holland is out and Wade Davis is in. That means the other roles in the bullpen will also be switched around.

• Taken Danny Duffy out of the starting rotation and sent him to the bullpen.

• Taken Jeremy Guthrie out of the bullpen and put him back in the rotation.

• Lost their regular second baseman—Omar Infante—and replaced him with Ben Zobrist.

• Tried to figure out if Alex Rios is going to be the right fielder or the job will be given to some combination of Jonny Gomes, Jarrod Dyson and Paulo Orlando.

• Taken Alcides Escobar out of the leadoff spot and replaced him with Ben Zobrist.

• Taken Ben Zobrist out of the leadoff spot and replaced him with Alex Gordon.

• Changed the way catcher Salvador Perez sets a target.

I could go on and often do, but you get the idea: the Royals’ big lead in the divisional race has allowed them the luxury of taking their foot off the gas pedal and trying out some different lineups. The Royals have some issues to resolve before the playoffs start.

September 23, 2015—Mariners

The Royals are stumbling as they go down the stretch and have recently suffered several late-inning, walk-off losses. There’s talk that team has lost its mojo or rhythm or whatever the hell it is winning teams have going for them. Go into the postseason playing like this and the Royals have a good chance to go home early.

Something has to change.

The Royals rally and tie the game 3-3 in the bottom of the ninth inning and go to extra innings, but if they lose yet another extra-inning game, the loss will be even more devastating than usual.

But here in the tenth inning, the Royals have a chance to beat the Mariners: Alcides Escobar starts the inning by hitting a fly ball to left field for the first out, but then Alex Gordon singles. Ben Zobrist is then hit by a pitch; Zobrist goes to first base and Gordon moves up to second.

Both managers make a move: the Mariners change pitchers and the Royals send Paulo Orlando out to second base, pinch-running for Gordon. The extra speed matters; if the Royals score a run the game’s over.

Lorenzo Cain steps up to the plate.

Lorenzo admits he’s a better hitter when he hits the ball to right field or up the middle, but he also admits his emotions sometimes get the better of him and he tries to do something big; like pull a ball for a walk-off home run. When Lorenzo gets in pull mode, he’s vulnerable to a slider away; but tonight—with Orlando’s speed on second base—a measly single will get the job done.

Lorenzo gets a 1-0 slider, but does not try to pull it. He waits back on it and hits a soft line drive to right field for a single. The ball bounces twice and is then caught by Seattle’s right fielder, Seth Smith.

Smith is charging forward, so he’ll have momentum behind his throw home; if Smith were moving sideways, the throw wouldn’t be as strong.

To make matters worse, Orlando gets a bad read on the ball and hesitates before heading for third base. But Paulo turns on the jets and is going full speed when he hits third base. Meanwhile, Seth Smith is retrieving the ball and throwing it to home plate—third base coach Mike Jirschele has a decision to make.

There are a lot of reasons for Jirschele to put up the stop sign: the Mariners outfield is playing shallow so they’ll have a chance to make a play at the plate, Smith is charging forward so he’ll have momentum behind his throw, Smith also has an above average throwing arm and Orlando got a bad jump.

Despite all the reasons to stop Paulo at third, Jirschele (the guy many fans that thought was too cautious in the final game of the 2014 World Series) still sends Orlando home and Paulo slides in under the tag—the Royals win, 4-3.

Happiness ensues.

When the media’s allowed into the clubhouse after a ballgame’s over, you rarely see a coach. They have a room of their own and even players are not allowed in the coaches’ room. Nobody is overly-eager to talk to the media, so if a coach stays in that off-limits coaches’ room, he doesn’t have to talk to reporters.

I ask Mike Swanson—the guy who rides herd on the media—if Jirsch would be willing to come out of the coaches’ room and talk with me; Jirschele’s a key figure in the Royals extra-inning win and I want to know why he sent Orlando home when just about everyone in the stadium (including me) thought he’d stop Paulo at third base.

Swanson says he’ll ask, but once Jirsch finds out I’m the one that wants to talk to him he’ll probably say no.

(This is baseball humor…I think.)

A minute or two later Mike Jirschele comes down the hallway wearing a Royals T-shirt, shorts and a smile. Third base coaches rarely get any attention unless they get a runner thrown out and making a tough decision that helps win a ballgame is about as good as it gets for a third-base coach.

I ask why he sent Paulo home and Mike asks a question of his own:

“Are we scoring a lot of runs?”

Here’s what Mike means: when a team’s not hitting, you need to be aggressive on the base paths—make the most out of the hits you get. Despite the fact that the Royals ended up with 12 hits that night, they left 16 runners on base and before Lorenzo hit that 10^th inning single, were 1-for-11 with runners in scoring position.

The Royals were having a lot of trouble coming up with a big hit.

Stop Orlando at third and the bases will be loaded with one out and a double play grounder would take the Royals out of the inning. And the way things have been going, a double-play grounder seemed like a distinct possibility.

Seth Smith is considered to have a slightly above major league average arm, but Jirsch points out that when a game is on the line, an outfielder will tend to rush his throw. Smith might have a slightly above-average arm most of the time, but with the pressure to make a perfect throw or lose the ballgame, Smith’s arm might not be so accurate.

(And if you’re wondering why Jirsch didn’t think the same thing back in 2014 when he stopped Gordon at third base, nobody on the field thought the play would be that close. The Giants shortstop, Brandon Crawford, wanted Jirsch to send Gordon because he thought he’d make the play easily.)

Despite being shallow and moving forward, Smith bounced his throw near the pitcher’s mound and threw the ball slightly up the third-base line. By the time Mariners catcher Jesus Sucre caught the ball and turned to make the tag, Orlando had scored.

Mike also figured that if Orlando was thrown out at the plate, it would only be the second out of the inning; they’d have another shot at winning with Eric Hosmer at the plate and Ben Zobrist in scoring position—but Mike had a chance to win the game on Cain’s single and wasn’t going to count on another hit.

(And if you say you thought of all that stuff before Cain hit the ball, I’ll say you’re lying. I’m watching baseball every day, being paid to do it and I didn’t think of all that stuff. Good third base coaches think farther ahead than the rest of us.)

There was at least one other guy who asked Mike Jirschele about sending Paulo Orlando home; Dayton Moore. Jirsch explained it to Dayton this way:

“Sometimes you gotta live dangerously.”

The Royals have been scuffling in the month of September, but sometimes a big, emotional win like this one can ignite a team; the 2014 Wild Card game is a great example—mentally, it set the Royals up for everything that came after.

If they could come from behind and win that game, why would they ever give up?

September 24, 2015—Mariners

The Royals beat the Mariners and because the Indians also beat the Twins, the Royals are the American League Central Division Champs.

If you want to see the bad side of sports, you don’t have to look very hard: athletes using PEDs, the occasional cheating scandal or parents and coaches who pressure the kids so much they take the joy out of playing a game. But sports can also be positive and the division-clinching win shows what a sports team can do for a community.

I normally sit in the press box and cheering is frowned on.

Jeering is OK, but express too much enthusiasm and you might be told to go buy a ticket if you want to cheer—and to be honest, that’s pretty much how it should be. The media is there to report on games, not root for the home team. But if I’m going to continue to be honest (almost always a bad idea and should be avoided whenever possible) reporters get to know the players and you’d have to be a robot to not feel some joy when a guy you know and like does well.

It’s not that you’re rooting against the other team; you just don’t know those guys like you do the guys on the team you cover.

I have some friends at the Mariners game and go down to sit with them in the stands; sitting in the crowd is a totally different experience than watching a game from the press box.

Total strangers are exchanging high fives and hugs when Eric Hosmer or Mike Moustakas hits a home run. A guy you don’t know from Adam leans in to tell you the Twins are losing. When the Cleveland-Minnesota score goes up on the outfield scoreboard, the crowd erupts.

After the game, people don’t want to leave; someone’s set up a karaoke machine in the parking lot and once again total strangers form a bond—they’re singing and dancing to the B-52’s “Love Shack.”

If you’re a Royals fan and you were at the game or watched it on TV or listened to it on the radio, remember how you felt when the Royals won and clinched a playoff spot. If you high-fived somebody or ran to tell someone the news, remember how a sports team made you reach out to another human being. During the 2014 and ’15 playoffs you could start a conversation with absolutely anybody—including the guy mugging you—by asking:

“Did you see the game last night?”

Sharing joyful moments with other people makes life better and a baseball team made that happen: it’s sports at its best.

September 25, 2015—Indians

OK, forget all that sappy shit: the very next night Royals fans boo their team.

After the Royals won their division they partied; for tonight’s game Ned Yost has made out a lineup that appears to be pulled out of a hat or made up of the players that are the least hungover. The makeshift lineup almost gets no-hit by Cleveland pitcher, Carlos Carrasco. Social media is littered with comments about not paying Big League prices to see a Triple A team.

Nothing says “What have you done for me lately?” like booing a team that won a division championship the night before.

Only two regular starters are in the lineup—Alex Rios and Ben Zobrist (and I’m not sure those guys drink)—and the rest of the team is made up of bench players and rookies. Afterwards, Ned Yost says he doesn’t regret giving most of his starting lineup the night off; the night before they’d accomplished something special and he wanted them to go out and celebrate.

But the Royals are still in a tight race for home field advantage and after losing while Toronto wins, that lead for home field advantage is down to one game.