The Kansas City Royals are, arguably, one of the most exciting franchises in the league today.  They are young, talented, and have proven they can win at various levels on their way to the Major Leagues.

Exciting as that may be, when those young guys arrive in “the bigs”, they need leadership.  They need someone to show them how to act like big leaguers.  They need a guide along this journey that can show them, for lack of a better phrase, “The Royal Way”.

During the off-season, Dayton Moore and company were faced with a tough decision.  They had a glutton of youth that was becoming ready for the next step and a solid group behind them that could be ready sooner than later.  In particular, this created a problem in the outfield where they had two veteran players that showed promise.  The decision needed to be made between Jeff Francoeur and Melky Cabrera.  Many fans point out the inequity of the choice that was made.

A quick look at Baseball-Reference, accurate through 6/26…

Statistically speaking, it is obvious the wrong choice was made.  Now, I know, hindsight is 20-20 and by no means do I feel that anyone could have predicted that Melky would have such a great year or that Frenchy would have such an average one.  What I am here to say is simply that the choice of Francoeur over Cabrera cannot be measured by the typical numbers.  Nor do I feel that it will be something we may ever be able to measure.

Jeff Francoeur was kept on this team for his ability to usher in a crop of young guys into the proper way of handling themselves.  The intangibles around him as a man, a clubhouse personality, and a mentor all lead to the real reasons that he has a two year deal with this club.

Will he stick around beyond the trading deadline this year?  That will rely largely on factors of the production of other players in the system and the maturity of the roster as a whole.  If he should leave, who assumes his role as leadership both on and off the field?

Eric Hosmer
Hos is a bit of a natural choice here.  He was, in a very big way, the beginning of the youth movement in Kansas City.  He has spent a large amount of time in the system with a lot of the young players that are beginning to surface.  He’s young…very young, but his composure, quiet attitude, and expectation of winning will serve him well in the future.

Mike Moustakas
Moose is a much different candidate for leader of this team.  Throughout his minor league career, he has been known as a fiery personality that expects to win and is not afraid to tell anyone that they need to step it up a notch.  He is a player that will be vocal and visible in a leadership role.  In addition, he has earned a lot of respect for toning that side of his personality and game way down as he learns the ropes in Kansas City.

Alex Gordon
This is not only the most logical choice, but may be a change that is already in motion.  Gordon has been the player that has possibly most benefited from the presence of Jeff Francoeur.  They locker near each other, they are seen frequently together on road trips, and they have been seen working together in the field during warm ups.  Gordon received a long term deal from the club, is a leader on the field offensively and defensively, and has shown a large amount of maturity over the last few seasons.

As this team grows and becomes more and more competitive, leadership will be needed to help culture a winning environment and teach the players how to keep their heads down, their noses clean, and their game on the field pristine.  The right guys are in place to do just that and Jeff Fracoeur is a big part of ushering in a whole new era of Royals baseball.

Bill Ivie is the editor here at I-70 Baseball
He is the host of I-70 Radio, hosted every week on BlogTalkRadio.
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You can’t blame Ned Yost for trying. At least I won’t on this one.

He’s got a super athletic 22-year-old phenom, a rangy veteran with a great arm, and a run-producing doubles hitter. All of who were hitting relatively well at the time. Who wouldn’t want all three of them on the field at the same time?

And when you’re six to eight games below .500 and in danger of sliding into last place in your division, you could argue that there’s nothing you shouldn’t try.

I was nervous when the Royals announced that they would try Jeff Francoeur in centerfield, Billy Butler at first base, and allow the untested Eric Hosmer to learn on the job in right field.

I don’t think I was worried about the short-term results. What I was more worried about was that the position change would somehow unsettle Hosmer just as his bat was finally beginning to wake up.

I don’t know much about the psyche of big leaguers in general, or Hosmer specifically, but I was concerned that flailing around in unfamiliar territory would send the slick-fielding first baseman back into the funk that plagued him the first two months of the year.

Yost, on the other hand, overplayed his confidence to the media. He acted like the move was no big deal. He seemed to think that a few afternoons shagging balls in pregame would prepare Hosmer to play the position. Perhaps Yost thought, like all Little League coaches, that he could hide a poor fielder in right and he could somehow avoid having to make any plays.

But as the old saying goes, the ball will find you.

Pittsburg Experiment, Game 1: It didn’t take long for Hosmer to boot the first ball hit to him in right. “It was just a bad read on my part,” he said. That turned a single into a double, which resulted in the game’s first run.

Then in the third inning, Butler helped to botch a rundown, blindly chasing a base runner toward second while another snuck home. After the game, Yost tried to blame that one on Hochevar, but his analysis rang hollow.

Yost’s summary of the lineup after game one:

“I wouldn’t call it sloppy,” Royals manager Ned Yost said. “We’ve got guys playing out of position in a National League park and it’s going to take them a day or two to get acclimated.”

Pittsburg Experiment, Game 2: Ok, so on day two?  Well with the Royals leading and the bases full of Pirates, Hosmer allowed a seemingly catch-able ball to drop in, opening the floodgates to a five-run Pittsburg inning.

“I was playing pretty deep and got a bad read on it,” Hosmer said.

Pittsburg Experiment, Game 3: Stop now before we really embarrass ourselves.

The results of the experiment were so dreadful that Yost called it off a day early.

So you might argue that Yost shouldn’t give up on the alignment just because it didn’t work the first time out. After all, the logic behind it hasn’t changed, and Hosmer is certainly athletic enough to play right field.

Or you might argue that the results were so overwhelming that it should be scrapped without hesitation. Hosmer was bad in right. Butler shouldn’t be a regular first baseman. Francouer is a natural in right, not center. There’s no use trying to fit square pegs into round holes.

I’m not sure which is the right side of the argument. Yost will have six more games in National League parks to decide if the experiment is worth continuing.

All I know is that I don’t blame Yost for trying.

If you are ever looking for the definition of forcing an organization’s hand, you need look no further than Wil Myers. Myers is doing his best Eric Hosmer impersonation in 2012 and at some point this season the Kansas City Royals are going to have a decision to make. The options are numerous, but unfortunately none of them will be easy.

Option 1: Free Wil Myers!

Bringing Myers’ hot bat up to KC is probably the favorite option amongst Royals fans, but the question is, where? Jeff Francoeur and Alex Gordon are both under contract for at least the next two years and the club still has no idea what it has in Lorenzo Cain. Mike Moustakas is firmly entrenched at third. The only real option this season would be to send Eric Hosmer down for seasoning and bring Myers up to DH and spell outfielders while Billy Butler plays first. I don’t like the idea of Hosmer in Omaha or Billy Butler playing first base.

Of course you could avoid that whole mess by trading one of these big leaguers for starting pitching help…but who? I doubt anyone wants Gordon’s new contract until he proves last year wasn’t a fluke, and then Dayton Moore wouldn’t trade him anyway. Francoeur is coveted by no one as much as he is by Dayton Moore. Lorenzo Cain is injured. So that leaves Mike Moustakas…but really, if you’re going to trade Moustakas why wouldn’t you just…

Option 2: Trade Wil Myers

There is something to be said for trading players at their peak values, but this is not something the Royals have excelled at. Myers would probably bring a nice haul of prospect arms, but the Royals have shown that prospect arms rarely turn into starting rotation arms. Trading Myers for a starting pitcher would prove even more difficult. Most of the pitchers available on the market are free agents at the end of this season. Why in the world would you trade a prospect that you control for the next 6 years for a rent-a-starter when you are 10 games under .500?

So that leaves the only option as packaging Myers with other prospects for a pitcher you can control for 2+ years. Honestly, the list of good young pitchers locked up for 2+ years and available is ridiculously short. Of course, that lack of supply makes demand ridiculously high, which to me means trading Wil Myers is probably a bad solution.

Option 3: Platoon Wil Myers

I kid, I kid. I assume the Royals will not give Myers the Johnny Giavotella treatment. However, as much as this organization loves utility infielders, can we completely rule out the utility slugger? Myers can conceivably play all three outfield positions, third base and first base. Obviously he could fill in at DH as well. I wouldn’t put it past this organization to bring Myers up and play him 5 days a week at a different position each day.

Honestly, I am not sure I have the solution. Even though I hate option three, it would at least help the lineup. Best case scenario? Frenchy keeps up his current streak and we trade him and Broxton for a couple of AA All Stars in July, freeing up Wil Myers to play RF and Kelvin Herrera to get a chance to close. Of course, the idea of Dayton Moore trading Frenchy is like asking my 10 year old to give up his Xbox…you can’t fight love.

When Mike Moustakas banged a homer in just his second game as a big leaguer, hopes soared. And when he had a .385 average with four walks after four games, it looked like he was on his way to a great rookie season.

Mike Moustakas by Erika Lynn

But things went sour from that point on. By the time September rolled around, you had to wonder if Moustakas could hit big league pitching. He had not homered since his second game and had just 18 RBIs and an anemic .232 average.

But the big third baseman had struggled to adjust at every level, so the Royals stuck with him.

The show Moustakas put on in September is, the Royals hope, a preview of things to come. He batted .352 for the month and popped 4 homers, driving in 12 runs.

We all know what we WANT from Mike Moustakas. We WANT another George Brett. We want 30 homers and 100 RBIs and a .300 average every season.

But rather than talk about how it’s unfair to expect Moose to be George Brett, Royals fans might look around to see what other, mere mortals are doing at third base.

More specifically, Royals fans can ask “What are other teams in the division getting from their third basemen?”

The Royals sights should be set on becoming the best team in the division. They need some of the parts of their whole to become the best in the division. And believe it or not, Moustakas is not that far off from being the best third baseman in the division.

This season, the Tigers plan to play Miguel Cabrera at third. No one can expect Moose to be Cabrera at the plate, but Cabrera’s work at third remains to be seen. This experiment may not turn out as well as the Tigers hope.

The third basemen in the division consist of, basically, four youngsters trying to develop into solid big leaguers, and one of the best hitters of the last decade who isn’t really a natural third baseman.

For Chicago, 24-year-old Brent Morel has a couple of years of big league experience to build on, but hasn’t blossomed yet. In Cleveland, 23-year-old Lonnie Chisenhall hopes to take the position from last year’s starter, Jack Hannahan. And in Minnesota, the Twins look to 26-year-old Danny Valencia to provide the power they lack in their lineup.

It may not tell a lot to analyze last year’s numbers. But based on them, Moustakas wasn’t far from the others in the division, even with his struggles to adjust to the majors. If you average the numbers posted last season by Morel, Hannahan, Valencia and Brandon Inge of Detroit, you get numbers Moustakas could easily match.

The averages of Morel, Hannahan, Valencia and Inge, compared to Moustakas:

If Moustakas plays 123 games this season, there is no reason to think he can’t blow those numbers out of the water.

Interestingly, the guy being drummed out of a job – Hannahan – actually put up the best OBP, SLG, OPS and WAR: .331/.338/.719 and 2.2. The guy who played the most – Valencia – posted the lowest WAR (-1.1) even though he led the group with 15 homers and 72 RBIs.

The Royals find themselves in the same position as the Twins, White Sox and Indians. Each has a third baseman with minimal experience who they hope can make dramatic improvement.

Moustakas has started slowly this spring, but he won’t be moved out of the lineup by anything but injury this year. The Royals, like three other teams in the division, will wait patiently for their third-base prospect to develop.

Cabrera may post big offensive numbers this year, but the Royals hope Moustakas is the division’s best long-term.

It’s opening day for the Milwaukee Brewers. Sort of.

The ace of their staff will take the mound, ready to lead them to a Central Division title, a pennant and a World Series championship.

Better late than never. They’ve waited five weeks of the season for newly-acquired ace Zack Greinke to recover from a rib injury suffered playing pick-up basketball over the off season. Welcome to Zack’s World, Brewer’s fans.

Greinke will take the mound against the Atlanta Braves tonight for the first time in a uniform other than the Royal blue.

While the Brewers have stumbled out of the gate, going 13-15. Greinke has missed 28 games. That’s nearly one-fifth of the season. Is he worth the $13.5 million they owe him for this season? Was he worth the price of four potential big leaguers to acquire?

The only way the Brewers’ Greinke experiment will prove worthwhile is if they challenge for a championship. He’s not exactly off on the right foot.

What can Milwaukee fans expect in Greinke’s first outing? Well, his past couple of weeks have been basically like spring training. He was on a pitch count and was trying to knock off the rust as if this were March.

He’s due to throw 90 pitches today. Last Friday he threw 75 pitches over 5 innings for Nashville, the Brewers’ AAA club. He struck out seven, but took the loss by yielding seven hits and two earned runs to Albuquerque.

More interestingly to Royals fans, the past met the future when Greinke faced the hot prospects of the Omaha Storm Chasers. Omaha chased Greinke from that tune-up in just the third inning. He gave up back-to-back triples to Lorenzo Cain and David Lough.

Ironically, the game featured many of those Omaha players Greinke just couldn’t wait around for. He asked to be traded in typically undiplomatic fashion, saying he didn’t want to wait around for prospects to develop. Neither Eric Hosmer nor Mike Moustakas dented Greinke, but they will likely get another crack at him someday.

The Royals’ pain of being spurned by Greinke has been diminished significantly by their better-than-expected start. And they can relish the fact that while Greinke has been on the shelf, the four prospects they acquired in the deal have been gaining valuable experience.

And most of all, KC fans can shake their heads in wonder at the latest twist in the saga that is life with Greinke. Do you think Dayton Moore was the least bit surprised that Greinke was injured in an ill-advised non-baseball activity? My guess is he breathed a sigh of relief, glad he struck while the iron was hot.

The Greinke experiment may still work out. Milwaukee has other solid starters. They currently rank third in the National League in average and slugging, and second in home runs. But they will have to conquer the rugged NL Central. My guess is Milwaukee fans planned to be several games over .500 at this point, not looking up at three other teams in the division standings.

The Greinke soap opera is always worth watching. But it won’t break my heart to see that it’s been moved to a different channel this season. Hope Brewers fans can stomach the drama. I, for one, am glad to be done with it.

Baseball and statistics have been linked since the game began. Baseball officials, players and fans document, research, even worship stats more than in any other sport. It is undeniable the game has changed since its inception, so why wouldn’t statistics evolve as well? Baseball, being the ‘Old Boys Club’ it is, naturally has been resistant to change.

Ever since Moneyball was written by Michael Lewis, though, the tide has begun to turn. More top baseball officials and journalists are beginning to see how new statistics can prove useful. Things like batting average on balls in play (BABIP), isolated power (IPO), home runs per fly ball (HR/FB), ultimate zone rating (UZR), walks and hits per innings pitched (WHIP), and wins above replacement (WAR) are beginning to outweigh traditional stats like batting average, errors, and earned run average.

While the verdict is still out on some of the stats, most help put quantifiable means on things we hadn’t been able to before, such as defense. Most of these Sabermetrics originated with Bill James, a Senior Advisor of Baseball Operations for the Red Sox. Before James’ break into MLB, he was widely shunned for his new wave ideas on how baseball should be viewed by statisticians. James created this new world as a means to more efficiently run his teams in rotisserie baseball leagues, the grandfather to fantasy baseball. Undoubtedly Sabermetrics have made their presence known and are here to stay.

I urge even causal baseball fans to dig a little deeper into this arena to see how the landscape is changing with player evaluations. Websites like fangraphs.com, baseballthinkfactory.org, and hardballtimes.com all offer wonderful insight as to how the stats are determined and what they all mean. I have to warn you though some of the explanations read more like analytical reports than game recaps. Even surface knowledge of Sabermetrics will prove useful as you debate transactions made by your favorite team’s front office.

The main stat I will be citing is WAR. WAR quantifies how many wins a player is worth against a league average replacement player would be. For a complete definition of WAR check out http://saberlibrary.com/misc/war/. For example, during Zack Greinke’s 2009 dominance he had the league’s highest WAR, 9.4. If for some reason Greinke suffered any injury before his first start and was replaced by a league average pitcher the Royals would have ended up theoretically with about 9-10 fewer wins. Albert Pujols’ 8.5 WAR is obviously derived a little differently than Greinke’s since he is a position player. What WAR boils down to though is essentially runs created for offensive players or runs prevented for pitchers. Players with WAR of 8+ are MVP caliber, 5+ All-Star, 2+ starters, and 0-2 reserves. For time and length purposes my explanations of these stats are primitive, once again I call upon the readers to educate themselves.

If we are able to determine how many wins a player is worth, the next logical step is to determine how much a win in MLB costs. In 2008, the average cost of a win was $2.31 million. In 2009, it was $1.8 million. For purposes of ease, let’s say a win costs about $2 million. Obviously as wins accumulate they become harder to get. For example, wins 40-50 are much easier than wins 85-95. The cost goes up exponentially as win totals rise. These numbers are a set average, as if all wins were equal. With this information it becomes a lot easier to determine whether a player is worth his contract. For example, the Royals could have justified paying Greinke almost $20 million in 2009 and still consider it a good investment. He earned the team 9.5 wins, while wins cost $2 million, equaling $19 million worth of production.

Sean O'Sullivan

In the first move this season the Royals swapped Alberto Callaspo for Sean O’Sullivan and Will Smith. Callaspo provided the Royals with some versatility on the infield and a consistent stick in the lineup. He is 27, usually regarded as a player’s prime, and the numbers he put up this year are just a bit below his 2009 totals (.272/10 HR/55 RBI vs. .300/ 11 HR/ 73 RBI). That being said Callaspo’s WAR is 1.3. This shows he’s not quite productive enough to be a starter, but with a contract of only $460,000 he is well worth the money.

Since arriving Sean O’Sullivan has gotten rocked across the yard. His WAR is actually -1.0, far worse than a league average player. In seven of his ten appearances he has faced the Yankees, Angels, Rangers, White Sox, and Twins. A small sample size against some of the best teams in the league usually spells trouble for a young pitcher like O’Sullivan. Looking at his minor league record though, O’Sullivan was a pretty effective pitcher (.618 winning percentage, 1.2 WHIP, 6.6 SO/9). Considering O’Sullivan was a third round draft pick and broke into the big leagues at 21 years old, he must have some sustainable talent.

Will Smith is another young pitcher who got hit around pretty hard this season in the minors. Smith began the season in advanced A before the Angels fast tracked him through the organization to AAA Salt Lake. Kansas City sent him to AA Northwest Arkansas where he gave up 15 earned runs in his 18.2 innings pitched. He ran a .398 batting average against. All in all trading a reserve for a young talented pitcher is a quite common. With minor league infielders beginning to blossom for the Royals Callaspo probably wouldn’t have been around for much longer anyway.

Statistically speaking the Angels are the easy winners of this trade so far. The ages of the players the Royals received though leave a hung jury until a later date to make a full assessment.

Scott Podsednik

The next move the Royals made with the Dodgers for Lucas May and Elisaul Pimentel, in exchange for Scott Podsednik. Podsednik was a worthy contributor for the Royals before he jetted to Los Angeles. He did his job of getting on base (.353 OBP) and getting over (30 SB), while patrolling the Kauffman Stadium outfield adeptly. This translated into a 1.2 WAR while with the Royals, and considering Kansas City signed him for $1.6 it was a worthwhile investment.

May was drafted in 2003 out of high school as a shortstop. He played his first three years of pro ball there until he was moved to the outfield for two seasons. In 2007, he finally found a home behind the dish. May has steadily advanced as a hitter while moving through his eight years in the minors, showing ability to get on base along with some decent pop (.435 SLG, .758 OPS, 145 2B, 92 HR).

Young athletes at positions in demand are always good to have in the organization. Although May is unproven on a Major League level, Dayton Moore calls him a “slam dunk MLB catcher.” May saw his first big league action during September call-ups this season.

Pimentel is a pretty much an unknown quantity at this point. He has only played two professional years in the low minors, producing pedestrian numbers. Podsednik has fallen off since being traded to the Dodgers. Considering the Royals needed to make room to audition Alex Gordon and Podsednik’s contract is up at season’s end, I’m going to give this one to the Royals.

It will be interesting to see how the Royals handle May in the future. Brayan Pena continues to disappoint as the Royals give him opportunities. Pena has barely played above replacement level since arriving on the scene. His highest WAR was posted this year at 0.5. Recently Pena has shown signs of life, winning the AL Player of the Week on Sept. 13 (10-23, 4 XBH, 9 RBI). The Royals are pretty high on their third round draft pick last year named Wil Myers as well. Myers tore up the rookie league last year and continued stroking in advanced A this season.

The last deal finalized by the Royals before the July 31^st deadline sent Rick Ankiel and Kyle Farnsworth to the Atlanta Braves. In return, the Royals grabbed Jesse Chavez, Gregor Blanco, and Tim Collins. Ankiel signed with the Royals for $3.25 million, but didn’t play much because of injury. When he did play, it wasn’t very well (.261 BA, 15 RBI, 93 AB). Since going to the Braves he’s played even worse for a season total of 0.2 WAR (.204 BA, 7 RBI, 92 AB).

Farnsworth’s fate was the same. He pitched decently out of the bullpen for the first half of the season (1.1 WHIP, 2.42 ERA, 1.2 WAR), but turned back to his ‘gas can’ ways in a Braves uniform (5.40 ERA, -0.2 WAR). This along with the fact the Royals were paying him $4.5 million for his services bodes well for Kansas City.

I can call this one a win for the Royals without even discussing the players they received in return. Getting out from two players not worth their contract who don’t play into the future is a good move. Considering they both played significantly worse in the second half, any players in return for the Royals are icing on the cake.

But Jesse Chavez and Gregor Blanco aren’t much to write home about. These guys are cheap stop gaps with major league experience to hold down the fort until some young talent arrives. The real interesting piece of this deal is Tim Collins. Collins, 20, is an undersized (5’7’’, 155 lbs) lefty who has bounced around quite a bit this season. He was signed by the Blue Jays in 2007 as a non-draftee free agent, but got dealt to Atlanta in the Yunel Escobar/Alex Gonzalez deal. A few weeks later Kansas City acquired his rights and sent him to Omaha to pitch out of the bullpen. Collins, a career minor leaguer, doesn’t allow many men on base. He boasts a skinny career WHIP of 1.06 and is a strikeout machine (13.3 SO/9).

The last major deal with the Royals got done after the July 31^st deadline, sending Jose Guillen to the Giants. Kansas City will receive a player to be named later. Even though Guillen still leads the Royals in home runs, I have to say this was a winner for Kansas City. The outcome of this deal is similar to the Atlanta trade: addition by subtraction. The Royals owed Guillen $12 million to the aging outfielder who only played at a 0.8 WAR clip. Guillen only has 27 at-bats since joining San Francisco.

The Giants gamble was understandable since they are making a playoff push. In my mind anytime you can get rid of a guy who constantly dogs it down the line after calling out his team for not ‘playing fundamentally sound baseball’ is a good day. Guillen is widely criticized as one of the worst clubhouse cancers in MLB. As the Royals transition to their young talent, Guillen is a personality management surely doesn’t want around to rub off on prospects.

Overall the Royals made some pretty good moves looking at them so far. They got rid of aging players who didn’t figure into the picture, while saving some money and grabbing a few intriguing prospects. This allows the organization some opportunity to showcase some youngsters who haven’t gotten a big league shot. With the extra money Kansas City will now be able to make some more sound investments on the free agent market like they did last winter in Podsednik. It may even free up enough money to take a shot at Greinke when his contract is up. Although, with his comments about the organization a month ago, I wouldn’t count on it.