As Royals fans, we have very little to talk about right now.
Hell, most of us checked out sometime in June when it had become more than clear that the fast start was a mirage and that the air of respectability we thought was going to accompany the Royals resurgence had been knocked from our lungs.
Regardless, I would imagine that the bulk of Royals fans can only bring themselves to stop by this post-season in random passing glances. There isn't much joy that can be derived from watching a turncoat left fielder who used to wear Royal blue* try one more time to get a ring in New York. Was the 75-year-old Matt Stairs a Royal long enough to for us to root for him?
*And, yes, I can't remember him ever actually wearing a uniform that was Royal blue, but you know what I mean.
No. Right now, we can only be envious of fans who—let's be honest—aren't exactly starving for a successful baseball season.
Well, that and rooting against the Evil Empire.
Since free agency is still a ways down the road, and no trades or re-signings can be announced until after the World Series is completed, we bloggers have little of worth to write about. Well, unless you want to include fabricated trades that are all but completed involving Cy Young winners-to-be for 28-year-old has-beens and a bunch of never-will-bes*.
*I agree with what Sam Mellinger said about not wanting to tear into this writer too hard because he's not getting paid to do this and it is a labor of love (or "Labour of Love" for all you UB40 fans reading this blog), but I have to say that as a writer whose blog also appears on Bleacher Report I feel like this blogger has given the rest of us a bad name. I would like to think that my column never veers toward this reckless type of rumor-mongering, but part of me feels like my involvement with the same site somehow makes me slightly guilty by association.
Luckily, I have another blog that is not dependent upon my fandom of a horrible baseball team to turn my attention to. One only dependent on my consumption of pop culture . Needless to say, the subjects for entries there present themselves much more readily.
Here I am, left to write about what? Well, Clark Fosler has found his niche for October columns, and his work has been great thus far (who'd have thunk that the Royals third basemen collectively out-produced all other third basemen in the Central?).
So, I guess I can reflect about the limited Royals-relevant baseball action that is going on right now. Over at Kings of Kauffman , Wally Fish is doing a bang-up job of staying on top of any developments with the Surprise Rafters .
Aside from the slightly discouraging displacement of David Lough (one of the only offensive bright spots in the Royals minor league system this year) on the roster due to some hamstring issues, there is a little good news. After a year marked with significant struggles at the plate in an admittedly hostile hitting environment, Mike Moustakas has begun to alleviate some of my concerns.
Moustakas scuffled his way to a .250/.297/.421 split with 16 home runs and 10 steals in Wilmington. While those numbers are not encouraging, the 20-year-old (he just turned 21 in September) worked a worrying 32 walks in 530 plate appearances. In 30 plate appearances in the Arizona Fall League, Moustakas is hitting .276/.313/.483 with a 1:3 BB:K, one home run, one steal, three doubles, six runs, and nine runs batted in.
I am well aware of the fact that this is an absurdly small sample size, but we don't have a lot to talk about right now, do we?
The average is clearly up here, and it was looking a lot nicer before a 1-for-8 stretch in his last two games. Four extra-base hits in 29 at-bats is also encouraging. Now, another pair of games like his on Thursday and Friday, and the picture is a little less hopeful. He'd be hitting .216 were that to happen, and then the reactionaries among us are crying that the sky is falling again.
Right now, we can only hope that this season in High-A was an aberration, that he does know the difference between a ball and a strike, and that (as a 21-year-old this coming season, presumably most of which will be spent as a Natural) he begins to live up to the hype that goes along with being a high first-round draft pick.
But if he wants to do me a solid, he'll work his way on base three times via the base-on-balls in his next game, and I'll run with that small sample size screaming into the hills announcing to all the flora and fauna that Mike Moustakas has arrived.
Until then, I get to bite my nails to the quick, hoping that he isn't the next wasted number two pick of the draft, further setting back a franchise that cannot afford to be so wasteful.
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