Grinders!!!

The Royals came back from a 2-1 deficit to not only earn their second road win but a second consecutive win.

Wins for the Royals are a scarce quantity.
Strangely, it all reminds me of quote Chef from South ParkChef said in season one: "Football is a lot like a woman; you can’t always score, but when you do it makes it all worthwhile."

If there has been a silver lining to what has become a ludicrously long DL-list, it is that the new (Kerry Robinson)  and familiar (Aaron Guiel) have really energized the lineup.

All right team! Let’s make it three in a row!!

Does Anyone Care?

Pretty awful title, I know especially for the The Royals Optimist of all people, yet it’s a fair question. The Royals may well hit every single record for futility this year. (Look, I may be an optimist, but I am not neccesarily detached from reality).

What brought this title up was that I recently upgraded from Gameday Audio to MLB.TV. I certainly recommend it as MLB.TV is AWESOME. However, some things are better left to your imagination. For instance, Mark Teahen’s strikeout in the top of the eighth in tonight’s (4 May, 2006) was gut wrenching as that third strike was so clearly out of the strike zone.

If I were in the Royal’s shoes, I don’t know if I could handle it any better. The deludge of injuries, the bad luck, the constant losing.

This is the End..

Cue the tears, the soundtrack, the ticker-tape parade, the creepy Jim Morrison music, all of that stuff: There is a good possibility that Mike Sweeney has played his last game and/or season.

While that is a hopefully pre-mature obit, it does rouse a great deal of emotions. WIn or lose, Sweeney always came to play. He was the face of the franchise and always kept his head up even as the losses piled up around him.

A lot of folks (The Royals Optimist included) will second-guess the decision to not trade Sweeney.  He clearly was the best asset the Royals had. Forgetting that for a second, I am of the belief that a man of Sweeney’s passion, baseball intellect and upstanding nature deserved a taste of the postseason.

Going to Bawwwwwstan

Mcad10973I’ll be out for the next four days accompanying my wife and The Boy to the Hub of the Universe.

I am betting that I won’t have Internet and thus unable to blog a whole lot. But you never can say.

Last year, my wife and I were in the process of moving from Las Vegas, NV to Iowa City. During that time I had no real contact on what was going on in the world. When the dust finally cleared, the Royals had hired Buddy Bell and swept the Yankees.
Bostonmap
So I think I wisely leary about this. Have a safe weekend
Matt

Win Shares 4/26/05

R Hernandez 29.5 %
E Dessens 7.7 %
A Burgos 7.6 %
M Stairs 14.4 %
M Grudzielanek 11.5 %
E Brown 7.5 %
M Teahen -0.2 %
D Mientkiewicz -3.2 %
A Berroa -5.6 %
S Costa -6.0 %
R Sanders -6.2 %
P Bako -7.0 %

These win shares (which I totally snagged from the awesome site FanGraphs.com by the way; check them out) are painting a bleak picture. Nice to see one of our pitchers go through 7 innings and not be stymied by the bullpen.

For what its worth, Sanders, while 0-4, did have a sacrifice fly to score a runner in the 6th.

None the less, a wins a win!! Congrat to Runvy for allowing two hits, one run through seven.