The Royals won the AL pennant, lost in Game 7 of the World Series and are apparently made of magic. What else do you really need to know?
Preseason Prediction: Realistically, the Royals should be neither appreciably better nor appreciably worse. On one hand, the offense should be more efficient with Aoki and Infante giving them an actually competent top of the order. There is also a reasonable expectation that Gordon, Hosmer and Butler could all take small steps forward as well. Kansas City won’t have a juggernaut offense, but they should be able to close the gap on being league average.
The problem I foresee is that the pitching figures to regress by an equal or greater amount than the offense will progress. Jeremy Guthrie is unlikely to have the same kind of success in 2014 and Ervin Santana, for all his inconsistency, was great in 2013 and being replaced by a lesser pitcher in Jason Vargas. Offsetting that though will hopefully be that the Royals won’t waste another 24 starts on Wade Davis and get much better work from some combination of Danny Duffy and Yordano Ventura.
They do still have a talented and deep bullpen though, so if things break right, they could replicate the same relief-fueled success that drove the 2012 Orioles and 2013 Pirates. Add it all together and the Royals are probably looking at another 86-win season. (Garrett Wilson, March 5th)
What Went Right: The thing that went exceedingly right for the Royals was that they developed a three-headed bullpen hydra of Greg Holland, Kelvin Herrera and a thankfully bullpen-bound Wade Davis. That trio allowed a combined 33 runs and turned every Royals game into a six-inning contest. It was all part of an underrated strategy to build the team around run prevention.
The other part of that equation was Kansas City’s terrific defense. They boasted one of the best defensive outfields of the modern era with Alex Gordon, Lorenzo Cain and a combination of Jarrod Dyson and the oft-adventurous Nori Aoki. Their infield defense wasn’t shabby either as both Eric Hosmer and Alcides Escobar are Gold Glove nominees, for whatever that’s worth. As always, they are anchored by Salvador Perez behind the plate. This was a defensive squad that gave almost nothing away and helped make a solid rotation look like a great rotation. Just ask Danny Duffy and the 1.37 gap between his 2.55 ERA and 3.92 FIP, he’ll tell ya.
What Went Wrong: The Royals still can’t hit. The expected step forward their offense was supposed to take never came. If anything, they were worse with just three players, with 120 PAs or more, finishing the season with a wRC+ of 100 or better. They also were the only team in baseball to not break the century mark in homers.
Mike Moustakas and Omar Infante were two of the biggest offenders, each finishing with a wRC+ of 76 as (mostly) full-time starters. On a team with no power and no high-end offensive talent, those are two pretty weighty anchors to carry in the lineup everyday. It also didn’t help that their two of their supposed young cornerstones took a step backward with the bat. Eric Hosmer, whose already taken a step or two back since his impressive rookie campaign in 2011, generated almost no power with a .127 ISO. Sal Perez was able to maintain his modest power production, but his OBP cratered all the way down to .289.
There just wasn’t a whole lot of good offense going on in KC. The hitters with good OBPs had almost no power and the few hitters with power had poor OBPs. Alex Gordon was the “best” hitter with a 122 wRC+, which is good, but nothing special.
Most Surprising Player: Wade Davis was “meh” as a starter for the Rays his first two years in the league. Then he was pretty good as a reliever for them for a year before being dealt to the Royals. They tried him as a starter again last year to appalling results. So they moved him back to the bullpen in hopes of being a useful reliever. They got that and a whole lot more. Davis was arguably the best reliever in baseball this year with 1.00 ERA, 13.63 K/9 rate and a jaw-dropping 3.1 fWAR… AS A RELIEVER.
Most Disappointing Player: Picking back up on the trend of disappointing offensive performers, Billy Butler can’t help but stand out. He had a big 2012 campaign that had folks thinking he was finally fulfilling all his promise. Then he regressed a bit, but was still quite good, in 2013. The hope going into 2014 was that Butler could be somewhere in between those two performance levels. Instead, the bottom fell out. He set career lows in average (.271), OBP (.323), walk rate (6.8%), ISO (.107) and homers (9). Country Breakfast hit more like Country Light Morning Snack (sorry). It was a performance so poor that it not only undermined the Royals’ already meager offense, but might very well have spelled an end to his time in KC. While the organization and fans love Butler, they probably don’t love him enough to pick up his $12 million option for 2015.
The Future: On one hand, the Royals have a young core they are built around. Yordano Ventura and Danny Duffy will front the rotation and Hosmer, Cain, Escobar, Perez and three-headed bullpen monster aren’t going anywhere anytime soon either. However, they are facing the loss of some very big pieces this offseason with James Shields and Nori Aoki becoming free agents and the team holding a $12.5 million option on Billy Butler. It’s hard to see the Royals having enough money to bring them all back, Shields in particular.
Either way, the Royals should at least be competitive in 2015. They could even be World Series favorites if the breakout postseason performances of guys like Hosmer, Moustakas and Perez can carry over into next season.
