It was a great day at the plate for the Royals today. Chris Getz and Mitch Maier both hit homeruns. Bloomquist went 3 for 4. Brayan Pena had 2 singles. Kyle Farnesforth picked up the win in the game, putting him to 1-1. It was a good rebound for Farnesworth after previousley giving up 5 runs in his last game. Brian Bannister and dusty hughes also pitched. For the Angels, ace Ervin Santana pitched. He didn’t do much, but Kendry Morales did. Morales went 2 for 3 with an RBI double.

 

The Royals are now 5-3-1 in Cactus League play. The royals have Oakalnd today (Sunday) at 3:10. Rick Ankiel, who has missed the last few games will possibly get back in the lineup. The Royals have Josh Rupe, Blake Wood and Matt Herges. All are right-handers. The A’s starter will be Trevor Cahill.

The White Sox will have to rely on young players like Gordon Beckham.

American League Central-  Thsi will be a tight division with three teams. Tigers, Twins, and Royals. The Twins have the best hitter in the division,Mauer, and another great hitter with Morneau. They have a little bit of trouble with their relief pitching but the starting pitchers are stable. The Tigers lost ace Edwin Jackson, and are going to have to rely on Verlander in pitching. In hitting they lost speedster Granderson to the Yankees, and have only Cabrera left to save them. Ordonez and Guillen are getting old, and are starting to have worse stats by the years. They traded away their best rookie pitcher, Lucas French. The Tigers have little youth. They will have to rely on Cabrera and Inge to try to get something going. The Royals also are one of the teams that have a shot. They have great young hitters like Butler, DeJesus, and Gordon. They also got a big plus by adding .300 hitter Scott Podsednik. Don’t forget the Royals also have a pitching staff thats rising, with Greinke to start, and hopefully Hochevar will come through this year. The relief pitching is holding the Royals back. Many of the games I watched last year were blown by Farnesworth, Cruz, and Mahay. Soria is fine, but before they get to him, the relievers blow the game. They have to establish a solid relief pitcher like perhaps Carlos Rosa. If they can get a solid pitching staff, they’ve got a shot at the division. The White Sox will have some problems this season. They will ahve to rely on stable hitters like Gordon Beckum or Alexei Ramirez. The only noteable thing they did was add Mark Teahen. Sending him in to repalce star Jermaine Dye will be a negative. The pitching staff is solid, but won’t compete with a poor offense. This will be the first year the Sox won’t be a division contender. Last but not least, we have the Indians. They will be one of the worst teams in the American League. There best hitter, Martinez, got sent to Boston. There best pitcher got traded to Philadelphia. There next best hitter came off arguabley his worst year. There utility man DeRosa got sent to St. Louis. The only player in my mind that they have is Sin-Soo-Choo. Rookies Michael Brantley and Lou Marson will make little impact. The Indians will ahve to play small ball if they don’t want to be in the basement. This is how the American League Central will turn out.

American League East- It will be almost identical to last year. The only thing differnt is that the Rays and Red Sox will switch positions. The Red sox downgraded by switcing Jason Bay with Adrian Beltre. They also lost MiKe Lowell. They will have a whole year this time with Martinez. Ellsbury should be their best hitter this year. The Red Sox continue to dominate in pitching with Lester and Beckett. Lackey won’t make much of an impact. The relief will be poor, but the offense can make up for it. The Yankees added Mike Cameron, Curtis Granderson, and a few others. They will easily win the division in my mind. They have everthing from speed, power, coaching, money, and World Series rings. However I don’t think they’ll go far in the postseason. The Rays have many unreliable hitters like Kapler, Burrell, and yes, Carlos Pena. Longoria and Crawford will carry the power and speed. For homeruns, they have Carlos Pena. They have good relief pitchers, and solid starters. The Rays might even get the wild card. They will fianlly get back into a powerful position since the 2008 World Series run. The Blue Jays and Orioles both have too many issues with starting pitching and hitting. The Oriole4s even lost Markakis. They will suck, but the other three will hold their own.

American League West- The Rangers will win this division. At this point they have to powerful of a lineup not to win the division. Cruz, Hamilton, Andrus, Kinsler, Guerero and Young. Their pitching will be led by youngsters like Matt Harrison. The hitting will mostly do it all though. The Angels will get second with the strong pitching that they have with Weaver and Santana. Don’t forget the strong relief pitching. They will probably land a wild card. The Mariners will get third, but they are still a good team. I’ll give them credit for getting Figgins and Lee this offseason. They will be a contender, but will still get third. Why, you may ask, its because they have no one pitching after Lee and Hernandez, no one. They will still be a good team thougb. The A’s stand no chance though. All they have is Raja Davis. They will get last,and that is all I can say about them. Good Luck American League.

Feel free to comment on what you think, and the National League and Royals predictions will be coming out later. These predictions are not certain at all.

*= Wild Card                                               

AL                                                                                                                           NL

Central                                                                                                             Central  

1. Twins                                                                                                 1. Cardinals

2. Royals                                                                                                2. Brewers*

3. Tigers                                                                                                 3. Reds

4. White Sox                                                                                          4. Cubs

5. Indians                                                                                               5. Pirates

East                                                                                                     6. Pirates

1. Yankees                                                                                              East

2. Rays                                                                                                1. Mets

3. Red Sox                                                                                           2. Phillies 

4. Blue Jays                                                                                         3. Marlins

5. Orioles                                                                                             4. Braves

West                                                                                                   5. Nationals

1. Rangers                                                                                          West

2. Angels*                                                                                             1. Giants

3. Mariners                                                                                           2. Dodgers

4. A’s                                                                                                   3. Rockies

                                                                                                           4. D-Backs

                                                                                                           5. Padres

Playoffs

 

Angels over Twins                                                                      Cardinals over Giants 

Rangers over Yankees                                                               Brewers  over Mets

Angels over Rangers                                                                Cardinals over Brewers

Cardinals over Angels 

If you have been watching the Royals over the years, you will have noticed they always start off good. But, there seasons have always ended up like trash. Well, it seems to be the Royals always start to have a really bad losing streak in the middle of May, for the past few years. I’ll explain. The 2008 Royals started off good, well for the Royals anyway. By May 18, they were 20-22. Only two games under .500. But then the curse hit, the curse of mid may. It all started with the series in Boston. I can still remeber that series. I watched in disgust for four long and hard days as the Royals sailed to 20-26. I thought, well its just Boston, there one of the best teams in baseball, we’ll play better next series. Then they headed for another four game series, in Toronto. Again, I watched in disgust as the Jays shut us down 6-0, 1-7, 2-7, and finally 1-3. This was frustrating for all Royals fans. Sadly, Mid May was only partially done with its curse. The Royals were set to play the rival Minnesota Twins. We lost two heartbreakers in 3-4 and 8-9 losses against the Twins. The final game we lost 1-5, pathetic. It still wasn’t over, the next game the Royals lost to Cleveland 4-5. Thank God that was the end of the streak, because at that point it was the end of May. The Royals had just come on an 11 losing streak. Dropping there record of 20-22 to 20-33. May strikes hard in Kansas City.

That wasn’t the end of Thr Curse of Mid May. It struck again in KC in 2009. Although this time the curse let the Royals sneak in a few wins here and there. the sad part about this time was that the Royals were 18-11 and in firstplace in the AL Central. They had thoughts of the postseason on their minds. It started in the series against Anaheim. The Royals lost 1-4, 0-1, 3-4. Then the Royals took a short trip up to Oakland, one of the worst teams in baseball at the time. The Royals, for some reason, lost 3-12 and 2-7. The next game against Baltimore they lost 5-9. However, the next game against Baltimore the Royals snuck in a wins 8-1 and 7-4 against Baltimore. The streak continued though with another loss 2-3. The Royals next played division rival Cleveland. They took the first game 6-5, but lost there next four games 5-6, 3-8, 0-5, and 0-5 again . The Mid May curse stopped there. There record though worsened to 21-22. On game below .500.

The curse has hurt the Royals many other times through this decade, and most of the time after a good start. I’m hoping it won’t happen again this year. The Royals really can’t afford it.

Signing Jason Kendall

Comments- This was a bad deal. Basically all it did was downgrade the Royals in the catchers position. Honestly, the Royals are better off going with second year catcher Brayan Pena. He has a much better bat and can hold his own on defense. Jason Kendall was terrible at batting and average at fielding. Although I don’t think it wouldn’t hurt that bad just to put one bad hitter in the lineup. Still, the Royals are better off going with the young Brayan Pena.

 

Signing Rick Ankiel

 Comments- Ankiel has a good arm and is okay at hitting. The reason I’m worried about him is because he is coming off a big injury. It will be interesting to see if he can get his bat back together.

IF-OF Mark Teahen for 3B Josh Fields and 2B Chris Getz

Comments- I think this was the worst move of the offseason. Teahen was a fan favorite and a utility player. Teahen could was a good hitter, and getting better. This trade was basically Mark Teahen for Chris Getz. No one has even mentioned Josh Fields’s name in Spring Training. Getz will most likely have to split time this entire season with Callaspo and Fields will just be benched. This is just another bad deal from Dayton Moore.

Cutting Miguel Olivo, Mike Jacobs, John Buck, Coco Crisp 

Comments- It was ridiculous cutting Miguel Olivo, he was are best heavy hitter. You could see through the season Olivo was getting better. It was wise cutting John Buck. He was just a player on the roster who took up too much space on the roster. Jacobs was a terrible fielder and bad at getting on base, although he coul hit homeruns. Crisp was just another player who took up space on the roster. You could tell that from the begining. I liked his defense, but he couldn’t hit worth a dime.

Signing Scott Podsednik

Comments- Dayton, I actually like this move you made here. Podsednik willn ot only improve the defense, but he can hit too. I don’t expect him too do worse on the Royals. He cam efrom a team that is very similar to the Royals and played in the same division. Good job on this one Dayton

I wil, finish up the rest later.

Dayton moore has not done much since he’s joined KC. The best I would say he’s done is sign Zack Greinke to a contract. . Dayton’s blown all the money on terrible players. The worst deal of the decade: Jose Guillen for $36 million. Whats next: Gil Meche for $55 million. Meche at his best was 14-11 with an ERA of 3.98, (which wasn’t that bad) but the other seasons he has gotten hurt, and had bad stats. Guillen at his best hit 20 HR’s with a .264 AVG, pathetic for what he’s getting paid. Look at what the weaknesses are for the Royals. The starting rotation, you’ve got Braden Looper and Jarod Washburn just sitting out there waiting to be signed, when the Royals can’t decide what they’re going to do with there roation after Greinke. Dayton could go and sign these players up but he doesn’t. One reason is because he spent all the money on Guillen and Meche. Without those ridiculous ammounts of pay, he could have possibly brought in Nick Markakis. Yes, I said Nick Markakis. This offseason he promised he would trade many players and get new ones. well, he traded fan favorite Mark Teahen for two unproven infielders. Everyone was still waitng for more aquisitions so he basically says okay fine, heres Rick Ankiel go and have fun with him. Ankiel is another player who has gotten hurt in his career and is getting old and shows no promise. Also, I would also like to point out that he signs old and over the hill players. he also signs players that  players or that are getting hurt all of the time. Guillen is leaving this team at the end of the year and it’s going to be interseting to see what Dayton does with all the new money he has to spend without Jose Guillen. Will he spend it on another Guillen type player, or will he get a promising young player that is proven. Dayton, your job is on the line, you better improve this team.  

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