Royals Report Card 2011: Part Six.

You go to war with the rotation you have, not the rotation you want. So enough pining for what we don’t have – here’s a report card for everyone who started a game for the Royals last season:

Nate Adcock: B

Adcock, I think, is a reminder of how difficult it is to strike gold in the Rule 5 draft. By any reasonable expectation, his season had to be considered a success. For one thing, he actually stayed on the Royals’ active roster for the entire year, which is in itself a rarity – of the 19 players selected in the 2010 Rule 5 draft, just six of them made it through the season with their new teams unscathed.

Adcock finished with mediocre but acceptable numbers for a bottom-of-the-bullpen guy – a 4.62 ERA in 60 innings, with 36 strikeouts and 23 unintentional walks. He made three starts during the season, and while he was blasted in one of them – he gave up 7 runs in 2.2 innings on a day when the ball was flying in Arlington – he pitched very well in the other two: five shutout innings against the Cardinals on May 21st, and two runs allowed in 5.1 innings in Detroit on August 31st.

The problem is that, despite sticking on the roster all season, he pitched in just 21 games in relief. He went 13 games without pitching from April 8th to April 22nd. He pitched in just three games in all of June, and just twice in September. After throwing three innings on June 16th, he didn’t pitch again until July 1st, when he threw two innings in a 9-0 loss – and then didn’t pitch again until July 22nd, when he closed out a 10-4 victory.

The Royals gave all sorts of reasons for why they had to employ seven and sometimes eight relievers all season, but really the reason boils down to this: they were carrying a pitcher they had so little faith in that they allowed him to take the mound one time in five weeks. That will play havoc with your roster.

But in the end, they made it through the season with Adcock…so now what? Adcock wasn’t a top prospect before they snagged him – he didn’t rank among the Royals’ top 30 prospects last year per Baseball America, nor did he with the Pirates in 2010. He had an acceptable rookie season, but didn’t do anything that made you think he’s ready for a more prominent role. I mean, is he one of the Royals’ eight best bullpen options for 2012? Is he one of their five best options for the rotation? No and no.

Which means the best outcome for him is that the Royals send him to Omaha and put him in the rotation, and see if he can become something – which is great, except that the CBA prohibits teams from cutting a player’s salary by more than 20% from one year to the next, even if they’re in the minor leagues. Adcock made the major league minimum of $414,000 last year – so the Royals will owe him about $330,000 to pitch in the minors this season. That’s not an insignificant amount of money for someone who lights up neither radar guns nor the eyes of prospect gurus.

But while Adcock doesn’t throw hard – his fastball averaged 90.4 mph last season per Fangraphs – he was drafted with a reputation for having a lot of sink on his heater, and that certainly bore out. Adcock’s groundball rate as a rookie was 55.6%, which was the highest of any Royals pitcher with at least 20 innings. Adcock turns 24 this month; there’s not a lot of projection left with him, but he’s at least young enough to refine his pitches.

Adcock might wind up a lot like Kanekoa Texeira, who stuck on the Royals’ roster for much of 2010 and then quietly faded away after struggling in Omaha early in 2011. But that groundball rate tells me that it’s worth keeping an eye on him. Adcock may not have the pedigree of his teammates, but the Royals clearly saw something in him when they drafted him. If they allow him to make up for missed development time in Triple-A this season, they might still get something out of their investment.

In the meantime, perhaps it’s a blessing that the Royals didn’t try to snag another pitcher in December’s Rule 5 draft. They’ve got a hill to climb if they want to contend in 2012, and playing with a 24-man roster wouldn’t help.

Bruce Chen: B+

A year after surprising everyone by going 12-7 with a 4.17 ERA for the Royals, Chen came back on a one-year deal and went 12-8 with a 3.77 ERA. Chen became only the second Royals pitcher since 1999 to win 12 games in back-to-back years – Zack Greinke did it in 2008 and 2009.

Which is why Chen is now back on a two-year deal.

Chen’s ability to continue to pitch well depends on whether he has the rare, almost mythical ability to consistently beat the odds on balls in play. To reiterate: balls in play turn into hits roughly 30% of the time, and that rate is almost completely independent of the pitcher on the mound. Against Roy Halladay, batters have hit .295 on balls in play in his career; against Oliver Perez, they hit .292. The difference between Halladay and Perez is entirely the result of walks, strikeouts, and home runs – not balls in play.

Last season, on balls in play against Bruce Chen, batters hit just .280. In 2010, they hit .279. Those numbers look like he was the beneficiary of good luck – until you notice that for his career, in a career spanning nearly 1200 innings, batters have hit .282 on balls in play. If that’s a fluke, it’s a particularly persistent one.

There’s reason to think it isn’t. Chen is one of the most extreme flyball pitchers in the major leagues. Last season, just 35% of balls in play against Chen were on the ground, right at his career average, while 45% were in the air. Flyballs – the ones that don’t clear the fence – are more likely to be turned into outs than grounders. While his flyball tendencies make Chen prone to the home run, they also make a .280 BABIP seem sustainable.

What will determine whether Chen can keep it up is not whether he can keep his BABIP down; it’s whether he can keep his homers down. He gave up 18 homers in 155 innings last year, 17 in 140 innings in 2010, and while those aren’t good ratios, they’re much better than his career norms. Prior to 2010, Chen had allowed 166 career homers in 869 innings, nearly one every five innings. Kauffman Stadium is the perfect fit for him, but not even the K suppresses home runs that much.

So did Chen, at the age of 33, finally figure out how to avoid surrendering meatballs in 2010? He wouldn’t be the first crafty, soft-tossing lefty to put it together in his early 30s, but believing that he figured it out requires a small act of faith. I’ll be honest: I’m skeptical, and I’m worried that the Royals will regret this contract before the end of its first quarter. Of the five guys who are supposed to open the season in the Royals’ rotation, Chen is the one most likely to lose his job for cause by June.

But that doesn’t mean I’m not rooting for him. Chen is one of the most fascinating players in the game. How many former top prospects – Chen was Baseball America’s #4 prospect in 1999 – finally find success over a decade later, when their fastball hits 87 on a good day? How many Chinese-Panamanians learn English so well and embrace their adopted country so tightly that the “Bruce Chen Joke of the Day” will be a new feature at Kauffman Stadium all season long? How many Chinese-Panamanians play major league baseball, period?

On paper, Bruce Chen looks like one of the Royals players most likely to give us grief in 2012. And yet he’s also one of the easiest players to root for. It’s another subtle reason why the Royals seem headed in the right direction – even their mistakes are loveable. Chen could certainly earn his contract, his clubhouse presence is key for a team building with youth, and I'm happy he's here. At least in February.

Kyle Davies: F

Last season was a mixed bag for Davies. On the one hand, he had his worst season as a member of the Royals, posting a 6.75 ERA; he lost eight straight starts and finished with a 1-9 record in 13 starts; he went on the DL twice with shoulder problems; it was revealed that Davies had the worst ERA in the history of baseball of any pitcher with 120 or more career starts; he was arrested for disorderly intoxication while on the DL in August and was released the next day – the Royals insist it was just a coincidence.

On the other hand, he was paid $3.2 million. We should all have such terrible years.

I’ve been saying for years that Davies should be tried in the bullpen, and after his release, the Blue Jays picked him up and tried him in relief in Triple-A Las Vegas. He pitched well in six appearances, but then he always pitched well in the minors – his career ERA in Triple-A is 2.65. We probably haven’t heard the last of Davies, but we’ve probably heard the last of him in a Royals uniform. Which is just as well.

Danny Duffy: B+ (minors), C- (majors)

While the other three lefties in the Royals’ vaunted quartet were struggling (Mike Montgomery and Chris Dwyer) or blowing out their elbows (John Lamb), Duffy took a big step forward early last season, moving up to Triple-A and striking out over a batter an inning before getting called up after just seven starts. In 82 career innings in the high minors, Duffy now has 89 strikeouts and just 19 walks. Duffy, remember, briefly walked away from the game just a year before. If you had told me on May 18th, 2010, while Duffy was still retired, that he’d be in the Royals’ major-league rotation one year later, I would have asked you to pass the pipe.

But all Duffy managed to accomplish during his time in the majors was to remind us how difficult it is for even highly regarded prospects to adjust to the majors. The stuff was there; Duffy averaged 93.3 mph on his fastball, which is terrific for a left-hander, and struck out 87 batters in 105 innings. But he left both his command and his control in Omaha. His lack of control manifested in his 51 walks; his lack of command is evident in the 15 homers he surrendered.

In 20 starts with the Royals, Duffy finished with a 5.64 ERA. I think we’ve become numb to ERAs in the upper 5s as Royals fans, both because of how bad our pitching has been and because, when the fences were brought in 10 feet between 1996 and 2003, Kauffman Stadium was one of the best-hitting parks in the majors during one of the best-hitting eras in history.

So perhaps you don’t appreciate how bad a 5.64 ERA is. It’s really, really bad. It was bad ten years ago; in 2011, when the league ERA was 4.08, it was awful. Duffy’s ERA+, which adjusts his ERA for the context of his league and ballpark, was 73. That’s the same ERA+ Runelvys Hernandez had in 2006 – when Hernandez had a 6.48 ERA. In Royals history, in fact, only five pitchers have had a lower ERA+ than Duffy did in a season of at least 100 innings.

It’s not quite as bad as it looks, though, because while Duffy gave a ton of earned runs, he didn’t give up a single unearned run all season. The distinction between earned and unearned runs is very ambiguous, and the case has been eloquently stated that we should abandon the distinctions entirely – pitchers have nearly as much control over “unearned” runs as they do over “earned” runs. Given a normal percentage of unearned runs, and Duffy’s ERA would have been about 30 points lower – bad, but not historically so.

I’m rambling…the point is that Duffy, despite having the tools to succeed in the majors, gave up a toxic mix of walks and home runs as a rookie. He still has the tools to turn it around, but it’s far from a fait accompli. A look at some comparables gives you an idea of the wide range of outcomes possible.

In the divisional era, 11 other pitchers have made 15+ starts in a season at the age of 22, with a strikeout rate of at least 7 per 9 innings, but with an ERA above 5 anyway. Basically, this is a list of pitchers who were good enough to be in a major-league rotation at the age of 22, but were ineffective despite a good strikeout rate.

The 11 included pitchers of almost every flavor. There were future stars in Greg Swindell, Javier Vazquez, and John Danks, along with Bobby Witt, one of the great teases of my lifetime. There was a future set-up man in Eric Plunk. There was a steady, reliable innings-eater in Randy Wolf. There were the inevitable pitchers whose careers were ruined by injuries, including Rocky Coppinger, Jesse Foppert, and Adam Loewen. And there were the guys who washed out quickly, and probably shouldn’t be in the discussion at all: Rick VandenHurk and Sean Gallagher.

Based on that cohort, there’s about a 50/50 chance that Duffy will make something of himself. The comps don’t really give an indication as to which way he will go, but they do suggest we’ll know soon. The pitchers that wound up as successes all improved significantly, and in some cases dramatically, at age 23. The failures didn’t; in most cases they didn’t even last the year in the rotation. The range of variation on Duffy’s 2012 season is enormous. On this team, that just makes him one among many.

Jeff Francis: C+

Ten years from now, I suspect that when you ask Royals fans to come up with a list of pitchers who made 30 or more starts with the team, Jeff Francis’ name will be about the last one anyone will remember. His tenure with the team was eminently forgettable, not because he was awful, but precisely because he wasn’t. He was just there, every fifth day, tossing six innings and giving up three or four runs.

He wasn’t the pitcher the Royals hoped to get – after a 4.77 ERA in six seasons in Coors Field, they probably weren’t expecting his ERA to be higher pitching half his games in Kauffman Stadium. On the other hand, they also could not have expected that he’d make 31 starts, given that he had missed nearly two full seasons with a rotator cuff injury and had just returned the year before.

(It’s worth pointing out that while Francis signed for $2 million, he almost certainly made a lot more than that. His contract called for $2 million in “performance bonuses”, but remember that MLB’s rules prohibit bonuses for stats other than those pertaining to playing time, i.e. games played, innings pitched, etc. Francis tossed 31 starts and threw 183 innings, which means he had to have come close to maxing out his bonus money. He still wasn’t a terrible signing, but at close to $4 million he wasn’t exactly a bargain either.)

His superficial stats indicate a 6-16 record and a 4.82 ERA, which both look terrible, but they easily could have been a lot better. The Royals averaged just 3.86 runs in his starts. Every year some pitcher draws the short straw in run support, and 2011 was Francis’ year. (In the Royals’ other 131 games, they averaged 4.70 runs a game.) Francis was also slightly unlucky on balls in play, as opposing batters hit .319 in those situations, higher than the team average of .303.

Francis was as dependent on balls in play as anyone last year, because he was a strike-throwing machine. He walked only 39 batters in his 31 starts, five of them intentional. Only one other qualifying Royals starter since the 1994-95 strike walked fewer batters per nine innings than Francis: Paul Byrd, who walked just 38 batters in 228 innings in 2002, and went 17-11 with a 3.90 ERA. Francis didn’t strike anyone out either – just 91 in 183 innings, just under one every other inning – but with a better defense and/or better luck, he might have had a much better season.

Francis signed a minor-league deal with the Reds, and they’re a terrific fit for him. He’s even more suited for NL competition than the typical pitcher, and the Reds have a very underrated defense – Drew Stubbs and Jay Bruce are fantastic defenders, Scott Rolen can still pick it, Brandon Phillips is very good, and Zack Cozart has a good reputation as well. His shoulder history will always make him a poor bet to get through a season unscathed, but if Francis makes their rotation out of spring training, a nice little comeback season wouldn’t surprise me a bit.

Back with the second half of starting pitchers soon.

For Want Of A Pitcher: Left Wanting.

(My apologies for going so long between posts. To make it up to you, I’m headed to spring training for the first time ever – I’m planning to be in Surprise from the 28th until March 3rd. Hopefully you’ll see a lot more content from me then, and if I’m lucky maybe even some interviews with members of the organization.)

As you’ve probably noticed, it doesn’t look like the Royals are going to take my advice about acquiring another starting pitcher this off-season. This is disappointing, and not only because I wrote about 50,000 words on the subject*. I remain convinced that the Royals have a legitimate shot at the AL Central – if the Tigers stumble, the division is wide-open for a team to finish in first place with something like 85 wins – and adding an impact starting pitcher would have significantly raised those odds.

*: Though between offering Edwin Jackson a three-year deal and trying to get A.J. Burnett with the Yankees paying two-thirds of his contract, it looks like the Pirates are at least trying to heed my advice.

I’m not advocating that the Royals add a starter just for the sake of adding one. I wrote up close to 40 starting pitchers when the off-season began, and very few of them would hold any appeal today. (While Burnett, for instance, is worth $13 million over two years for the Pirates, I wouldn't want him at that price for the Royals.) The Royals added Jonathan Sanchez, whose upside is higher than all but a handful of those pitchers, and they did so without surrendering any prospects or making a long-term financial commitment. I salute them for that.

But aside from Sanchez, the only move the Royals made to upgrade their 2012 rotation was to bring back Bruce Chen. I think the world of Chen, but when you re-sign a 34-year-old starter coming off the best two-year stretch of his career, the word that comes to mind isn’t “upgrade”, it’s “regression”.

Meanwhile, Edwin Jackson signed a one-year contract for $11 million.

One year. Eleven million dollars.

Look, I appreciate that I might be the biggest Edwin Jackson supporter in the industry right now – Joe Sheehan and I might be the only two analysts in the world who think he’s due to break out. But you don’t have to think Jackson is the second coming of Jason Schmidt, or even the second coming of Gil Meche, to think that a one-year contract for him is criminal.

I can’t fault the Royals too much for not signing Roy Oswalt, because it’s not entirely clear that they could lure him to Kansas City anyway. He reportedly turned down an offer from Detroit, and told the Indians not to even bother making one, and even the Red Sox got the cold shoulder. (Also, he still hasn’t signed yet. It’s not too late to make it happen, Dayton!) But the decision to not pursue Jackson, given the strangely depressed market for his services, is mystifying.

There’s the argument to be made that, having not received any satisfactory long-term offers, agent Scott Boras elected to get Jackson a one-year deal with the team that gave Jackson the best odds of increasing his market value next winter. In other words, the Nationals got him not only because of the money they offered, but because pitching in the NL is a lot easier than trying to dominate in the crucible of the AL East. Maybe Jackson wouldn’t have signed with the Royals for the same terms the Nationals gave him.

But I think those concerns are overblown. Even with the league disparities, it’s hard to argue the AL Central is significantly more competitive than the NL East. Pitching for the Nationals, Jackson will face the Phillies, the Braves, the suddenly free-spending Marlins, and yes, the Mets nearly half the time. With the Royals, he’d be facing the Tigers, White Sox, Indians, and Twins.

And then there’s the little matter of winning. Scott Boras is well aware of how much talent the Royals have on their roster – he represents seemingly half their players. He knows that the one thing the Royals lack – above-average starting pitching – is the exact void Jackson would fill, making them at least fringe contenders in the AL Central. The Royals aren’t the Pirates. If they had outbid the Nationals for his services, I think he’d be in Surprise right now.

So why didn’t the Royals sign another starter? Funny you should ask, because Bob Dutton did the same thing of Dayton Moore a few days ago.

“It just doesn’t fit”, he said. “For me, we would be abandoning our plan with the young players. That’s not who we are. I think it’s important that we understand who we are, where we’re going and what we’re trying to do.”

“Abandoning that (approach), and precluding any of those young pitchers from being in our rotation, is doing just that.”

Let’s break down the possible reasons why the Royals might have decided not to pursue another starting pitcher. We’ll begin by taking Moore at face value:

1) The Royals have enough starting pitcher options already.

The Royals already have a tentative rotation set up: Luke Hochevar, Jonathan Sanchez, Bruce Chen, Felipe Paulino, and Danny Duffy. The Royals have already announced that the first three are locks (which they should be), while Paulino and Duffy have the early edge for the 4-5 spots but are not guaranteed anything.

You know how I feel about Paulino; the case can be made that he’s the best starting pitcher on the roster, and he absolutely should be in the starting rotation. Duffy took a step forward in the minors last year, but had a 5.64 ERA with the Royals. I don’t think it’s sacrilege to say that a refresher stint with Omaha might be a good thing for Duffy if he scuffles in Arizona.

Even if Duffy pitches brilliantly, you can’t start spring training with just five tentative starters, particularly when not one of them took a consistent turn in a rotation the last two years. Sanchez made 52 starts in 2010 and 2011 combined; Chen and Hochevar made 48. Nobody in the Royals’ projected rotation has made 30 starts in back-to-back seasons at any point in their career.

And for as many pitching prospects as the Royals have, barring a miracle, none of them are ready to toe the slab in the majors on Opening Day.

The argument that the Royals have enough pitching is predicated around some of the less-heralded pitchers on the roster. If Everett Teaford were any more under the radar, he’d be a B-2 Bomber. Two years ago he was a non-prospect, but he added 5 mph to his fastball, and now he’s a left-hander who over the last two years struck out 150 batters in 139 innings in the high minors, and acquitted himself okay as a swingman for the Royals last year. Nate Adcock is even less sexy than Teaford, if that’s possible, but the Royals must have had some reason to take him in the Rule 5 draft, and he made a few spot starts for the team last year.

Luis Mendoza led the PCL with a 2.18 ERA last season, and even though he didn’t strike anyone out, he’s out of options and the Royals might feel compelled to give him a chance to prove 2011 was a fluke. And of course Vinny Mazzaro and Sean O’Sullivan are still on the roster in the event of a meteor strike or an outbreak of bubonic plague or something.

Finally, there’s Aaron Crow, who it seems will be given every chance to make it as a starting pitcher this spring. I love the idea of putting Crow back in the starter’s role; I hate the idea that there’s any way he should break camp in the Royals’ rotation. Crow has never succeeded as a starter in professional baseball. Granted, it was only one season, but he struggled as a starter in Double-A, and he struggled as a starter in Single-A. He succeed as a reliever in the majors, but if you’re going to make him a starter again, don’t you kind of have to make him prove it in the minor leagues for a month or two first? I’d say that even if a month or two in the minors didn’t also push back his free agency by a year. That it does is a nice bonus.

So yes, if the Royals want to be technical about it, they have plenty of options for the starting rotation on Opening Day. But if we’re talking good options, I’m not sure they even have five of those.

2) The Royals don’t have, or don’t want to spend, the money to add a starter.

This is sort of the elephant in the room, isn’t it? With Alex Gordon’s contract finalized, the Royals’ payroll for 2012 looks to be around $56 million. You can add another $1-2 million to account for Noel Arguelles and the possibility that Aaron Crow starts in the minors, but even then it tops out at $58 million.

While the Royals’ payroll in 2011 was under $40 million – artifically lowered by Gil Meche’s unexpected retirement – that was an anomaly. In 2010, the Royals had a payroll of $76.8 million, per Baseball Prospectus. In 2009, their payroll was $75.0 million. It was $64 million in 2008, and $70 million in 2007.

Meanwhile, revenues in major league baseball have only been going up over time. While the Royals are locked into their TV contract for several more years, and so are not able to take advantage of the massive escalation in TV rights fees that teams like the Angels and Rangers are getting, they do share in those windfalls through revenue sharing. They make more money through national TV contracts and through MLB.com, where revenues are shared equally among all 30 teams.

If the Royals could afford a payroll of $70 million or more three times in four years between 2007 and 2010, there’s no way on God’s green earth you can convince me that they can’t afford a payroll of $70 million this season. Which means there’s no way you can convince me that the Royals couldn’t afford Jackson’s contract, or whatever it will take to sign Oswalt now.

But while the money is there, that doesn’t mean the Glass family is willing to spend it. I have credited the Glasses for reversing their early penuriousness, and spending aggressively on player development at the same time that they raised payroll. In 2007, for instance, the Royals payroll was just $14 million shy of the MLB average of $84 million. And they continue to spend money on player development – just in the last two weeks, they spent $550,000 to sign Cuban defector Ramon Hernandez Jorrin, and a shade under $100,000 to sign a 17-year-old Dominican right-hander named Branly Crisotomo. So the unwillingness to raise the major league payroll is…puzzling. And at least a little concerning.

It’s certainly possible that the money is there to add payroll if needed, and Dayton Moore simply decided to stand pat with the roster he has. But it’s something to watch closely.

3) The Royals don’t want to block any of their pitching prospects once they’re ready.

That’s a noble gesture, but the Royals sure seem to be applying it inconsistently.

After struggling through his first Double-A season, largely due to a traumatic knee injury that subsequently got infected, Wil Myers went to the Arizona Fall League fully healthy and raked, hitting .360/.481/.674. That restored his elite prospect status; Baseball America ranked him the #5 prospect in the league, behind the two best hitting prospects in baseball (Bryce Harper and Mike Trout), and the first two picks in the 2011 draft (Gerrit Cole and Danny Hultzen.) The Top 100 Prospect ranking have been coming out over the past two weeks, and Myers’ status is almost unchanged from last season. On Kevin Goldstein’s Top 101 Prospect list for Baseball Prospectus, Myers dropped from #13 all the way to #19. Keith Law at ESPN.com dropped Myers from #8 to #13.

If Myers continues to rake in spring training, he will probably start the year in Triple-A; if he returns to Northwest Arkansas, a promotion to Omaha will probably come after his first prolonged hot stretch. There’s a good chance he’ll be ready for major league playing time by September. By April, 2013, Myers may be ready to play right field every day for the Royals.

Or he would, if Jeff Francoeur weren’t already signed for the next two years.

Lorenzo Cain was pretty clearly ready for the majors at the start of last season, after hitting .306/.348/.415 for the Brewers during the last two months of 2010. But because Melky Cabrera was busy rapping out a 200-hit season, Cain spent the entire year in Omaha, getting called up only after the Storm Chasers won the PCL title, and got into six games in September more out of pity than anything else.

And you know what? The Royals were right to keep Cain in Omaha, because Cabrera was having a great season. If Myers goes nuts this season and is ready for a major-league job, that’s a pleasant dilemma for the team to have. Too much talent is never a bad thing. But I think it’s incongruous to re-sign Jeff Francoeur without worrying what that does to Myers’ development, but then to turn around and say we can’t bring in an impact starter because he might get in the way of Mike Montgomery.

While you can only start one right fielder, you can start five pitchers. The odds are awfully high that injury or poor performance opens up an opportunity for Montgomery eventually.

Besides which, how likely is it that one of the Royals’ top pitching prospects will be banging on the door this year? Mike Montgomery has a full season in Triple-A under his belt, and if he solves whatever issues plagued him last year, he could be ready for an audition in May or June. Then again, he might not – he did have a 5.32 ERA last season.

Besides Montgomery…Jake Odorizzi might be ready in July if he suddenly adds the velocity in the fastball the Royals think is still in his arm. Chris Dwyer might be ready in August if he suddenly learns to throw strikes for the first time in his career. John Lamb might be ready in September if his rehab from Tommy John goes perfectly. But there’s a very good chance that none of them will earn a call-up in 2012, and even if they’re ready late in the season, none of them will be such finished products that delaying their major-league debut by a month or two will cause permanent harm.

For a one-year deal for someone like Oswalt to damage the youth movement would require an incredibly combination of circumstances: it would require everyone in the rotation to stay healthy and effective; it would require one of the Royals’ top prospects to have a massive breakout season; and it would require that prospect to be so polished that by August he has literally run out of things to work on at the Triple-A level.

And you know what? If all those things happen, well, party.

While none of the Royals’ top prospects, except possibly for Montgomery, are likely to be ready for deployment in 2012, many of them should be ready by early 2013 – Odorizzi and Lamb, Dwyer if he isn’t a reliever by then, maybe even Jason Adam or Yordano Ventura if they go crazy this season and jump two levels. I can definitely see the argument that signing a starting pitcher past 2012 might impact the Royals’ youth movement.

But neither Jackson nor Oswalt required a commitment beyond 2012. Which would have fit the Royals’ plans nicely, as they have not made a commitment beyond 2012 to any pitcher on their entire roster, with two exceptions.

One is Noel Arguelles, the Cuban defector who signed a 5-year deal after the 2009 season, and will make around $1.4 million each of the next three years regardless of where he pitches. That’s not a trivial expense, but that goes into the player development bin, much like how Bubba Starling’s $7.5 million contract will be paid out over three years.

The other exception is the starter the Royals did sign as a free agent this winter, Bruce Chen. Which brings me to the last, and in my mind most likely, explanation:

4) The Royals mis-timed the market, and overpaid for Bruce Chen.

I like Bruce Chen a lot. He’s a legitimately funny guy who is absolutely beloved by his teammates. (The other day Danny Duffy tweeted Chen’s latest joke: “ned i need a trainer, my changeup is sick”. The point isn’t whether the joke was funny or not. The point is that his junior teammate enjoyed it so much he felt compelled to tell the world about it.) Chen seems to genuinely appreciate the opportunity to play for the Royals, he loves the team and its fanbase, and he was the Royals’ best starting pitcher the last two seasons.

That said, he’s not an impact starter, and if he’s occupying the rotation spot that could have gone to Jackson or Oswalt, then the Royals made a mistake.

Which is why these comments from Dayton Moore are so interesting:

“I guess if we had known all along that Edwin Jackson or Oswalt were going to take one-year deals,” Moore said, “maybe we would have done things a little differently or thought things through a little differently. But I don’t think so.”

Whoa. Maybe it’s dangerous to read too much into that quote – he did end with the qualifier “I don’t think so” – but it’s amazing to me that Moore would even hint at regret.

And if he thinks he might “have done things a little differently” – it’s hard to escape the conclusion that giving Chen a two-year deal is at the top of his list of regrets. What else did the Royals do this winter? They traded for Jonathan Sanchez, but they’re only committed to Sanchez for one year. If blocking your pitching prospects is your greatest concern, then that second year has to be the source of your discontent.

“I think we would have come to the same conclusion. Sanchez really made sense for us at one year for $5.6 million. We needed to get Bruce Chen back. We feel he’s going to continue to give us consistency.

“Once we were committed to those two guys and Hoch, to do anything else would block those young guys from getting an opportunity.”

I wouldn’t even go so far as to characterize Chen’s contract as a mistake – I think it’s a risk, but the money involved ($9 million over two years) is manageable. There’s a chance he could be this generation’s version of Larry Gura, and continue to guile his way to success without striking anyone out.

But then, I didn’t think signing Chen precluded the Royals from signing another starting pitcher. I thought that, even with Chen, the Royals still had the payroll space to spend $10-12 million on a legitimate #2 starter. I thought that, even with Chen, the Royals could open up a spot in the rotation for one more guy – Danny Duffy would have been slated for the minors at the beginning of spring training, waiting for an opening that would inevitably present itself.

But if Dayton Moore knew that he didn’t have the money for another guy, then spending $8.5 million combined on Chen and Jonathan Broxton is a waste of resources if it could have been spent on Jackson. And if he knew that he didn’t have another rotation spot to offer, he should have been more patient to see how the market presented itself. Every year Moore likes to make an aggressive move right out of the gate, and more often than not he shoots himself in the foot. He traded Leo Nunez (excuse me, Juan Carlos Oviedo) for Mike Jacobs on October 31st. He traded Ramon Ramirez for Coco Crisp on November 19th. He traded David DeJesus for Vinny Mazzaro and Justin Marks on November 10th. He signed Bruce Chen on November 23rd, when if he had waited until January, he would have had a greater selection at discounted prices to look at it in the showroom.

The decision to not add another starter may still yield some benefits. If adding another starter meant that it was Felipe Paulino, and not Duffy, who lost his rotation spot, then maybe it’s better they didn’t do so. If keeping a rotation spot empty means the Royals are committed to Aaron Crow as a starter, and if that experiment succeeds, the dividends would be substantial. So I can’t characterize the decision to stand pat as a clear mistake. But it is a missed opportunity.

I’ve been saying all winter that the 2012 AL Central is there for the taking, and the Tigers’ signing of Prince Fielder only changes that calculus a little. Maybe standing pat now gives the Royals a tiny edge in the future, but sometimes you have to seize the day. Moore’s boldness has cost the Royals in the past, but at the very moment he positioned the Royals to where a bold move might make a difference, he lost his nerve. It remains to be seen if his hesitation means we all lost.

The Royals And A Prince.

The State of the Royals as a franchise has oscillated over the last two weeks, through no fault of their own. Twelve days ago Victor Martinez blew out his knee, costing the Detroit Tigers the services of their second-best hitter (and third-most highly paid player) for probably all of 2012. Then five days ago the Tigers responded to their one-year problem with a nine-year solution, guaranteeing Prince Fielder $214 million to bash home runs and take out some justifiable anger at his father by usurping his status as the best Fielder in Tigers history. Or something like that.

It’s best to evaluate these two events together, because in tandem the impact of each event is muted. Martinez’s injury immediately improved the Royals’ odds of winning the division in 2012; Fielder’s contract returned the Royals back to square one and then some.

Given a few days to ponder the implications of Fielder signing in Detroit, I hold a pair of contradictory but not mutually exclusive opinions. I think – as most people do – that Fielder’s contract is a bad thing for the Tigers in the long term. But I also think it’s a bad thing for the Royals in the short term. But maybe not as bad as it looks on the surface.

Prince Fielder is a fantastic hitter, one of the best in baseball. He hit .299/.415/.566 last season, and he’s averaged .285/.399/.553 over the last five years. Much as he and Ryan Braun made up arguably the best 3-4 duo in the game last season, pairing Fielder up with Miguel Cabrera gives the Tigers the most imposing pair of hitters in any team’s lineup to start the season.

But…that kind of sums up Fielder’s contributions. He’s terrible defensively, even by the remedial standards of first baseman – he cost the Brewers something like 8 runs a season with his glove. (Per Baseball Info Solutions, Fielder ranks as the worst defensive first baseman in baseball over the last five years.) He’s an incredibly slow runner, enough to cost the Brewers about 5 runs a season with his legs. If he mashes the way he did last year, he’s still an elite player – but if he has a season like he did in 2010, when he hit .261/.401/.471, he’s not nearly as valuable as his reputation suggests. Last year was just the second season of his career when he was worth at least 4 bWAR, which is the standard for a well-above-average player.

For $23.8 million a season, Fielder has to be more than an above-average player; he needs to be a star. And he probably will, at least in 2012, and probably in 2013. Despite his physique, he’s an incredibly durable player – Fielder has missed 13 games in the last six seasons combined. He doesn’t turn 28 until May, so he’s still squarely in the peak age range for the typical hitter.

Only Fielder is not your typical hitter. His skill set – heavy on home runs, walks, and strikeouts, light on balls in play – is a prime exhibit of what Bill James called “old player’s skills”, because that hitting approach is something you see from veterans, and when you see it in a young player, you worry that if he’s already hitting like a much older player, he might age like a much older player as well. James used Alvin Davis as his poster child for this concept – Davis was the AL Rookie of the Year in 1984, and was one of the league’s better hitters through 1990, when he hit .283/.387/.429 at the age of 29. But Davis, like Fielder, was a bad first baseman with no speed, and whose approach consisted of waiting for a good pitch to drive. In 1991, Davis hit .221/.299/.335. In 1992, Davis played 40 games for the Angels, and his career was finished.

Consider Ben Grieve. The #2 overall pick in the 1994 draft. Ranked by Baseball America as the #1 prospect in all the land in 1998. Rookie of the Year and an All-Star the same year, at the age of 22. Two years later, after three quality seasons with the A’s, they cashed out, sending him to Tampa Bay in the infamous three-way trade that sent Johnny Damon to Oakland and left the Royals with Roberto Hernandez. (And also gave us Angel Berroa, but also cost us Mark Ellis.) Maybe Billy Beane knew something the rest of us didn’t, because it seemed strange that he would part with a classic Moneyball-type player years before the book even came out. Grieve had two mediocre seasons as the Devil Rays’ starting right fielder, then completely collapsed, losing the everyday job by the time he was 27. He was out of the majors by the time he was 29.

Fielder’s a better hitter than Davis ever was, and has sustained his performance for longer than Grieve ever did. There are others, of course – Travis Hafner, Brad Wilkerson, Jason Bay. But the most illustrative example might be the player who personified “old players’ skills” as much as anyone who ever played the game, until suddenly he didn’t have any skills at all. From 2004 to 2009, Adam Dunn walked over 100 times every season. He hit at least 38 homers every year from 2004 to 2010. He also struck out at least 164 times in each of those seven seasons, which goes a long way towards explaining why Dunn has never batted .270 in any major league season. Dunn is on the Mount Rushmore of Three True Outcomes hitters.

In 2010, at the age of 30, Dunn hit .260/.356/.536, essentially what he had done since he entered the majors. His walk rate was a little down, but nothing serious. The White Sox signed him to a 4-year, $56 million deal.

In 2011, at the age of 31, Dunn suffered through one of the worst seasons in major league history. He hit .159, which would have broken the all-time worst batting average (.179, by Rob Deer in 1989) by 20 points had manager Ozzie Guillen not benched Dunn in September, keeping Dunn six plate appearances away from qualifying for the batting title. He hit 11 homers. He still took some walks, but when your DH hits .159 and slugs .277, you’re in trouble. When that DH is still under contract for three more years at $14 million per, you’re in massive trouble.

Dunn is a particularly illustrative example for Fielder because, like Fielder, despite his skill set he was a very durable player. From 2004 to 2010, Dunn missed 26 games total. Even in 2011, he was healthy. He just lost it.

Obviously, not every player with patience and power at a young age is destined to age worse than “The English Patient”. Jim Thome had one of his best seasons, at-bat for at-bat, at the age of 39. But there’s certainly risk that Fielder will fall off a cliff in the not-too-distant future. That risk is heavily exacerbated by his physique, which can only be described as…unique. As Rob Neyer has pointed out, Fielder is listed at 5’11” and 275 pounds, and no other player in major league history is listed as being that short and that heavy. This article at Fangraphs takes a look at the track record of particularly hefty ballplayers, and finds that they peak earlier and decline faster than their slimmer teammates.

There are other factors that conspire to make this deal worse. Fielder is moving from the NL to the AL, and his numbers will dip even if his talent level does not. His arrival in Detroit either means there will be a 1B/DH logjam when Martinez returns next year, or – and I still refuse to believe this is going to happen – Miguel Cabrera is going to move to third base, where he will probably cost the Tigers 30 runs a season with his glove. Lorenzo Cain and Alcides Escobar ought to be practicing their bunting skills as I type this, and the Royals ought to consider bringing up every speedster in the organization for each Tigers series, including Jarrod Dyson, Derrick Robinson, and Willie Wilson.

My personal feeling is that Fielder will probably hit at close to his established level for 2012, and probably 2013 and 2014 as well…but as soon as 2015, when Fielder turns 31, he might quickly decline to the point where he isn’t worth $24 million or anywhere close to it. Tigers’ owner Mike Illitch is 83 years old, and has made it pretty clear that he wants a title now, and if Fielder’s contract is killing the Tigers when Illitch is 91 years old, so be it.

I go by my instinct, like everybody else does," said owner Mike Ilitch, who signed off on the massive deal after what had been a quiet offseason for the Tigers. "My instincts told me that this is going to work out fine."

Instinct is such a…quaint term in baseball. As Rick Peterson said, “In God We Trust; all other must bring data.” Pledging $214 million to a fat, slow, maladroit first baseman on the basis of instinct is the sort of 20th-century thinking that enabled data-driven teams like the A’s and Red Sox to beat up on their competition in the first place. This move reminds me of the moves the Royals made in Ewing Kauffman’s final years to win him another title before he died, culminating in the trade of prospects Jon Lieber, who would win 131 games in the majors, and Dan Miceli, who spent 14 years in the majors, for a second-tier closer in Stan Belinda, literally the day before Kauffman passed away.

Twelve years ago, the Tigers traded six players to get 30-year-old Juan Gonzalez, then offered Gonzalez an 8-year, $140 million contract extension. Gonzalez, showing the same wisdom that characterized his other career choices, declined the offer, saving the Tigers from having to eat literally half the contract four years later. I don’t think the Fielder contract will turn out as badly as the Gonzalez contract would have, but it could be close.

But if the contract goes rancid for the Tigers in 2015 or 2016, they still stand to benefit from it over the next three or four years. Which means that the Fielder contract will likely hurt the Royals more than it will 28 other teams. The Royals’ window to contend – and this is a gross oversimplification – seems to extend from now through 2017, when Eric Hosmer gains free agency. A hapless 2018 Tigers team might help the White Sox or Indians or Twins more than the Royals. But the Tigers have Fielder, Cabrera, and Verlander under contract for the next three years, and a competitive Tigers team from 2012 through 2014 stands to hurt the Royals more than any other AL Central team.

The Tigers don’t have much to surround that trio. Martinez, who will be 34 years old when he returns, coming off a year missed to injury, and possibly without a position, is making $13 million a season. Those four players alone will earn a shade over $77 million this year and next. The Tigers already have over $127 million committed in payroll for this season, and that’s with only 18 players under contract. The Tigers already have one of the majors’ weaker farm systems, and they just gave up their first-round pick. Even Mike Illitch has his limits, and the Tigers face an uphill battle to surround Cabrera, Fielder, and Verlander with enough talent to win 90+ games, given their financial constraints.

Only, as the signing of Fielder shows, it’s not clear that Illitch has any limits, or that the Tigers have any financial constraints. It’ll hurt them in the long run, but for now, Tigers fans have to be pleased that they have an owner who’s willing to prioritize winning over profits. Meanwhile, the Royals still haven’t completed a contract extension for Alex Gordon. That kind of sucks.

In the end, I think that the Fielder contract diminishes the Royals’ playoff hopes, at least in 2012. But it’s hardly a game-changer, even in 2012. Given the amount of youth on the roster, the Royals’ best-case scenario still trumps the Tigers’ best-case scenario. Verlander can hardly be better than he was last year, and might be substantially worse even if he’s really good. Victor Martinez hit .330/.380/.470 last season; the Tigers will miss his bat almost as much as they’ll appreciate Fielder’s. If they really play Cabrera at third base, a Cabrera/Peralta/Raburn/Fielder infield might earn the distinction of being the worst defensive alignment ever put forth by a contending ballclub. (Mind you, it didn’t hurt the Brewers when they tried the same thing last year, but this defense looks even worse.)

I’m a little less optimistic about the Royals for this season than I was before, but then in the minds of most people, 2012 wasn’t the year the Royals were supposed to start contending anyway. As soon as next year, when the Tigers have to figure out what to do with Victor Martinez, and Fielder is a year closer to the end of his reign as one of the game’s great sluggers, the impact of this contract on the Royals’ playoff hopes may be insignificant. It will certainly be far less significant than the Royals’ own efforts to find an impact starting pitcher or two, whether that be from outside the organization or from the development of someone inside the organization.

So basically, I wouldn’t lose a ton of sleep over this deal. It might come back to haunt the Royals if they win 88 games this season and the Tigers win 90. But if the Royals win 88 games this season, they’ll be almost certain to improve on that total from 2013 onward, and be poised to dominate the AL Central for several years, Prince Fielder or not. The Tigers took care of business last week, a very expensive piece of business at that. But as long as the Royals take care of their own business, not even a Prince will stand in their way for long.

Royals Report Card 2011: Part Five.

Finishing up the hitters with the second half of my outfielder review:

Jeff Francoeur: A-

A year ago, Jeff Francoeur was even more of a punch line than Melky Cabrera. Today, well, Francoeur is still a punch line among a certain element of baseball analysts, who believe that his 2011 season 1) was a fluke and/or 2) does not abrogate his horrible performance from 2008 to 2010. But even those analysts who believe that Francoeur will once again be an out machine in 2012 say so with considerably less confidence than before.

I can certainly see the case for their skepticism. Despite having his highest OPS (.805) since his 70-game rookie season, and despite having the best overall season of his career by Baseball-Reference (2.7 bWAR), Francoeur’s improvement was not the result of addressing his biggest weakness, his lack of discipline at the plate. Francoeur actually drew fewer walks (37 to 39) and struck out more times (123 to 111) than he did in 2008. That was the same 2008 season in which Francoeur was a full three games worse than a replacement-level player, one of the ten worst seasons by a position player in the Expansion Era.

But if you look closer, you can see some signs of improvement. I am hardly an expert when it comes to understanding Pitch f/x data, so I apologize if I’m completely misinterpreting the data. But if you compare Francoeur’s performance in 2011 to 2008, here’s what you find:

In 2008, when a pitch was outside the strike zone, Francoeur still swung at it 40.5% of the time. In 2011, he swung only 37.8% of the time. The league as a whole swung at bad pitches 27.6% of the time in 2008, and 28.6% of the time in 2011. I don’t think the entire league suddenly became more aggressive – this is probably an artifact of subtle alterations to the definition of the strike zone by the Pitch f/x computers. So let me phrase it this way: in 2008, Francoeur’s swing rate at bad pitches was 12.9% higher than the average hitter. In 2011, it was 8.8% higher.

In 2008, when Francoeur swung at bad pitches, he made contact 64.8% of the time – 1.1% lower than league average. In 2011, he made contact 72.4% of the time – 7.7% higher than league average.

Francoeur’s swing rate and contact rate on pitches within the strike zone did not appear to change significantly. But in 2011 he swung at fewer bad pitches, and took better swings at those pitches, than he did in 2008, or even in 2010. The improvement in his selectivity wasn’t enormous, and frankly it wasn’t enough by itself to explain his performance at the plate. But it was, at least, part of the answer.

The one other data point at Fangraphs that stands out is the data which breaks down Francoeur’s performance by pitch type. Frenchy showed, by far, his greatest improvement against fastballs – he was 6 runs above average against the heater, compared to 16 runs below average in 2010. That would go against the narrative that Francoeur improved when he stopped swinging at breaking stuff in the dirt.

Single-season data is fluky, and 2010 might be an outlier – he was above-average against fastballs in 2009, and terrible against sliders. From 2008 to 2010, he was 19.8 runs below average against the fastball, but 20.6 runs below average against sliders. In 2011, he was +6 against fastballs, and +2.7 against sliders. It’s fair to say that he showed significant improvement against both pitches.

My impression from watching Francoeur is this: he was a little better at laying off waste pitches down-and-away. He was also surprisingly good at dropping the bat head on inside fastballs and turning on them, whether for doubles down the line or homers into the left-field bleachers. The data certainly doesn’t contradict that. Francoeur was a little choosier about which pitches to swing at, but he was also served well by a new approach to inside fastballs.

The end result of his altered approach was a very solid .285/.329/.476 season, including 47 doubles, which nearly led the league. (After Ned Yost benched Francoeur for the last five games, Miguel Cabrera snuck past him with 48.) He hit right-handers for a line of .279/.318/.445, which is better than what he had done against all pitchers in his career (.270/.313/.433), and he crushed left-handers (.302/.363/.570).

Francoeur stole 22 bases, nearly equally the 23 bases he stole in the previous six years combined. He threw out 16 baserunners, which ranked second to Alex Gordon in all of baseball, and the amazing thing is that Francoeur threw out baserunners at pretty much his career rate. When you combine strength with accuracy, Francoeur might well have the best arm of any outfielder in the majors. (Francoeur’s arm alone has been worth somewhere between 5 and 8 runs a season, which is remarkable.)

So it was a good season, better than a lot of people thought possible, and there’s a lesson in that. It is very hard for me to write about the lessons learned without coming off as smug, given that I loved the Melky Cabrera signing and advocated that the Royals acquire Francoeur back in 2009. But I’ll try, and please forgive me if I fail.

In the three-division era (since 1995), 22 different players have played in 120 or more games in a season at the age of 21 or less. Here’s a list of those players, roughly in order of (present and future) career value:

Alex Rodriguez

Albert Pujols

Miguel Cabrera

Andruw Jones

Adrian Beltre

Justin Upton

Mike Stanton

Ryan Zimmerman

Jason Heyward

Eric Hosmer

Carl Crawford

Edgar Renteria

Elvis Andrus

Freddie Freeman

Starlin Castro

Melky Cabrera

Jose Guillen

Delmon Young

Cristian Guzman

Rocco Baldelli

Luis Rivas

Mike Caruso

Remember, the only qualification to make this list is to have played in 120 games in a season by age 21 – it didn’t matter how well or poorly the player performed. And yet: look at that list. You’ve got Mike Caruso, who somehow dinked his way to a .306 average for the 1998 White Sox, and was never heard from again. Luis Rivas was a bad defensive second baseman as a rookie and never improved. Rocco Baldelli had a pair of good seasons before he was felled by a rare mitochondrial disorder.

Every other player on that list has gone to a long, and in most cases excellent, career. Cristian Guzman, as a rookie, was just this side of Tony Pena Jr bad: he hit .226/.267/.276. But he was a 21-year-old rookie. The next year he led the AL with 20 triples, and the year after that he hit .302/.337/.477. His career petered out after 1406 games. Jose Guillen, who I ranked 17th out of 22 players, spent 14 seasons in the majors and played in 1650 games. At least half the players listed above have Hall of Fame possibilities.

Melky Cabrera is on that list. Jeff Francoeur is not, because he wasn’t called up as a rookie until mid-season – but he was so exceptional as a rookie that he was worth 2.5 bWAR in just 70 games. Among all players 21 or younger since 1995, Francoeur’s rookie season was the 16th-best. Only three other players in the Top 25 played in fewer than 100 games: Brett Lawrie last season, Adam Dunn, and Jose Reyes.

You might think, from my past writings on the topic, that player age is a bit of an obsession for me. You’re probably right – but only because I think that most people don’t comprehend just how important it is. For position players, it’s absolutely vital. As the list above shows, if a player is talented enough to play every day in the majors by the time he’s 21, it almost doesn’t matter how well he performs – he’s talented enough to have a long and successful career.

Cabrera was talented enough at age 21 to be the starting left fielder for the New York Yankees, on their way to winning the AL East for the ninth straight year. Francoeur was talented enough to be the everyday right fielder for an Atlanta Braves team that was on its way to finishing in first place for the 14th time in 15 years. That talent was largely wasted by both players over the next few years – Cabrera because he got out of shape, Francoeur because he never learned the strike zone. But the talent was still there.

Cabrera was 26 for most of last season. Francoeur was 27. Those are the two most common ages for a hitter to have his best season. Just like how some presumed washed-up former child stars come back to have a second career, Cabrera and Francoeur were both young enough to do the same. Sure, some child stars are fated to be Gary Coleman or Emmanuel Lewis. But some turn out to be Jason Bateman or Neil Patrick Harris. The Royals spent less than $4 million combined to find out whether either one was salvageable - and they got savaged for it.

There is a term used among fantasy baseball adherents to talk about players who were hyped prospects once upon a time, and then went bust, and just as they were over-rated when they were young and their upside appeared limitless, they’ve become under-rated now that the shine has worn off. They’re called “post-hype sleepers”. That’s what Francoeur and Cabrera were: post-hype sleepers. They were such deep sleepers, in fact, that even people who were familiar with the strategy thought that Dayton Moore was insane. He wasn’t. For at least one off-season, failed phenoms were the new market inefficiency, and Moore profited greatly from it.

He then doubled down on Francoeur, and it remains to be seen how that investment will turn out. You’ll recall that I was not partial to Francoeur’s extension at the time. However, two of my main objections to the deal have dissipated. My first objection was that the Royals gave him that extension in mid-August, when we had just four months of data suggesting he was an improved hitter. He could have easily gone in the tank over the last six weeks and the contract would already look like an albatross before it started. But after the signing, Francoeur actually performed better – he hit .313/.328/.523 in his last 30 games. (Albeit with just two walks – one intentional – and 26 strikeouts.) Waiting until the end of the season would not have lowered Francoeur’s market value – it might have increased it.

My second concern was that Francoeur was not as strong a fit for the Royals’ lineup as Melky Cabrera or Lorenzo Cain, because Cain provided defense and Cabrera provided the switch-hitting bat. That concern remains, but the Royals managed to solve their outfield glut while getting good value in return, by turning Cabrera into Jonathan Sanchez.

The lineup still tilts to the right too much – Gordon, Hosmer, and Moustakas are the only left-handed bats most nights – but I’d argue that upgrading the defense in centerfield means more to the 2012 Royals than having a fourth left-handed stick. The problem is that the right-handed lean to the Royals lineup is not just a problem for 2012. While the Royals are loaded to the gills with left-handed pitchers, they don’t have a single left-handed-hitting prospect of any note in the minor leagues. Balancing the lineup will be an ongoing project for the Royals’ front office for the next several years. But if you’re only going to go with three left-handed hitters, you could do a lot worse than Gordon, Hosmer, and Moustakas. So long as those three stay healthy, the lack of lineup balance won’t be a critical concern.

Also, we now have a number of similar contracts handed out to free-agent outfielders this winter, to compare with Francoeur’s deal:

Jeff Francoeur: 2.7 bWAR (2011), 3.3 bWAR (2009-2011), 2 years, $13.5 million

Coco Crisp: 2.1, 5.9, 2 years, $14 million

Jason Kubel: 1.3, 5.2, 2 years, $15 million

Josh Willingham: 1.8, 6.3, 3 years, $21 million

Francoeur had a better 2011 than any of the others, but had the worst three-year performance by far. Where you’d place Francoeur among his peers depends entirely on how much weight you place on his 2011 performance.

But Francoeur has two undeniable advantages. The first is that he has the least pricey contract. The difference with Crisp and Kubel is miniscule, but the third-year commitment for Willingham is a big strike against him.

The other edge for Francoeur is, once again, his age. Francoeur just turned 28 last week. Kubel will be 30 in May, Crisp is 32, and Willingham will be 30 before the season begins. Francoeur will be younger at the end of his contract than the other three at the beginning of theirs.

And then there’s the whole issue of Francoeur’s clubhouse influence. I have no doubt that the value of a player’s leadership in the clubhouse is overrated by insiders. I also have no doubt that it exists. I have no way to quantify its importance, but common sense tells me that having a player with a strong work ethic, and who is willing to impart that work ethic on his fellow teammates, is a lot more important on a team brimming with rookies and sophomores than on a team full of veterans.

If having Francoeur around to guide them makes it, say, 5% more likely that Hosmer and Moustakas reach their potential, to say nothing of Giavotella or Salvador Perez or even some of the pitchers, that effect would almost certainly be undetectable even if there was a way to measure it. And yet that effect would almost certainly be worth seven figures. I can’t prove that Francoeur has that effect, but “unprovable” is not the same as “non-existent”. Even stat guys have to take some things on faith. Everything I know about Francoeur tells me that he’s a positive influence on his younger teammates. That doesn’t justify a long-term deal to an undeserving player, but for a borderline case like Francoeur, that matters.

So call me crazy, but gun to my head, I’d rather have Francoeur under the terms of his contract than any of the other guys above on the terms of theirs. There’s a risk that Frenchy turns back into a punchline, sure. But you have to endure some risk to get a reward, and if Francoeur comes even close to duplicating last year’s performance, there will be a reward. So I’ve staked out a place of my own in the French Quarter. Go ahead and laugh at me. It wouldn’t be the first time.

Alex Gordon: A

And speaking of post-hype sleepers…going into 2011, Gordon was pretty much the definition of the term. In fact, googling the phrase led me straight to this column from last spring, and Gordon was the very first name on the list.

Of course, Gordon could have been the very first name on the list in 2010…or 2009. And there was a very real worry that if he was still on that list in 2012, it wouldn’t have been in a Royals uniform.

Instead, by year’s end the only lists Gordon was on was at the bottom of a few MVP ballots. He hit for average (.303), he hit for power (23 homers, 45 doubles), he drew walks (67, which led the team), he stole bases (17 in 25 attempts), he played good defense (he won a Gold Glove*), and it was as if 2009 and 2010 never happened.

*: I said he won a Gold Glove. I didn’t say he deserved it. My apologies to Brett Gardner.

Seriously, if you just erased 2009 and 2010 from his stat line, Gordon’s progression as a player looks completely normal: College Player of the Year at age 21, Minor League Player of the Year at age 22, a somewhat disappointing rookie season at age 23, an above-average season at age 24, and an All-Star-caliber season at age 27. Just never mind what he did at ages 25 and 26.

In pointed contrast to Francoeur, I don’t know anyone – stat analyst or scout – who thinks that Gordon’s breakout was a fluke. That doesn’t mean he won’t regress a little this season, because he might. But the base skills that produced 5.9 Wins Above Replacement – the best season by any Royals position player since Carlos Beltran in 2003 – are legitimate. As much as I write about how the Royals need to sign Edwin Jackson or Roy Oswalt, the reality is that the Royals’ #1 priority is still to sign Gordon to a contract extension that keeps him in Kansas City through at least 2015.

There’s no obvious reason why a deal won’t get done, and frankly I’m a little disappointed it hasn’t already. That was always part of the appeal with Gordon, why he was such a perfect player to be on the board when the Royals had the #2 overall pick in 2005: he’s from Nebraska, he grew up a Royals fan, he has a brother named Brett for God’s sake. Scott Boras is not his agent. He’s not Eric Hosmer, where you pretty much knew from the moment he was drafted that in a perfect world where he turned into a superstar, he was ours for six-plus years and then off to the highest bidder. Gordon seemed like a guy whose greatness wouldn’t prevent him from sticking around a while. And here we are, he’s coming off a great year, he’s two years from free agency and he’s expressed a willingness to sign a long-term deal. Let’s get this done, guys.

The most comparable long-term extension given to a player approaching free agency this winter was the one Howie Kendrick inked with the Angels. Kendrick has had a similar career arc as Gordon: massively hyped in the minor leagues (where he had a .360 career average), some early success in the majors (he hit .314/.340/.435 in 2007-2008 combined), followed by consecutively disappointing seasons in 2009 and 2010. Like Gordon, Kendrick had his best season in 2011, hitting .285/.338/.464 and making his first All-Star team. He also plays a fine second base, so while he wasn’t as valuable as Gordon was, he was closer than you might think – he had 4.3 bWAR, which is a very good number.

Kendrick signed for 4 years and $33.5 million. While he didn’t have as good a season in 2011, he also never struggled as badly as Gordon did in 2009 and 2010. He’s about seven months older than Gordon. Most importantly, he was going to be a free agent in one year, not two. Add all the factors together, and while I think Gordon can ask for more, I don’t think it’s a lot more.

I said during the season that Gordon probably was worth somewhere between $38 and $42 million for a four-year deal, and those numbers still fit. Maybe on the high side if there’s an option year, maybe on the low side if Gordon wants a no-trade clause, but those are details best left for the two sides to negotiate. The big picture is this: Gordon wants to stay, the Royals can afford to pay him, and they absolutely can’t afford for him to leave. Get it done, guys. Everyone – myself included – will sleep better at night.

If it’s going to happen, it will probably happen soon. In the last 12 hours, Brayan Pena and Chris Getz have agreed to terms on a contract. There’s a reason for the timing here – the deadline to exchange arbitration figures is tomorrow. Dayton Moore is a student of the Braves Way, and the Braves have long had a policy that if they don’t come to terms with a player before both sides have to exchange figures, then they will see the process through – meaning they will go to an arbitration hearing no matter what.

The rationale is that, if a player knows that the team will put them through the arbitration process, they will be more motivated to get a deal done before figures are exchanged – and by and large that has been the case, as I’m pretty sure the Royals haven’t had an arbitration hearing with a single player since Moore became the GM. (Someone correct me if I’m wrong.)

The one exception to this policy is if a player is willing to sign a long-term deal. Last January, Billy Butler exchanged numbers with the Royals – and one week later, on January 23rd, they announced a four-year deal. I suspect the same thing will happen here – once the Royals put all their other contracts to bed, they can devote all their resources to getting Gordon signed for the long term. But if Moore and Gordon aren’t shaking hands at the front of a press conference by month’s end, getting antsy is a perfectly justifiable reaction.

Mitch Maier: C+

Poor Mitch Maier. It’s hard to be on a team’s active roster all season long and wind up with fewer than 100 at-bats, but that’s what happens when the three outfielders in front of you avoid injury all season and all have the best seasons of their career. Maier batted so infrequently that when he finally got some pity playing time in the last three games of the season, he went 1-for-9…and it nearly ruined his season numbers. He was batting .244/.365/.360 until then, and his final line was .232/.345/.337, which is borderline acceptable at best for a backup outfielder.

In Maier’s defense, it’s not really fair to judge him based on 113 plate appearances. On the other hand, Maier’s career line is .253/.332/.346. This is who he is. He has no power, and he doesn’t hit for a high average. It’s a credit to him that he’s made himself a viable major leaguer anyway – he has the highest walk rate on the team, he’s a good baserunner, he isn’t vulnerable to left-handed pitching (he’s actually hit lefties slightly better than right-handers for his career), he can play all three outfield positions adequately, and he understands and has embraced his role as a bench player.

Is that enough to keep him in the majors? It really depends on how large a bench the Royals want. The Royals will be keeping a backup catcher (Brayan Pena) and a utility infielder (Yuniesky Betancourt). Even with the mammoth 12-man pitching staffs that teams like to employ these days, that still leaves two open roster spots. It would make more sense for the Royals to employ Jarrod Dyson, who does two things (run and play the outfield) better than Maier, and Clint Robinson, who does one very important thing (hit) better than Maier. (I don’t think Robinson will ever hit well enough to play every day, but as a pinch-hitting threat he has his uses.)

But the Royals are making noises about starting the season with thirteen pitchers, which is absurd, as it would leave them with a three-man bench. If that’s the case, though, then Maier is probably the best choice for the job. He can’t run as fast as Dyson, but he runs fast enough that he can pinch-run for Billy Butler and Mike Moustakas and Salvador Perez. He doesn’t hit as well as Robinson, but he hits well enough to pinch-hit for Alcides Escobar against right-handed pitchers, and against certain pitchers he might be a better option than Perez or Giavotella or Cain. His jack-of-all-trades skill set makes him the best option for a roster spot that requires him to do a little of everything. But the Royals as a team would be better off splitting that role into two parts. And if they do the right thing, Maier may find himself the last guy without a chair at the end of spring training.

Royals Report Card 2011: Part Four.

We continue to wait and hope for the price tag on either Edwin Jackson or Roy Oswalt to drop, Dutch auction-style, until Dayton Moore puts up his hand. In the meantime, let’s move on to the DHs (i.e. Billy Butler) and the first half of the outfield corps:

Billy Butler: C+

In 2011, Butler did pretty much what he did in 2010 and 2009, and for many, doing the same was a disappointment. He played every day and hit a ton of doubles. He hit for a good average, he drew a fair amount of walks, and didn’t strike out a lot. But he only hit 19 home runs, and unless and until he hits 25 homers and drives in 100 runs – neither of which he’s ever done – Butler’s lack of power will be the first thing that comes to mind for a large portion of the Royals’ fan base.

Let’s look at these one by one:

He played every day. Butler played in 159 games in 2011. He played in 158 games in 2010, and 159 games in 2009. Butler is the first player in Royals history to play in 154 or more games in three consecutive seasons. In fact, the only other Royal to play in 158 games in any three different seasons is Kevin Seitzer, who did so in 1987, 1989, and 1990. Butler may look like the Pillsbury Dough Boy, but on the field he’s the closest thing the Royals have to Iron Man.

He hit a ton of doubles. Butler hit 44 doubles last year; he hit 45 doubles in 2010 and 51 doubles in 2009. That’s three consecutive seasons with at least 44 doubles. No other Royal has hit 44 doubles in any three different seasons. You’d be forgiven for thinking that 44 doubles in a season is no big deal, given that Butler was joined by the entire Royals starting outfield in that department in 2011. But it is, and it goes a long way towards compensating for his lack of light-tower power.

He hit for a good average. Butler only hit .291 last year, down from .318 and .301 the two previous seasons. That looks like a fluke, or at least it’s entirely BABIP-driven – his batting average on balls in play was .316, down from .341 and .332. The difference between hitting .290 and .310 isn’t a huge deal, in all honesty, but for however much it matters, Butler’s “true” talent level is probably slightly north of .300, and he can be expected to rebound slightly in that regard.

He drew a fair amount of walks, and didn’t strike out a lot. Butler drew 66 walks, down from a career-high 69 in 2010, and struck out 95 times, up from 78 the year before. He was given an intentional pass a career-high 15 times, five of them by April 17th, before Eric Hosmer was promoted. Butler probably was a tad more aggressive at the plate than in previous years, but not enough to be concerned. He managed a .360+ OBP for the third straight year.

Short of going the Eddie Yost route and embarking on a mission to walk 100 times a year, Butler’s about as valuable as a DH can be without hitting more than 15-20 homers a season. That is to say, he’s a nice piece to the lineup, and he’s worth the $8 million he’ll be paid annually for the next three years. But he’s not a star.

As it’s been said the last three years, what will determine whether Butler can make the leap to stardom is whether he can hit more balls over the fence – and what will determine whether he can hit more balls over the fence is whether he can hit more balls in the air, period. He made modest improvements in that regard last year. Prior to 2011, Butler hit groundballs 47-48% of the time, and flyballs about 34% of the time. Last year his groundball rate dropped to 45.6%, and his flyball rate inched upwards to 35.8%, per Fangraphs. Most notably, after grounding into a franchise-record 32 double plays in 2010, he hit into only 16 last year, his lowest total in a full season.

Butler turns 26 in April. While 27 is the most common age for a position player to have the best season of his career, 26 might be the most common age for an already-established major league hitter to take a leap forward from his previous performance.

I have no idea whether Butler will make that leap, or take a small step, or inch forward at a snail’s pace. What I do know is that if he doesn’t improve one bit, he’s still an incredibly useful player and an integral part of what the Royals will try to accomplish over the next three years. But if he could figure out a way to turn a dozen of those balls off the wall into balls in the bleachers, well, that wouldn’t suck.

Melky Cabrera: A-

The Royals don’t have a long history of players who had great one-and-done seasons in a Royals uniform. There is Jay Bell, of course, who came over in that weird deal with the Pirates after the 1996 season, when the Royals traded Joe Randa and three pitchers named Jeff (Granger, Martin, and Wallace) for Bell and another Jeff, King. Bell was only under contract for one season, but what a season it was: he hit .291/.368/.461 with 21 homers and 71 walks as a shortstop.

Per Baseball-Reference, Bell was worth 5.3 Wins Above Replacement in 1997, easily the best season ever by a Royals shortstop, and the best season by any Royals hitter from 1986 to 2000. The Diamondbacks then signed him as a free agent in their inaugural season; the Royals got two draft picks, which they then wasted on Matt Burch and Chris George.

That very same year, the Royals employed Chili Davis as their DH. Davis had also been acquired in a savvy deal, as Herk Robinson dealt Mark Gubicza – who made all of two starts for the Angels before it became clear to everyone that he was finished – and marginal pitching prospect Mike Bovee* to Anaheim for Davis. Davis was 37, under contract for just one year, and hadn’t played the field in years. But he could hit. He batted .279/.386/.509 with 30 homers and 85 walks. Per Baseball-Reference, he was worth a respectable 2.3 WAR. (This was the peak of the high-offense era, and this was when the Royals had moved the fences in at Kauffman Stadium, making it one of the better hitters’ parks in the game.)

*: Long-time readers may have heard me say this before, but without Mike Bovee, I might never have started writing about baseball. But that’s a story for another day.

There aren’t a whole lot of others. The Royals have had 121 seasons from a position player with at least 2.3 WAR. Aside from Bell and Davis, the only other season that ranks in the Top 121 from a player who spent just that one season with the Royals is by Richie Scheinblum, in 1972. Scheinblum was purchased from the Texas Rangers after the 1971 season, then hit .300/.383/.418 for the Royals. If those numbers don’t impress you, they should; the AL hit .239/.306/.343 as a whole, which is why that winter the AL owners voted for the creation of the designated hitter.

And now…Melky Cabrera. Like Scheinblum, and unlike Bell and Davis, the Royals acquired Cabrera when he was essentially an unwanted commodity; the Royals inked him to a one-year, $1.25 million contract, and even that modest commitment had some fans up in arms. He then went out and hit .305/.339/.470. He became the first Royal with 200 base hits since 2000, and he also had 309 total bases, the most by any Royal since 2002.

Those numbers aren’t quite as good as they look, because Cabrera had plenty of opportunities to get them. The combination of playing every day, hitting at the top of the lineup, and rarely walking meant that Cabrera finished with 658 at-bats, the third-most in Royals history. Still, they were excellent numbers; it was easily the best season of his career. He also stole 20 bases, after never stealing more than 13 in a season. It’s amazing what you can do when you’re not fat.

The fly in the ointment was Melky’s defense, although its impact is debatable. Baseball-Reference rated his defense as 19 runs below average in 2011, which is terrible, and limited his overall value to 2.9 WAR (still a good season). But Fangraphs’ UZR system rated his defense at 7 runs below average, and Baseball Info Solutions’ +/- system rated him at just 3 runs below average. Gun to my head and I had to choose just one rating, I like BIS the most, but it’s always best to look at a range of data.

Cabrera’s season was so out of character for him that it’s possible, even though he’s still just 27, that the Royals enjoyed the best season he’ll ever have. Even if he does have a better year, it’s almost certain that no team will ever get more bang for their buck than the Royals got for $1.25 million.

Scheinblum was one-and-done with the Royals because, after the 1972 season, the Royals packaged him with Roger Nelson (who had just set the franchise record with a 2.08 ERA) to the Reds for Wayne Simpson…and Hal McRae. (There’s a reason why Cedric Tallis needs to be inducted into the Royals’ Hall of Fame this winter.) There’s no way that Jonathan Sanchez, who will be a free agent in a year, can live up to that deal. But turning $1.25 million into one excellent season from a centerfielder into a left-handed starter that struck out 200 batters two years ago may wind up being one of the great transaction series in Dayton Moore’s career.

Lorenzo Cain: B

Pity the Painkiller. In 2010, he reaches the major leagues with the Milwaukee Brewers at the age of 24, and proceeds to hit .306 over the next two months. Then the Brewers decide they’re going to go for it in 2011, and trade for Zack Greinke…and he’s part of the trade to Kansas City.

But wait, there’s more! Nine days before the trade, the Royals had signed Melky Cabrera, and guaranteed him their everyday centerfield job. We love you, Lorenzo, but even though you had a great year in the minors, and you hit over .300 in the majors, and you’re about to turn 25…we’re going to have to send you back to Omaha to start the season. But don’t worry – if Melky hits like he has in the past, you’ll be up to take his job by May!

Given the circumstances, it would have been understandable if Cain became somewhat disillusioned and had a subpar year. But I was told at the time of the trade that Cain had a great disposition, and if he was disappointed by his situation, he hid it well. He hit .312/.380/.497 in Omaha while waiting for an opening that – understandably – never came. After never hitting more than 11 homers in a season before, he cranked out 16. And now, an everyday job in the majors appears to be his.

If there’s one concern I have with Cain, it’s that after showing impressive plate discipline in 2010 – he walked 45 times in 84 games and had a .402 OBP in the minors – he fell off in that department last year. He drew fewer walks (40) despite playing 128 games in Omaha. However, he also set a career high with 15 hit-by-pitches. That may be a cheap way to get on base, but it still counts on the scoreboard, and Cain’s OBP in Omaha was still .380.

He turns 26 in April, so it’s now or never for Cain. Cain is as experienced as any serious prospect the Royals have had in recent memory; he’s played 156 games in Triple-A, and 144 in Double-A, along with his successful stint with the Brewers in 2010. (By serious prospect, I mean guys that the Royals genuinely liked, as opposed to someone like Kila Ka’aihue or Mike Aviles, who only got an opportunity to play grudgingly.)

For Cain, this means that there should be no adjustment process to the major leagues, and it wouldn’t surprise me if he comes out of the gate as one of the Royals’ hottest hitters in April. For the Royals, it means the days of rushing guys to the major leagues are long over. Cain won’t match his performance in Omaha from last season, or Cabrera’s performance with the Royals. But he ought to hit .275/.330/.410 or thereabouts, with improved defense and speed. He’s not someone you’d want to make a long-term commitment to, both because of his ability and his age. But he’s a perfectly respectable short-term solution in centerfield, and if all goes according to plan, the bridge to the Bubba Starling Era in Kansas City.

Jarrod Dyson: C+

“Once [Dave] Roberts got to Boston, he mostly sat. And sat. The manager kept an eye on him but didn’t call his name very often. It was as if Roberts had changed from a ballplayer into some kind of glass-front box with the words break in case of need for stolen base stenciled on the front. But Epstein’s orthodoxy, reinforced by special adviser Bill James, the creator of the whole analytical business that had debunked stolen bases in the first place, held that if you built the right kind of team, Roberts’s skill set would be largely extraneous. Except—and this was the key part of it, the flexible part of it that most people didn’t get—except when it was necessary.

And so here Roberts was, glass broken, standing on first base with Bill Mueller at the plate, the only potential run of the year that mattered anymore. It was a desperate moment, but nonetheless a moment that had been planned for. That was the difference between this time around and 1949, 1978, 2003, and all the other disappointments of the last century. God was in the details, and so were playoff victories. And the Red Sox were finally looking after the details.”

- From the prologue to Mind Game: How the Boston Red Sox Got Smart, Won a World Series, and Created a New Blueprint for Winning

Coming into the 2011 season, I don’t think the Royals knew exactly what they had in Jarrod Dyson. I don’t think any of us knew. That’s not surprising, given that Dyson came into professional baseball with precious little experience – there’s a reason he was a 50th-round draft pick – and then, owing to frequent nagging injuries, played in only 305 minor-league games in his first five seasons.

The best thing for Dyson would have been a full year in Triple-A, but Ned Yost could not resist the temptation to keep Dyson around for the first six weeks of the season as a pinch-runner and occasional defensive replacement. Dyson eventually got everyday playing time in Omaha, but only played in 83 games for the Storm Chasers.

In the end, we did learn some things about Dyson. We learned that he’s not a complete cipher at the plate; he hit .279 in Omaha, his highest batting average at any minor league stop that lasted for more than three weeks, and after hitting two home runs in his first five seasons combined, he hit three in 2011 alone. We learned that unlike a lot of speed goofs, he’ll take a walk every now and then. In 129 career games at Triple-A, Dyson has a line of .276/.345/.354, which is respectable.

We learned that these incremental improvements aside, Dyson’s bat is unlikely to keep him in a major league lineup on an everyday basis. My hopes that he might be the new Gary Pettis, modest though they might be, seem unlikely to be realized. If he has a career in the major leagues, it’s almost certainly as a bench player.

But we learned – if we didn’t know already – that he has the potential to be a game-changer off the bench.

Dyson had already demonstrated not just elite speed, but the ability to use that speed in a baseball context. Joey Gathright, for all his speed, was never all that good at stealing bases. But prior to 2011, Dyson had 131 steals in 163 attempts in the minor leagues, an excellent 80% success rate. For a guy who was still learning how to play the game, that was impressive.

In 2011, he took it up a notch. In those 83 games for Omaha, Dyson stole 38 bases – in 40 attempts. Combine that with his performance in Omaha in late 2010, and in 129 games he is 51-for-56 at that level, a 91.1% success rate.

He hasn’t been that good in the major leagues – his success rate drops all the way to 90.9%. In 2010, he stole 9 bases in 10 attempts during his September callup; his one caught stealing was actually a pickoff by the pitcher when he took off for third base too early. In 2011, Dyson stole 11 more bases before he was finally thrown out for the first time by a catcher* in the final game of the season.

*: Well, other than Salvador Perez in spring training.

“When I was with the Dodgers,” Roberts reflects, “Maury Wills once told me that there will come a point in my career when everyone in the ballpark will know that I have to steal a base, and I will steal that base. When I got out there, I knew that was what Maury Wills was talking about.”

Dyson reached base safely 16 times with the Royals last season. He pinch-ran another 12 times. He stole 11 bases. When Dyson reached base, there was about a 40% chance that he’d steal another – and remember, in some of those instances the base in front of him was occupied, or the score wasn’t close. When Dyson reached base, everyone in the ballpark knew that he was going to try to steal, and he usually did anyway.

That’s quite a useful skill.

On top of that, Dyson continued to put up frankly ridiculous defensive statistics on those rare occasions when he got to play the field. Dyson has played just 228 innings in the field in the major leagues, the equivalent of about 25 full games. The defensive metrics out there (Fangraphs, Total Zone, BIS’ +/-) rate him as somewhere between 5 and 8 runs better than your average centerfielder in that span. Over the course of a full season, that would come out to somewhere between 30 and 50 runs above average. That’s insane.

Between his speed and his defense, Dyson has two elite skills that would make him a fantastic bench player. The irony is that with Lorenzo Cain subbing for Melky Cabrera, the need for a defensive upgrade in the late innings has gone down significantly. Even so, if the Royals are serious about contending in 2012 and beyond, having a bench player that can win them a game with his legs is an asset worth holding on to. Dyson’s already 27; it’s time to stop worrying about what Dyson could become in future with the chance to play every day, and it’s time to focus on how he can help the ballclub right now.

And if the Royals should find themselves, at some point in the future, in an elimination playoff game, down a run to Mariano Rivera, and Billy Butler leads off with a walk…well, it would be awfully nice to have Jarrod Dyson behind that glass.

“Rivera got set in the stretch, looked once more at Roberts, then committed to home plate with a barely perceptible transfer of weight to his right foot, his left foot now rising off the mound.

But Roberts was already gone, digging toward second, erasing the past with every step.”