Danny Duffy is headed for surgery. After an MRI revealed a torn ulnar collateral ligament in Duffy’s left elbow, it looks like Tommy John surgery will sideline the left-hander until next season. A former top prospect in the Kansas City Royals’ farm system, Duffy reached the majors last season. And even though he struggled initially, the 23-year-old seemed to be making progress this year. And now that he’s out for the season, the Royals’ rise to prominence may be put on hold even longer.

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The Peter Bourjos trade rumors have started to circulate again. The primary discussant in the linked article is the Nationals, but the Royals, Diamondbacks, and Blue Jays are also mentioned. With super-prospect Mike Trout in the majors, the Angels already having something of an outfield crunch and Bourjos flat-lining on offense so far this season, there is a surface rationality to the idea of trading him. Let’s briefly look at how Bourjos might fit into the plans of the teams allegedly interested in Bourjos before turning to the question of how this makes sense (or nonsense) for the Angels.

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The past weekend did not go well for the Kansas City Royals. They were not only swept during their opening series at home by division rival Cleveland, but the sweep was pretty humiliating. Although the Royals at least managed to make a game of it (including the obligatory Yunibomb) on Saturday, all three games exposed Kansas City’s starting pitching. The Royals do not get any respite — they welcome American League Central favorite Detroit to town today. If they thought Cleveland made mincemeat of their starters…

Some fans may be ready to jump off of the 2012 “Our Time” bandwagon. That is understandable (and we are all fans, so I will not pretend I am not subject to the same emotions), but to be “worried” about the Royals in the aftermath of this weekend’s sweep might sort of miss the point. If one wants to worry about the Royals, point that fretful energy in the right direction.

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Many writers scoffed when Ned Yost and the Kansas City Royals handed the closer’s role to right-hander Jonathan Broxton this spring. After all, Broxton is returning from an elbow injury that rendered him ineffective (5.63 FIP) and held him to only 14 appearances last season, while fellow right-hander Greg Holland burst onto the scene in 2011 with an 11.10 K/9 strikeout rate and a minuscule 2.21 FIP.

It only seemed natural that Greg Holland be given the job in the spring. He is arguably the best reliever in the Royals’ bullpen and was utterly dominating throughout all of 2011. The decision to hand the reins to Broxton was largely branded as the epitome of pandering to the baseball cliche of the “closer mentality.” Broxton possessed it because he had accumulated 84 saves over the course of his seven-year career. Holland, on the other hand, only has four career saves, so question marks remain as to whether he has closer mentality.

On Sunday afternoon against the Los Angeles Angels, however, Broxton entered the game in a save situation and struck out three consecutive hitters: Torii Hunter, Vernon Wells, and Kendrys Morales. While not three of the most dangerous hitters in the league, Broxton alleviated some of the fears concerning his effectiveness that the majority of Royals fans harbored heading into the season.

But, does this mean the Jonathan Broxton has returned?

The early results indicate that Broxton has turned a corner and should produce results closer to the strong 2006-2009 seasons, rather than the lackluster 2010-2011 seasons. The swinging strikes had been on the decline in each of the past two years, but he generated six swings-and-misses on Sunday on only fourteen pitches. While that 42.86% SwStr% is certainly not sustainable throughout the course of the season, it serves as a positive harbinger for subsequent performances as the season wears on.

Perhaps the most encouraging aspect to Broxton’s inning of work on Sunday was the rebound in velocity. His once overpowering fastball had decreased in velocity over the past couple of seasons, which ultimately played a significant role in his lessened effectiveness, but pitch f/x registered his average fastball velocity back at 2008-2009 levels.

Not only did Broxton throw his fastball significantly harder on Sunday than he has in previous years, but his slider was also ridiculous. The average velocity of his slider against the Los Angeles Angels was 90.04 MPH. The career high average for Broxton’s slider was in 2009, when he averaged 88.6 MPH over the course of the season. More importantly, he threw his slider five times and threw five strikes — three of them of the swinging variety.

One outing is far too little to officially declare Jonathan Broxton healthy and “back” to his elite level of performance. It could simply be a blip on the radar screen. However, his stellar spring performance (1.13 ERA and 12.4 K/9), his increased velocity on both his fastball and slider, and his clean bill of health all suggest that the right-hander is poised for a huge comeback season on the mound for the Royals.

After the season ends, the one-year, $4M contract that Broxton signed could be one of the biggest bargains of the offseason.

Word broke late Friday afternoon that the Royals and 28-year-old left fielder Alex Gordon reached a contract extension. The skinny on the contract is that it’s a four-year deal worth $37.5 million, with a player option for 2016 that can bring the total value to $50 million even. The contract buys out two years of team control and an additional two of free agency, and breaks down to $6/$9/$10/$12.5, and negates the $4.775 midpoint, arbitration-avoiding deal the two parties agreed to in early February. Read the rest of this entry »

Read the methodology behind the ratings here. Remember that the grading scale is 20-80, with 50 representing league average.

2012 Organizational Rankings

#30 – Baltimore
#29 – Houston
#28 – Oakland
#27 – Pittsburgh
#26 – San Diego
#25 – Minnesota
#24 – Chicago White Sox
#23 – Seattle

Kansas City’s 2011 Ranking: 25th

2012 Outlook: 45 (20th)

For the first time in a while, the Royals’ hitting pre-season hitting projects to be pretty good. The offense was quietly above average in 2011 (102 wRC+), and while regression is to be expected from player like Alex Gordon and Jeff Francoeur, one can also expect improvement from exciting young players like Eric Hosmer and Mike Moustakas.

The loss of Salvador Perez for a large chunk of the season will probably hurt defensively as well as offensively, but if Hosmer can start living up to his reputation in the field to go along with the strong defensive work expected from Alcides Escobar and Lorenzo Cain, the fielding should also good on balance.

So is Kansas City ready to take a shot at Detroit in 2012?

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Since the 2011 season ended and the offseason began, people largely assumed that Johnny Giavotella would break camp as the starting second baseman for the Kansas City Royals. He mashed Triple-A last year to the tune of .338/.390/.481 and was named player of the year in the Royals’ minor league system. Furthermore, the organization benched starter Chris Getz late last year in favor of Giavotella in hopes of grooming the 24-year-old for extensive big league action in 2012.

Despite those facts, the Royals optioned Giavotella to Triple-A Omaha yesterday and will begin the season with some combination of Chris Getz and Yuniesky Betancourt at second base.

You read that correctly. On Sunday afternoon, the Kansas City Royals actively chose a pair of players who both compiled an identical wOBA of .278 last season (average wOBA for an American League second baseman was .312) to split time at second base over a young player who posted a .390 and .381 wOBA in his past two minor league stops, respectively.

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On the heels of news that Joakim Soria will need Tommy John surgery, the Royals’ bullpen is a state of flux. Luckily, unlike most bullpens around the majors, the Royals have excellent options to fill the role. Jonathan Broxton may be the frontrunner for the job, given his history as a stud with the Dodgers. But the closer of the future is already in the Royals’ bullpen, and even if he doesn’t become the closer of the present, Greg Holland is already making hitters take notice.

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On Tuesday, the Kansas City Royals acquired Jason Bourgeois and Humberto Quintero from the Houston Astros in exchange for minor league reliever Kevin Chapman and a player to be named later (whom Jeff Luhnow told Brian McTaggart will be a key component of the deal). The acquisition of Quintero serves a clear purpose for the Royals, who are short on catching depth with Salvador Perez out up to three months with a knee injury. Royalty and the bourgeoisie have been a fantastic fit throughout history; does this continue with Jason Bourgeois and the Royals?

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Royals closer Joakim Soria left a spring training game on Sunday with a sore right elbow, a frustrating development for a player looking to rebound from a sub-par 2012. As of this writing, there is no word on whether the issue will cause Soria to miss any time to start the season. If Soria does miss time, it may not have that much of an impact on Kansas City because the team has a deep bullpen. However, this raises a further question regarding whether Soria should have been traded a year or two ago to maximize the return.

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You can try to dispense of these notes on the Alcides Escobar extension, but you won’t be able to: as the title of this post suggests, they’re indispensable.

Regarding Alcides Escobar, The Extension He Signed
The 25-year-old shortstop Escobar and the Royals agreed Thursday to a four-year, $10.5 million extension that includes a pair of club options that could bring the overall value of the contract to $21.75 million. Per the Associated Press, “Escobar will make $1 million this season and $3 million each of the next three seasons. The options are for $5.25 million in 2016 and $6.5 million in 2017 with $500,000 buyouts each year.”

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Salvador Perez won’t be ready for Opening Day.

Less than a month after the Kansas City Royals rewarded him with a five-year, $7 million contract, Perez now has a meniscus tear — an injury serious enough that the Royals decided to send its starting catcher back to Kansas City for surgery. Now that there’s some uncertainty surrounding Perez, it’s unclear how the Royals will respond.

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With disabled list information available going back 10 years, I have decided to examine some league wide and team trends.

League Trends

To begin with, here are the league values for trips, days and average days lost to the DL over the past 10 years.

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Salvador Perez just joined a very exclusive club. By signing a five year, $7 million guaranteed contract — which includes three additional option years — with the Kansas City Royals, the 21-year-old catcher joins Evan Longoria and Matt Moore as players who have signed significant extensions before accumulating a year of major-league service time. While Longoria’s and Moore’s contracts are considered major steals for the Tampa Bay Rays, the Perez deal is a bit more uncertain. With the Royals starting their build a competitive team, they need to be sure they’re extending the right players.
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I have gone through all of the 2011 MLB transactions and compiled the disabled list (DL) data for the 2011 season. I have put all the information in a Google Doc for people to use

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Kansas City entered 2011 with the undisputed best minor league system in baseball. A year later the landscape has chanced somewhat thanks to promotions (Mike Moustakas, Eric Hosmer, Salvador Perez, Tim Collins, etc.) and injuries. The organization is not as deep as it once was but it still has some impressive talent and is easily in the Top 10, if not the Top 5, when discussing the best minor league systems.

1. Wil Myers, OF
BORN: Dec. 10, 1990
EXPERIENCE: 3 seasons
ACQUIRED: 2009 3rd round, North Carolina HS
2010-11 TOP 10 RANKING: 3rd

Drafted as a prep catcher, the organization made the difficult decision to move Myers to right field so his defensive development would not hold him back and would allow his potentially-plus bat to dictate his movement through the system. After a dominating performance in A-ball in 2010, Myers struggled at double-A and was merely “average” according to his wRC+ of .104. He continued to show patience (12.5 BB%) but his strikeout rate rose to almost 21 K% and his average slipped to .254. His power output also dipped considerably with his isolated power rate hitting .138. A knee infection knocked Myers out from mid-May until early June and could be somewhat to blame for his struggles; his best power displays came in April and August. Perhaps feeling that he had something to prove, Myers lit the Arizona Fall League on fire after being assigned there for the fall. He hit .360 with 14 extra base hits in 23 games (wRC+ of 178). With the strong showing in the AFL, Myers will likely move up to triple-A for 2012 and could reach Kansas City before the end of the year.

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It is a simple question.

What is sabermetrics?

Not the history of it, but what is it, right now? What is, in our nerdiest of lingoes, its derivative? Where is it pointing? What does it do?

Last Tuesday I created no little stir when I listed the 2012 saber teams, delineating them according to their perceived embrace of modern sabermetrics.

Today, I recognize I needed to take a step back and first define sabermetrics, because it became obvious quickly I did not have the same definition at heart as some of the readers and protesters who gathered outside my apartment.

I believe, and this is my belief — as researcher and a linguist — that sabermetrics is not statistics. The term itself has come to — or needs to — describe more than just on-base percentage, weighted runs created plus, fielding independent pitching, and wins above replacement.

Sabermetrics is the advanced study of baseball, not the burying of one’s head in numbers.
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Silly monkey, BRAINS ARE FOR ZOMBIES.

Casey Kotchman is in many ways a man without a home — a player equal parts under-appreciated and over-valued, who irks both old and new schools at the same time. Old school analysts say his defense is amazing, but they cannot quantify it, and in 2011, they claimed his cleared vision meant he finally learned how to aim the ball “where they ain’t,” but he’s still a .268 hitter with little power. The new school says he’s worth about 7.6 runs per season defensively, but worth ~1.1 WAR per 600 PAs — not good — and his BABIP was high 2011, so he should not be able to repeat his success.

Despite his inability to build a consistent following of fans in the baseball outsiders communities, Kotchman seems to have some insider communities very much interested in him, as Tom Tango points out:

Kotchman’s last four teams: Redsox, Mariners, Rays, Indians. Can we say that a team that signs Kotchman is saber-leaning?

Indeed, after spending five and a half seasons on the Angels’ and Braves’ rosters, Kotchman has begun to shuffle around with the Nerdz, most recently signing with the Cleveland Indians. It makes sense too — Kotchman’s lack of power keeps him cheap, and his strong defense keeps him amorphous for the old school teams, while the new schools might have different valuations on Kotchman, they can at least quantify his contributions and better know how he fits.

Then, on Monday, the Houston Astros signed Justin Ruggiano, long-time Tampa Bay Rays outfielder who was never good enough to stick on the Rays’ roster, but who possesses strong defensive chops and above average patience. His lack of power and ~.290 batting average, however, must make him a mystery — or at least an undesirable asset — to the old school teams.

Upon Ruggiano signing with the Astros, a once highly old school team, my reaction was all: “Welp, that’s one more team to compete with” — and then it occurred to me! No only have the Astros entered the realm of, so to speak, saber-minded organizations, but so have the long-backward Chicago Cubs.

Suddenly the league looks very different.

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This morning I was scrolling through some of Dan Szymborski’s projections over at Baseball Think Factory, and I noticed that he had run a projection for Matt Stairs. I had not heard any news about the guy we all know now as a pinch-hitter. As I scoured the internets (read: typed “Matt Stairs” into Google) I quickly realized that Stairs had retired, though since he will be a studio analyst for NESN this year, all is not lost. Still, it will be disappointing to not see him on the field any longer.

Few pinch hitters struck fear in my heart the way Matt Stairs did. When Stairs came to the plate against a team for which I was rooting, I always sure that something bad was about to happen. Even still, I couldn’t hate him. A portly slugger with a great sense of humor — I will always remember Will Carroll forwarding the Baseball Prospectus email group an email from Stairs with a picture of his flexed calf muscle and promptly doubling over in laughter — Stairs was exceedingly easy to root for, and in the latter, pinch-hitting days of his career he became somewhat of a nerdy folk hero.

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It’s probably the Canadian in me talking, but I have always been a Jeff Francis fan. The University of British Columbia product was selected 9th overall by the Colorado Rockies in the famed Moneyball draft, and rewarded the team with 11.8 WAR in his first five big league seasons before succumbing to the injury bug. Now, the 31 year old finds himself without a job a month before spring training despite posting 4.6 WAR over the last two seasons.

Why is he unemployed? Well, the 85 MPH fastball has something to do with it, but so does the fact that he’s traditionally been a guy whose results haven’t matched his peripherals. Other than his 36.2 inning cup of coffee in 2004, only once in his career has his ERA been lower than his FIP. For his career, his FIP is a respectful 4.40, but his ERA is 4.78, a 38 point gap that helps shed light on the perception of Francis as a guy you only want on the hill if you have no other options. The last two seasons have been especially brutal, with an ERA almost a full run higher than his FIP – the main culprit being, as usual, a .317 BABIP. His inflated hit rate has been fueled in part by a significant drop in his infield fly rate, which has hovered at close to 6% over the last two years after being over 10% early in his career.

There is nothing overly unusual about a pitcher posting back-to-back seasons with BABIP’s of .320 and .316, or having a career mark of .310. These numbers are well within the expected random variation of our sample of major league pitchers. However, Francis has changed quite a bit since his early days in Colorado when he was throwing 89-92 MPH. He is now down in the 85 MPH range, and is now a full-blown pitch to contact guy. Last season, only 16.20% of Francis’ plate appearances ended in a walk or strikeout, ranking him 93rd out of 94 qualified pitchers. I decided to do some digging to see if just maybe these two factors might be related.

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