are a couple of those exceptions the games you handed the twins 12 walks, or possibly the next night when you offered 14 free passes.

Yes. Those are two bad games we played over the past 3 months. You really burned me there...by pointing out two bad games we played when I made the statement that "we have been playing decent baseball for the past 2-3 months for the most part."

I think we all get it by now. No need for the sarcasm everytime they do good.

go to bed NOWWWWW..

yeah I'm not happy w/ a split but looking back I guess I should be considering we sucked majorly in two games.

So...I can't say something every time we do good, but every, and I mean EVERY single time we do something bad I get to be made fun of and our team gets to be criticized and on and on in the media and on here and pretty much everywhere...every time we lose we get made fun of and criticized and we are poked fun at in every way possible by everybody..but when we do good and I say something..now it's too much...right.

As soon as we quit being made fun of and criticized after EVERY SINGLE LOSS...then I will stop being sarcastic when we win.

Seriously, I haven't seen many posts the last 2-3 months bashing the KC Royals, I dont pass through this thread much, but everytime I see it, it's "wow look at EVERYONE saying we suck", but I don't see much of people posting here laughing at the Royals when they lose a series (Maybe in April/may, but definately not as much now)

I understand what you're trying to get at, but it's kinda repetitive. The majority of the baseball crew here KNOW that your team is doing well for itself and it has nowhere to go but up. I'm not saying to completely shut down...but every post is saying "look at everyone saying how much we suck", and lately, how much of it have we seen?

Four letters.

E

S

P

N

I rest my case.

I can't get on ESPN to say it, so I am going to say it in MY thread about MY team. If you don't want to read it, don't read the thread. When we are constantly bashed everywhere (and we've been bashed plenty on here as well....look around)...I am not just gonna "let it go," when we do do well. Besides, just a few posts up a Twins fan is bashing my team about two bad games we had.........so I'm gonna respond.

Fair enough. We canucks dont get ESPN, but I dont hear a lot of people talkin crap about it.

I didnt think the post above were really an insult...he was just asking if those were the games you were talking about. You said your team was playing well minus a couple exceptions, and he just asked if those were the case. *shrug*

No, you got me wrong. I didn't mean to bash or insult. I just brought it up, those were the two games I wne to the K to see. I'm just saying that handing out free passes is something that can kill teams and its something that the Royals obviously have to work on to be contenders.

Please....it was a bashing post. Of course we didn't play well when we walked 14 and 12 guys in a game or whatever...don't tell me that he "had to ask" if those were games in which I thought we played well..please.

It was a bashing post. It happens all the time, whether it be on here, from friends/family, ESPN, radio...everywhere. When we do do well..I'm gonna talk about it.

Oh yeah, Kansas Sh*tty just swept a double header from Oakland. God we are horrible.

Fine, have it your way. Every one hates the Royals and wants to see them fail.

No, but come on, get serious.

I say they have been playing well for the most part for the past 3 months.

You respond with "yeah, those games where they walked 14 and 12 batters in one game...are those what you are talking about??" Come on. Did you REALLY REALLY REALLY think that those two are what I think are "good games???" Did you REALLY REALLY have to ask if I think walking 26 batters over a two game span is what I consider "playing well??" Come on...I'm not buying it. I'm not saying that every person that bashes my team on a particular occasion "hates my team and wants them to fail," but it was a bash on my team...and thus when we do good, I'm gonna talk good about my team. Simple as that. I'm sure ESPN doesn't "hate the Royals and want them to fail," but they bash them a lot and thus I am going to bring it up when we are winning. That's all.

I hope the Royals step up and beat the Tigers and Twins and would like to see them make the AL Central even more competitive in the next few years. It could be exiciting. No sw

Holy crap..Mark Teahen is good. OPS at .907 now....incredible baserunning...25+ HR power.....great plate discipline...defense pretty good....don't tell me ever again that he is a "below average player/prospect" and that the Beltran trade was a bad one..after tonight..it's official. The Royal's have their next superstar on the way...along with Alex Gordon and Billy Butler..and Greinke perhaps..and Hochevar......damn.

Also gonna go ahead and point out that Teahen has a higher OPS than David Wright...and is hitting more HRs per AB than Wright....batting average and OBP about the same.....far superior baserunning.....very good defensively....man...all this is pretty good for a "bust" whom we acquired in one of the worst trades of all time.......also pretty good for only the 2nd best 3rd base prospect in our system.

Damn we suck.

Come on Koop, rise above the haters and keep the message positive. I, too, am sick of the Royals bashing and the fact that they don't get any credit for anything they've done right, but they're still 15-25 since the All-Star break and have the worst record in the majors by 2 1/2 games. Are they getting better? Of course they are. Do they have bright points and good players? Damn right they do. So just keep pointing out the good things and keep the bitterness out of it. And don't gloat too much when we pull a Detroit Tigers on the league in 2008...

Oh, hell, gloat all you want!

I'm not saying the Royals are a good team now....just saying that we're not that bad right now either. Yeah..15-25 since the AS Break...but when you play the ChiSox and Twins and Tigers and Red Sox and all the other good teams every series.....that's just gonna happen. I've taken way way way way way too much bashing of my team to not be sarcastic about it. I'm not p*ssed off in my posts....just sarcastic.

To me the posts seem more bitter than sarcastic, but it's obviously hard to tell over a message board. I'm just saying that I enjoy reading your posts a lot more when they're more positive. Anyway, keep up the good work!

Um, Teahen is goot. They'd better hold on to this lead.

4 for 4 again tonight with a walk also so far tonight.....OPS up to .921....yeah...so at what point does he go from "an average prospect" to one of the better hitters in the game (not saying he is anywhere close to that...just saying he is really really really really playing well right now.)

It will be interesting to see what he can do next year.

Fantasy sleeper indeed. His numbers are practically indistinguishable from David Wright's.

What an unbelievable game tonight..I'm pretty sure the record for "most ground balls to find the perfect hole" has been absolutely shattered tonight...both teams just had every single ball find every perfect hole all night..the pitching was bad..buy holy crap were those guys lucky to get that many hits. Sucks to lose..but sh*t happens I guess. When every ground ball finds a hole...they just pile up I guess.

You wouldn't know that listening to any baseball analyst. To them Wright and Reyes are the best thing to happen to baseball since the changeup

And tonight's Royals game was historic. Only the second team to lose after scoring 10 runs in the first.

Well..you didn't know. They play in New York, so that makes them naturally better than any other prospect elsewhere in baseball.

..and yeah, tonight's loss was pretty ugly. Every single ball hit by both teams found a hole, no matter how hard it was hit...pretty amazing, actually.

bump for Mark Redman being a sh*tty pitcher...say what you want about him, but he came back from injury during Spring Training too early and is 8-8 for a team that will win 60 games at best. That ain't that horrible. He isn't great. He doesn't suck. He's decent. He throwns 88 mph at best. He's Mark Redman.

Redman will always be just average, no matter where he is. I think his best season was in '03 with the Marlins, and thats just with a good team behind him. I hated him even when he with my team. He shouldn't have made that all-star team.

Lets bump again for Redman blowing.

How could you hate him when he had 14 wins and a 3.60 ERA for your World Series winning team??? Seems a bit odd......

GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO ROYALS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

did I hear right that Butler and Gordan are gonna be kept down for the callups. So they can retain their rights for one extrra year, not a bad idea. A scout from the Devil Rays was suprised they called up Delmon Young for that very reason.

Yeah..that's correct. Butler will be starting next year in Omaha most likely..Gordon is probably going to make the roster for Opening Day next year..unless Moore takes it really cautious with him too..but I doubt that. Gordon is ready....he's too good.

Also, no way Young should've been called up. His numbers aren't THAT great in AAA ball...he's so young.....bad move.

Ah crap, just another sh*tty game from my team. Wish we didn't suck so bad.

I wish the Sox could hit a changeup

I wish Gathright could catch a pop-fly...lol.

Tough break for us losing the ball in the lights...oh well. Perez seemed to pitch pretty well...that's a good thing.

Royals win the series 2-1.....right after taking 2 of 3 from the Twins (at Minnesota). Pretty good for a doomed-forever incredibly sucky with no good players/prospects/talent team.

I love the Royals.

you suck, that is all.

The race to avoid 100 losses is on. I think it's extremely obvious that our team and organization is much much improved over the course of the year..as we are playing good ball and have made a ton of progress in the minor leagues and have a lot of good players who are close to arriving in KC..but not seeing 100 losses in our column would sure make it that much nicer.

Dear The Royals,

Thank you for getting Denny Bautista onto the Rockies.

Love,
Giants fans

Yup...giving them Denny "chickenlegs" Bautista and Jeremy "Awful-dt" to the Rockies and getting Ryan Shealy in return...that's a major steal. Two injury prone pitchers who are very very very rapidly losing their "prospect/potential" status (they do have a little hope still...) in exchange for a MLB ready starting 1B just waiting to break out (very good minor league numbers)..just one of many awesome trades for the Royals this season. It seems a lot of people are surprised by some of these deals...too bad they weren't listening to me when I told everyone that this would all be happening way back in January and February and March.

Incredible DP turned by Mark Grudzielanek tonight....which follows his awesome catch last night....he should get the Gold Glove this year..he's been amazing with the glove this year and only has three errors..but of course he plays in Kansas City..so Robinson Cano or something retarded like that will get it.

Oh yeah..just another win tonight...swept Cleveland on the road..pitching has been good lately...offense has been good for a good while now...lots of pitching potential and offensive potential on the way..Ryan Braun in particular looked awesome......man, what a joke our organization is..according to Jim Rome anyways. Good one.

ESPN has at least one KC fan, baseball Insider Rob Neyer. Here's a recent article by him about KC's surging offense.

K.C.'s offense on upswing
By Rob Neyer
ESPN Insider
Archive

Care to guess which American League team has scored the most runs since the All-Star break?

Right. Bombers.

Care to guess who's No. 2?

Actually, two are No. 2: the Twins and Rangers both have scored 305 runs since the All-Star Game.

Now, in a perfect (for me) world, next I would ask if you care to guess who's No. 4. But that doesn't do me any good at all. So instead I'll skip a few spots, and ask …

Would you care to guess who's No. 6? Who's No. 6, and only 16 runs from being No. 2? Who's No. 6, and ahead of the Angels … and the White Sox … and the Red Sox?

Answer: Your (or rather, my) Kansas City Royals. That's right. Since the All-Star Game, the Royals have been, at worst, a middle-of-the-road offensive team, at least in terms of runs scored. Actually, that's not quite generous enough. Their surge began before the All-Star break. From June 1 through last night's 10-8 win, the Royals scored 486 runs, just behind the third-place Indians. Among the 10 teams the Royals have outscored since May: Minnesota, Boston, Detroit and Oakland.

Just a fluke? Sure, to some extent. The Royals have been unusually healthy, and their underlying stats don't quite match their scoring. But it's not completely a fluke. Before he got hurt, third baseman Mark Teahen was absolutely brilliant. David DeJesus has established himself as a solid major leaguer. After a lousy start, outfielder Emil Brown has been quite good. First baseman Ryan Shealy, swiped from the Rockies in a deadline deal, is better than the guy he replaced, Doug Mientkiewicz.

Which brings me to something that's actually relevant beyond Missouri. It's not like you and I need to learn this lesson again, but apparently there are still some baseball executives who do: You will rarely benefit from stocking your roster with overpriced veterans on the way down.

Prior to this season, the Royals signed Mientkiewicz, Reggie Sanders, and Mark Grudzielanek. Mientkiewicz and Sanders are both busts. Also prior to this season, the Pirates -- a decidedly Royals-like franchise -- acquired Jeromy Burnitz, Joe Randa, and Sean Casey. All three are (or were, in Casey's case) busts. This has happened so many times over the years, it's moderately amazing that players like these still get serious offers each winter from teams that have absolutely no business making serious offers.

I'll be surprised if new general manager Dayton Moore makes the same mistake this winter. If he does spend money, it'll probably be on a relief pitcher or three; the Royals' bullpen has been truly dreadful this season. The starters have been awful, too, but at least there's some hope there; the organization's got four legitimate prospects -- if you count Zack Greinke as a prospect -- in Double-A right now, and at least three of those four could be in the majors at some point next season.

Meanwhile, there's a real chance the lineup will get even better. Third baseman Alex Gordon, the overall No. 1 draft pick a year ago, was just named Minor League Player of the Year by Baseball America. "Outfielder" (and future DH) Billy Butler, another high draft pick (in 2004), is one of the better-hitting prospects in the minors. Add them to the lineup -- and figure out where Teahen's going to play -- and the Royals have a legitimate chance to rank in the top five or six in the league in scoring. Maybe not next season, but certainly in 2008.

What does it all mean? It means the Royals aren't going to be a joke for much longer. They're not going to win a division title, and wouldn't even if they were in a lousy division (they're not, and won't be for quite some time). They will, within the next two or three seasons, win half their games and escape the basement. I'm significantly more optimistic about the franchise's immediate future than I was just a few months ago, and it really is moderately amazing just how quickly things can change with a bit of luck and a bit more of (general) managerial acumen. Now, if they could just figure out a way to unload the incompetent shortstop and the bungling manager, something really amazing might happen.

He's got some good points, but it's so obvious that he hasn't really paid much attention and doesn't really know that much about the Royals.

First, he says our offense has been a fluke because we've been "unusually healthy??" WTF!?! Also, I didn't know Mark Teahen playing the ENTIRE year with a bad shoulder and needing season ending surgery was "healthy." I didn't know that this one guy who was our DH was healthy all this time..what's that guy's name...Mike..uh..Swen....Sweeney or something like that. Yeah, he's been real healthy. I guess Buck's aching knees/legs and DeJesus' bad hamstrings are just nothing. Yeah, we're 100% healthy all the way around. Whatever.

Also, Shealy is a LOT more than just "better than the guy he replaced." Shealy is going to be a really..really good hitter..and his defense has actually been outstanding so far. Shealy has awesome potential...30-35 HR power....900 OPS guy.

Doug Mientkiewicz was not a bust. He played his *** off. His defense was amazing. His offense wasn't that bad. Yeah, he got hurt, but ask anyone who is the guy that inspired Mark Teahen to start playing like he has. It was Mientkiewicz. He played decent and his all-out attitude and desire has rubbed off quite a bit.

Our current set of starters hasn't been that bad. Hudson has been pretty good this year. Hernandez has shown signs of coming around. De La Rosa has shown pretty sick stuff/potential. Redman has been decent all year. Perez has been up and down so far....either pretty good or giving up a lot of hits..but it's clear that he can be pretty good..hopefully he will be.

Billy Butler is not "one of the better hitting prospects" in the minor leagues. Many scouts consider the 20 year old who will be in AAA next year to be THE best pure hitting prospect in baseball. He is at least Top 5.

my god, you take offense even at compliments to your team.

Eh, Koop had some good points too. Calling Mientkiewicz a bust is really unfair to him. After all, he's hitting .283 this year, which is above his career average of .270. How is that a bust?

We all know that nobody knows KC's farm system better than Koop, but let's calm down about these guys until they see the big leagues next year. Shealy is playing great right now and certainly was a steal from the Rockies.

The starting pitching has been inconsistent at best, and the bullpen has been dreadful. I do like the way that some of the starters have looked recently (including Redman tonight), but they need to be much better in order to contend in the major's toughest division.

So Koop's complaint was that even in an article that's supposed to be "positive", they make excuses for their success and still have to point out the negatives. But still, calm down Koop.

Not taking "offense," just pointint out that he doesn't really know what he is talking about in terms of the Royals organization, despite thinking that he does. This is the same person who said that Alex Gordon and his 1.000+ OPS isn't "dominant enough" for us to get too excited about. This is the one who called Mark Teahen a worthless player and that the Beltran trade was one of the worst trades in baseball history. He has called us trading MacDougal to the ChiSox a horrible trade as well because he had a good ERA...despite the fact that we picked up two pretty solid starting pitching prospects. Now he is going to say that our "resurgent" offense is, in part, due to us being "unusually healthy" despite the fact that the guy we are paying 11 million per year to be our DH has been injured 100+ games each of the past three years?? I'm not "offended" by that, I just think it's very retarded.

Also, no, I will not "calm down" about Alex Gordon and Billy Butler and others. Those two are going to be among the very best hitters in baseball in five years or so. Which two hitters was it that dominated the Futures game. Which two hitters was it that pretty much carried their AA team to the playoffs? Gordon and Butler. Gordon was already labeled the "best player in the organization" back in Spring Training. Not the best minor league player..the best player period. He isn't the Minor League Player of the Year for nothing.

As for the starting pitching..I never said they were good. I just said that they are starting to look better. That's it. The real hope for our starting pitching lies in AA with Greinke, Hochevar, Billy Buckner, and Lumsden. If we can get two really good starting pitchers from those two (which is very very likely from Greinke and Hochevar at the very least), we have several other arms with pretty good potential. No one is saying that allll the players in our organization who have "potential" are going to all be stars, of course some will fail and some will surprise and etc,. but having so many different players to depend on for the future with so much potential, that's how small market teams get good.

I just gotta ask you Koop, what is the deal giving Meche $55 million. In '09 when it looks like you guys are going to have a chance to be contenders you are going to be paying Meche $12 million dollars.

where ya been koop?

Anyone really care?

just curious, he's a good person to talk baseball with.. and we just got Sisco from the Royals.

Gload in outfield. Not a bad hitter, but I have more faith in Sisco than the Royals do.