Kansas City Baseball Vault

Kris Medlen Omaha by KC Baseball Vault

This week, we took a look at the upcoming road trip against two interesting teams. Oakland, of course, caused some trouble back in April but haven't played well (thought their run differential is strong). Houston, the Royals' opponent following the A's, are having a great first half but their hitters may not make enough contact to keep it up.

We also discussed an article on Business Insider suggesting that the Royals have found a market inefficiency. The article supposes that the Royals are ensuring they pull their starters early to get to the bullpen faster. There may be some truth to the circumstances, but is it really something the Royals have set up as a goal? We discuss. (The article is here http://www.businessinsider.com/royals-rays-reinventing-how-teams-use-starting-pitchers-2015-6: if you agree/disagree, email us at kansascitybaseballvault at gmail.com)

Finally, we wanted to let everyone know of a great event to come out and cheer on the Royals. To celebrate the All- Star Game and the likely multiple Royals starting the game, we, along with Kelly's Westport Inn, will be hosting a watch party on July 14 while the All Stars are in Cincinnati.

This week we still couldn't believe the incredible turnout by Royals fans in this year's All-Star voting so far and offered some theories for the explosion and discussed the general enthusiasm of the Royals fanbase.

We also discussed some of the injuries to Royals starters and the depth of the organization and how it might all factor in down the line.

Danny Duffy's postgame reaction to his first rehab start in Omaha.

The Royals finished May with some weak offense, and it's led to a slight downturn, but we started out tonight talking about instant replay in baseball, focusing on the call that impacted the Royals in their loss against Cleveland on Tuesday, but expanded to talk about it generally and how it can improve.

But the Royals didn't lose on Tuesday because of the replay call. They lost because they've had trouble scoring runs lately. Jeff and Mike talked about the slide and how worried it might make us, but also identified one opportunity for improvement: swapping Omar Infante with Christian Colon.

After break, we talked about some progress from John Lamb and Kyle Zimmer, and a brief guess at the path ahead for rehabbing Kris Medlen. Then we finished up talking about attendance, fan enthusiasm, and the voting for the All-Star Game that has seen Royals doing well at every position on the diamond.

Dayton Moore was in Omaha Wednesday in support of his new book, Bill Fischer day in Papillion and to checkout the Storm Chaser prospects.

After a big series win in Detroit, the Royals remained in first place, despite some adversity and injury. Jeff and Mike talked about the formula for success as well as some concerns for the next five months of the season.

Then we welcomed Mike Groopman to the show as our guest. Groopman is Director of Operations/Analytics for the Kansas City Royals. He discussed the philosophy behind building an analytics department, the evolution of the Royals' approach to analytics, and the support he's gotten from the organization and how he interacts with other parts of the ballclub.

This week, we caught up on all the drama surrounding the Oakland and Chicago series, as the Royals ended up branded the bad boys of baseball.

We talked about the team concept, the suspensions following bench-clearing incidents, the immaturity of Yordano Ventura (and the role of Jeff Samardzija and Brett Lawrie in all of this, too), and basically what it all means along with the context of what the Royals are doing on the field.

(recorded 4/16/15)
After some illnesses and schedule conflicts, we finally made it back with an opportunity to talk about the Royals' hot start to 2015 and the key contributors.

We had an old voice on the show, as Chris Kamler, aka @TheFakeNed, joined us to talk about his book The Silence, The Series, and the Season of SungWoo (available at kamlerbook.com) and the spirit of Kansas City and the magical summer and postseason in 2014.

After Kamler snuck away, Jeff and Mike talked about the Yordano Ventura extension, the Mike Moustakas adjustments, and the potential stardom of Lorenzo Cain.

We also talked about beanball wars and retaliation (and this was even BEFORE the Brett Lawrie stuff).

Follow the KCBBV on Twitter at @KCBaseballVault. You can follow Jeff at @TheJeffReport, and Mike at @michaelengel. And give our sponsor, Kelly's Westport Inn, a follow as well to keep up on all upcoming events and fun at @KellysBarKC.

With less than a week until the Royals open their defense of the AL Championship, Jeff and Mike talked about the latest spring training news and the makeup of the roster - which is mostly set, barring injuries.

We offered some bold predictions for the upcoming season, some of which are probably nowhere near going to come true - but hey they might. We also wandered down memory lane to recall some past Royals and past seasons and events, including some painful Kansas City sports moments.