Royals Authority

For me, the most impressive and potentially meaningful thing about the Royals start is not their perfect record but their ridiculous run differential (RD). They have obliterated the White Sox, Angels, and Twins to the combined tune of 52 runs scored and 18 allowed. Since 1900, their +34 RD is tied for the fourth best after the first seven games of a season, and it represents the best RD a team has had after seven games since 1962. Only 17 squads since 1900 have had a +30 or better RD at this point in the season. (Unfortunately one of those teams is the 2015 Tigers.)

Here’s a look at those 17 teams, along with their final record and postseason performance:

Holy Moses. It’s almost scary how good most of those teams went on to be. Ignoring the 2015 Royals and Tigers, the other teams have a combined final winning percentage of .599, which is a 97 win season. Only four of the 15 teams missed out on postseason play.

Another way to look at the potential significance of KC’s RD is to find recent teams that have had a +34 or better RD during any seven game stretch in a season (not just the first seven of the year). (Rob Neyer has an interesting question about whether or not all streaks are created equal.) Over the last five years, 2010-14, there have been just 27 teams to put up such a good RD during any seven game stretch, or an average of five or six teams a year. Those 27 teams ended the year with an average of 88 wins, and 14 of them made the postseason. Holy Moses.

These numbers seem pretty exciting to me, but there are also a few teams that serve as cautionary tales. You may have noticed in the table above that the team with the best ever RD start to a season, the ’62 Cardinals, ended up with a just OK 84 wins and out of the playoffs. And over the last five seasons, three truly terrible teams have fluked into dominant seven game stretches at some point (2010 Twins, 2014 Red Sox, and 2014 Rockies). So of course this great start guarantees nothing. But more often than not, teams that have a stretch of seven games this good are for real.

Shout out to the magical Baseball Reference Play Index.

Earlier today, it was Alex Gordon and his wrist. Just a few hours later, it has become Alex Rios and his hand. Broken, you know. Out indefinitely.

Lots of speculation with this news, not the least of which was the removal of Terrance Gore from his AA game today. In combination with the speedster already being on the 40 man roster, one would be led to believe that Gore will take Rios’ spot on the 25 man roster. I don’t hate it.

After all, it took six games and an injury to get Jarrod Dyson into live action and, far as we can tell, neither Eric Kratz or Christian Colon really exist. This is not a team or a manager that is going to utilize the bench very much. Quite frankly, if you want strategery, Gore is probably more likely to see action than say a Whit Merrifield or someone of that ilk.

In the regular lineup, it appears that Jarrod Dyson and Paulo Orlando will platoon and likely do so in right field with Lorenzo Cain staying in center. Dyson, I assume because he is small and fast, is perceived as not having a good arm. Truthfully, Dyson’s arm is no worse than average, probably not a lot different than that of Cain. I like the idea of the guy playing everyday (Cain) staying in one spot, where he might be better than Dyson anyway. So, keeping Lorenzo in center and leaving rightfield to Dyson and Orlando makes sense to me and likely leads to better overall defense than the Royals were getting out of Rios. That is, by the way, not a criticism of Rios’ early season defense, but more a compliment for the amount of ground Dyson can cover. It should also be noted that Orlando is considered a superb defender with a very good arm.

The Royals are not blessed with a ton of major league ready depth, but they actually were assembled to, at minimum, get by with an injury to the very player who got hurt. Write this down, because I’m sure it has never been said before, are part of the game. This is as good a time and as tolerable a position to take the hit as the Royals could hope for. It’s not the best situation, but it is far from the worst.

Remain calm, everyone. Don’t panic.

Alex Gordon is off to a 1 for 16 start and that one hit was a seeing eye roller up the middle that was not exactly mashed. There has been some mock-snarky panic, some actual concern and an occasional casual fan wondering if they shouldn’t play ‘that kid’ Orlando more. Hey, Paulo Orlando is a great story. A guy I touted highly as a prospect long ago and then gave up on. A guy who did something that had never been done in baseball by hitting triples for his first three career hits. Let’s not get carried away, however.

Quick aside. With Orlando’s triples this year and Brandon Finnegan’s College World Series to actual World Series in the same season feat last year, Kansas City has had two guys in two years do something that has not been done in baseball ever before. It is hard to find something that has not already been done in this game these days - especially something good. Just kind of a cool side note.

Anyway, back to Gordon.

In a rather amazing trick, Gordon has a .348 on-base percentage despite having just one hit in five games. That number is courtesy of three walks (one intentional) and four hit by pitch. Getting on base half the time via the hit by pitch is a hell of a way to make a living and, check the math on this, likely not a sustainable model. Rickey Henderson posted on-base percentages of .400 and .410 in back to back seasons despite hitting below .250 both years. In one of those (1997), splitting time between Seattle and Anaheim, Rickey hit just .183 in 144 plate appearances but still got on base at .343 clip. I am not comparing Gordon to Henderson (Alex does not refer to himself in the third person and seems to be aware of who his teammates are and even knows their names), just another fun set of numbers to go with a quirky early season line from the Royals’ Gold Glove left-fielder.

Early is the key word in the previous sentence.

Seven games into 2014, Gordon was sporting a triple slash of just .231/.276/.308 with no home runs. I believe you will note that 2014 turned out alright for Alex. He started hot in 2013, but in 2012, Gordon began the season 0 for 16, didn’t get over the Mendoza line until April 26th and wound up hitting .294/.368/.455. Even in 2011, Gordon started 2 for 13 before notching 11 hits in his next four games on his way to his best triple slash line of his career and tying for his best WAR season of his career. The point of this is that a) Gordon has a bit of a slow start history, b) five games is JUST FIVE GAMES and c) a player in Gordon’s physical condition who has put up fWARs of 6.6, 5.5, 3.7 and 6.6 the last four years suddenly does not lose it.

Let’s also keep in mind The Wrist. Is it healthy? I don’t know - Ned has not called me this morning (weird, right?), but as cautious as the Royals were throughout the spring, it is hard to believe Gordon is out there playing in pain. And they were cautious this spring.

Gordon only appeared in 10 Major League spring training games, logging just 35 plate appearances: basically half of the other regulars. That is also not the entire story, either. The wrist surgery had to interfere with Alex’s off-season workouts. We have all heard tell of Gordon’s dedication to working out and while he certainly did not let himself go, the sore wrist and eventual surgery certainly changed the regimen this off-season. Let’s not underestimate the impact of a change of routine to a creature of habit.

While I am not privy to how many times Gordon steps in a batting cage during the winter, but I would wager the wrist kept him from doing it as much as in prior years. Even after getting back into physical shape, Gordon was still not cleared for actually swing a bat until spring training games were already underway.

Bottom line of all this: Alex Gordon is more than 30 spring training at-bats behind. I don’t know that it’s a stretch to say the Alex likely doesn’t quite feel like he is ready and may feel a tad behind. The wrist may not be, or at least feel quite as strong as it has before. True or not, it would be human nature to have at least a sprinkling of those thoughts going through Gordon’s head right now. Hell, who knows? None of that may be happening and it all may simply be that Alex Gordon is 30 at-bats behind the rest of baseball. If that is all there is to this story, then Alex is a couple of games from being right where the Royals need him.

If a 7-0 start means nothing, then a 1-16 start from a hitter means even less. I’m leaning towards Alex Gordon getting more hits this weekend against Oakland than Billy Butler collects against the Royals.

By the way, 7-0 is kind of fun, isn’t it?