Thursday, March 31, 2011

Mr. Misty

The Royals have apparently already given up on the “Lucas May to catcher” experiment, which began months before we actually traded for him near the deadline last season.  It looked for sure like the Royals were at least going to give him a shot to platoon with Bryan Pena for a while at the Major League level, at least until (God help us) Jason Kendall comes off the disabled list to reclaim his job of NOT hitting while plugging up the 2-spot, and NOT throwing anybody out from behind the plate.

But he’s durable.  Or was durable, anyway.

Now the Royals have traded for Matt Treanor*, and May’s future with Kansas City is severely in doubt—he has no options, and as far as I know, the Royals may have cut him already.  For the life of me, I cannot understand this move.

*By the way, Matt Treanor has done nothing in sports more notable than marrying Misty May, possibly the greatest beach volleyball player of all time.  Unlike Treanor, Chuck Finley was actually a baseball player who didn’t completely suck, but he’ll still forever be known to me as “Chucky Kitaen,” because of his marriage to Tawny Kitaen from the Whitesnake videos.  In the same sense, Matt Treanor, to me, will always be “Mr. Misty May.”  And as long as Dairy Queen doesn’t catch wind of it, he will be “Mr. Misty,” for short.

OH, and for another “by the way,” there’s a link between Mr. Misty and Kendall—1980s MTV.  While Mr. Misty parallels Finley, whose wife got practically naked on a car while “Here I go Again on My Own” rocked the audio track, Jason Kendall has his own MTV link—his wife was stolen by Rod Steward’s son, who once played the little curly-head boy in his dad’s  “Forever Young” video.  I’ll bet they play the entire season together, and no one BUT ME will ever point out this undeniable link.  Do not doubt my genius.

Were not Pena and May considered mere stop-gaps for Salvador Perez in a year or two, with the LEAST tradable of the two eventually becoming Perez’ backup?  I mean, we kind of know what we have in Pena, and it’s OK—a reasonably gifted switch hitter who is a good teammate, a good clubhouse guy and a guy who could probably be a decent backup catcher for 10 years in the league.  In May, we didn’t know yet—he showed some signs of decent pop in the minors.  And we know he was struggling a little in his switch from shortstop to catcher.  But what in the world was it going to hurt to give him a little longer look in the bigs?

Now we’re a month or two from the scenario of having two supremely OLD and UNTALENTED catchers behind the plate for a team that’s going to lose 90 games.  Neither of whom are anywhere near being in our long-term plans, nor will either will draw an ounce of interest to bring us anything back.

This entire spring, with regard to all of this nonsense of Kendall being ready for opening day, or maybe coming back after 15 days on the DL, the only constantly sane voice in my head has been that of Chevy Chase, repeating one of his great lines in the underrated Cold War era comedy, “Spies Like Us”:

“Cut the sucker.”

Why Kendall is on this team is WAY beyond me.  We’re not on the hook for THAT much salary (and our payroll is already embarrassingly low), he’s not a part of our future, and he’s not going to help us win NOW or EVER.

But instead of cutting the old, untalented catcher that we already had (which would allow our younger guys a chance to show whether they can play or not), we turn around and add ANOTHER old, untalented catcher to the fold.

Welcome to the Mr. Misty era at Kauffman Stadium.  I’m sure there’s a reason for it, but count me among those who fail to see what it possibly could be.

Monday, March 14, 2011

Revenge of the Realignment Haters

Before we get into the bracket, I though I’d offer up a few words to close out the 2011 Big 12 Tournament.  The tournament is a funny phenomenon—it’s amazing how much it “matters” while it’s actually going on.  I don’t think anyone really gives two rips about it as regular season play trudges along, and quite honestly, about a day after it’s over every year, everyone goes back to NOT caring about it.  It’s kind of like deciding on a whim to go see a non-Oscar-quality film with your wife.  You didn’t put a lot of thought into it, and it’s not going to change your life, but it’s fun for the 90 minutes you sat and held hands in the dark.

All that said, it was really nice to get a second crack at Texas in the finals.  I’ve tried not to make a big deal out of this and look like I was making excuses for the first game against the ‘Horns this year and all of that, but let’s face it.  Texas played a physically and emotionally drained Jayhawk team in the first meeting.  No need to rehash everything now, but they had not slept, they came out on adrenaline, and it just ran out.  Not so on Saturday.  They wanted Texas, they got in their faces the night before the game (before Texas had even played A&M) and told them as much, and they went out and kicked their butts.  Got to a big lead, held them at arm’s-length for their run, and finished strong.  Let there be no doubt as to who was the best team in the league this year.

NOW FOR MY INITIAL BRACKET REACTIONS….

I haven’t had a chance to get down to the intricacies of this bracket yet, but my initial feeling is that the committee hates the Big 12 this year.  Or at LEAST they hate the schools which caused all the conference realignment drama this past year and took this as their opportunity to punish them a little for their misbehavior.

FIRST OF ALL… the committee isn’t made up merely by the power brokers the way the BCS is.  There are PLENTY of people on the committee that have every reason to HATE the idea of the “mega conference,” which pushes them farther away from competition, and even FARTHER from the revenue.

Here’s your committee (with those who have a vested interest in HATING realignment in bold):

Eugene Smith, chair, Ohio State (one for the power conferences)
Stanley Morrison, UC-Riverside (one for the little guys)
Jeffery Hathaway, UCONN (big guys)
Lynn Hickey, UT-San Antonio (mid-major city)
Mike Bobinski, Xavier (another for the smalls)
Dan Beebe, Big 12 Conference (a “big guy,” BUT a guy with every reason to screw the trouble-makers)
Doug Fullerton, Big Sky (doesn’t get any more “mid-major”)
Ron Wellman, Wake Forest (big)
Steve Orsini, SMU (small)
Scott Barnes, Utah State (certainly not in the BCS)

Clearly, if the members of the committee had a vested interest in punishing teams involved with conference realignment, they would have the votes to inflict their punishment THIS YEAR, and I think that maybe they did.

Let me get the ones with no right to gripe out of the way:  KU and K-State should really like their seeds.  KU was a no-brainer for the #2 overall, and they got the #1 seed in the region they wanted.  For Kansas State, a #5 is EXTREMELY generous.  They just got back into the Top 25 for the first time in months, and then proved they probably didn’t deserve it with a Big 12 Tournament flame-out.  But then again, KSU wasn’t one of the naughty Big 12 schools who shook things up last year, so the committee gave them the benefit of the doubt.

A&M should feel slightly shafted, and perhaps the lightness of their shaft was due to the fact that they didn’t REALLY want to participate in conference shake-ups, but they were still guilty of playing three sides during the deal (Big 12, SEC and PAC 10).  A #7 isn’t too far off, but does seem a little unfair, relative to the #5 that Kansas State got.  They had IDENTICAL conference records, but A&M beat KSU head-to-head, AND actually won a tournament game.

But as we’ll see in a minute, proving you’re better than Kansas State didn’t pull a lot of weight with the committee this year.

Missouri as a #11 is kind of interesting.  Mizzou has probably been punished enough by the public humiliation they received for practically BEGGING to be a part of conference realignment, but getting left out in the cold when the Big 10 went for Nebraska in stead.  But an 11-seed is a little bit of further insult-to-injury for the Tigers.  Granted, they didn’t finish well.  But they’ve gone from maybe as high as a #4 or #5 all the way down to a #11 pretty quick.  I spoke with my friends a few weeks ago, and suggested that if Missouri lost the last three games of the regular season (which they ended up doing), then they would be a bubble team IF they also lost their opening Big 12 Tournament game.  Well, they won that game and, apparently, STILL were a bubble team.

With the way the play-in games worked out, you know that Missouri was somewhere between the 5th and 7th last at-large team in the field.  A loss to Texas Tech in Kansas City might have pushed them into the play-in, or perhaps even out of the field altogether.

Texas was a MAJOR offender in the conference shake-up banter of 2010, and they benefited the most in the long-run, being allowed to keep their unequal share of the conference revenue AND start their own ESPN network.  So they had to be punished, and the committee did so with a #4 seed.  Texas was a sure #1 (in most expert’s eyes) just about 3 weeks ago.  They fell, without question, but most people still thought they deserved a #2.  The committee could have sent them to a #3, and no one would have thought anything of it.  But dropping them TWO SPOTS was a clear message:  you have misbehaved, and you deserve to take a little medicine.

AND THEN THERE’S COLORADO.

I know what Colorado’s RPI says, and I know their non-con schedule sucked.  But come on, now.  NOBODY had Colorado even on the bubble.  Everyone thought they were in, and there was no doubt.

Except in the mind of the committee.

Colorado, obviously, was a big part of the shake-up—the ONLY school of the two that actually LEFT the conference to truly be a contender for a Tournament spot.  It was the committee’s chance to land their biggest blow, and they took it.  I don’t feel bad for Colorado, per se, but I do feel terrible for Tad Boyle.  The team he built (Northern Colorado) is enjoying their first ever Big Dance.  And the team he turned around to the surprise of everyone (Colorado) is sitting at home watching them.

Again, Colorado beat Kansas State not once, but THREE TIMES.  And you mean to tell me that there are 37 better at-large schools than Colorado?

Look at it another way.  Here are a list of Big 12 schools, and the number of wins they accumulated against their fellow conference schools who are headed to the NCAA Tournament:

Kansas = 5
Texas = 5
COLORADO = 5
A&M = 3
KSU = 3
Missouri = 1

Colorado never beat KU or A&M, but were a cumulative 5-1 against Missouri, Kansas State and Texas.

I don’t know any way to put it other than this was a punishment, or at least a message to stay in line.

Thursday, March 10, 2011

Gordon: Selectively Dominating

Alex Gordon hasn’t exactly been tearing the cover off the ball so far in the Cactus League, so I had to wait until he had his first really solid game, in terms of the “traditional” stats before brining this up.  He went 3-for-3 yesterday with his first extra base hit of Spring Training, so I figured no is as good of a time as any.

Alex appears to be making a conscious effort to be patient at the plate this pre-season.  I read some comments by Ned Yost in the past week that said everything about Alex’ swing and approach looked good, but he appeared to be just a tick behind in his swing to that point.  Perhaps there’s a fine line between patience and “slowness,” but it’s clear that Alex is thinking about something in there.

Now, we’re talking about a very small sample size here, so I’m not going to get too carried away.  While Alex has never been bad at drawing walks, he’s been exceptional at it to this point in Cactus League play.  He’s drawn 9 walks already, which is three times what any other Royal has drawn so far.  In fact, his 9 is good enough to lead BOTH Spring leagues to this point, and he’s done it in about 2/3 the number of plate appearances as many of the leagues’ starting position players.

Alex has struck out 6 times, which is second-most on the team.  But we know he’s going to strike out—that’s what he does.  And being patient and looking for pitches to hit isn’t necessarily going to make that better—he may even look at 3rd strikes more often than he did before.  But I think an Alex Gordon looking to swing only at pitches he can handle (and as we know, there are MANY he cannot handle) is going to be a lot more valuable player to the Royals, or to anyone who may end up with him at some point in this season.

We’re going to need to start seeing a little more pop pretty soon.  I’m not nervous yet—he has just as many extra base hits as Billy Butler does so far in camp, and you know Billy’s going to be good for 55-80 of those in the season.  But Alex is going to strike out a lot more than Billy will, and he also has a heck of a lot more to prove.  Perhaps finally getting a 3-for-3 day will break the dam a little for him—who knows?

I’ll be watching with great anticipation (again, or still, or whatever—sigh).

Saturday, March 5, 2011

The Madness: Pullen and Self March On

Many more baseball posts will be coming once the spring revs up a bit more and the story lines get established. But for now, March Madness has set in upon us, my friends!  A little K-State, a little Kansas today.  We’ll start with the Wildcats.

Just a few weeks ago, some buddies and I were throwing around names as our early favorites to land on the All Big 12 first team.  There were, of course, the usual suspects (Marcus Morris, Jordan Hamilton, Alec Burcs) along with a couple guys who were tearing it up early on before their teams faded a little (Marcus Denmon, Diante Garrett).  A few other names came up, and I was VERY pleased to see that LaceDarius Dunn wasn’t amongst them.  But also universally absent was Jacob Pullen.

And with good reason, too.  At the time, Kansas State was sitting at about 2 and 5 or something like that, and while Jake was scoring a ton of points, he was also hurting his team by his Dillard’s excursion, pathetic shooting and overall lack of leadership.  Unlike a lot of media outlets who are changing their tune (and despite what Frank Martin NOW says in praise of his comments), in my opinion, Jake talking about sitting out the NIT were authentic representations of his feelings—he truly felt his Wildcats were NIT bound.

And now, it seems unfathomable that ANYONE with a vote could leave him off of their first team ballot.  His play in the second half of the season (on both ends of the court) has been nothing short of inspiring.  I dare say that, should Kansas lose to Missouri and end up in a tie with Texas for the conference crown, there’s no real reason to object to Pullen being named the Conference Player of the Year (that is to say, if KU is the outright champion, there is no excuse for anyone other than Marcus Morris getting the nod, but otherwise, Jake’s a fair pick).

Think about how ludicrous that sounds.  Has anyone ever been picked as the pre-season Player of the Year, from the team picked to win the conference, and then have him actually hold on to win the honor, even though his team has grossly failed to live up to expectations?  I’m not dogging the Wildcats or Frank Martin—what he’s done to turn this around has been nothing short of amazing, and I applaud him.  It’s just that what Jake very well could pull off is highly, HIGHLY unlikely.

But let me share what I heard on 810 earlier this week.  Although he may be a Missouri alumnus (nobody’s perfect), Jon Sundvold is a guy whose opinion I respect.  He generally tells it like it is, is fair to all parties involved, and he genuinely seems like a pretty good dude.  On 810 the week, I heard Sundvold say that he felt Jacob Pullen was THE BEST defender in the league.  Sunny had no reason to blow purple sunshine you-know-where.  So that point resonated with me.  I mean, I know what good perimeter defense looks like, but I don’t watch it as closely as Sunny does. 

Then you have to think—you know what Pullen means to the Wildcats—take away, and they’re done.  And now you start thinking about him as a potential defensive MVP of the league, to go along with the fact that he’s one of the best pure scorers in the conference.  Hard to argue that he doesn’t at least belong on the short list for POY.

REALLY QUICK ON BILL SELF AND THE CONFERENCE CHAMPIONSHIP….

Obviously, Bill Self has seen his share of post-season successes and failures.  It doesn’t get any higher than cutting down the nets in the final game, and it doesn’t get any lower than bowing out to Bradley and Bucknell in the first round.  All-in-all, Self has been a very solid post-season coach, and all but a select few would trade for his successes in a heartbeat. 

But when it comes to regular season play….Bill Self is the UNDISPUTED champion of men’s college basketball today.

Self has been a NCAA Division One head coach for 18 seasons.  Only 14 of those have been with schools that play for a regular season conference championship (Oral Roberts was a D-1 independent in the Self years).  Of the 14 seasons has coached in a conference, his teams have won or tied for the conference championship ELEVEN TIMES.  He’s 11 for 14! 

That’s pretty good, but there are guys like Mark Few at Gonzaga who are gonna say, “Big deal….I’ve won 11 in a row at my school.”  True, but look at in terms of BCS-level conferences.  Self has coached 11 seasons in the BCS—three at Illinois, and now eight at Kansas.  Out of those 11 seasons, Self has won or shared NINE conference championships.  What coach today can say he only goes out and wins his BCS conference’s championship 82% of the time?  That’s an unreal number, just unreal.

On top of that, Self just became the only BCS conference coach to win as many as seven consecutive conference championships since John Wooden won his 9th consecutive league crown in 1975.  In fact, even before this year, Self was alone as the only coach since Wooden to win as many as six consecutive conference championships at a Big 12 school.

It all gets a heck of a lot harder next year, with the 18-game schedule.  It’s difficult for me to imagine Self or anyone else experiencing this kind of prolonged conference success.  But what he has done has been simply amazing, and I wanted to take a moment to step back and admire it.     

Thursday, March 3, 2011

NFL: Am I Alone In Feeling This Way?

I couldn’t possibly give two flying squirts if the NFL has a “Work Stoppage.”  I mean, I enjoy watching the Chiefs and all.  But of all my pet sports (MLB, NCAAFB, NCAABB, boxing, etc.), the NFL is, without question, the one I would care the absolute least if it disappeared for a year. 

In a sense, I don’t find the NFL as enjoyable because the competitive balance is so artificial.  It’s got everything all the small market teams in baseball want—revenue sharing, common TV deals, salary caps, etc.  But that makes it feel contrived, to me.

College football, MLB, boxing, whatever….winning in these feels more “real,” because the better teams/competitors are the ones who wanted it worse, or who found a way to invest more in it or try harder.  If you want to have the biggest and best NCAA football stadium and program facilities, you can have them—just go out and find a way to get the money.  If it doesn’t work out, it just means some others did better than you did.  If you want to be the best middleweight fighter in the world, go out and try to make it happen with diet and hard work.  If you want to find a way to compete in baseball, invent new and ingenious ways of doing things (a la “Moneyball).

With the NFL, the difference between the very worst teams and the very best is quite miniscule.  You see 4-12 teams go to Division Champions in one year spans ALL THE TIME (look no further than our own Chiefs this year).   

I don’t know.  I just happen to take more pleasure in victories EARNED, rather than those you got simply because everyone’s been handicapped to make it “fair.”