Umfragen » The Royals are TOTALLY in the right here"Dayton Moore

http://www.chicagocubsteamshop.com/authentic-david-ross-jersey , General Manager of the Kansas City Royals, believes and expects the 2019 Royals team to win. Moreso, Moore publicly stated this to longtime Kansas City Star writer Vahe Gregorian on February 9, 2019, mere weeks before the full team kicks off Spring Training in Arizona:For the Royals, fresh off a 58-104 season that was the third-worst in franchise history and second-worst among all MLB teams in 2018, there is no conceivable way that such an expectation would come to blow in the front office’s face. None whatsoever. The 2019 Royals will be manned by dozens of great players. These include both the established sort, like Danny Duffy, Salvador Perez, and Whit Merrifield; those veterans just bursting with potential, like Ian Kennedy, Brad Boxberger, and Wily Peralty; and household names, like Ben Lively, Chris Ellis, and Chris Owens.Surely, for a front office who has guided the team to exactly one division crown in 13 seasons, expecting to win the division four years after the team embarked on its last winning season is a reasonable goal. Like Moore said: “expectations drive results Addison Russell Jersey ,” just like Kyle Zimmer’s expectations of success led to his 2015 Cy Young campaign, Bubba Starling’s rookie of the year season, and Mike Moustakas’ instant success in the big leagues from the moment he stepped to the plate for the first time. Clearly, there is absolutely nothing more to success in baseball, and indeed life, outside of picture-perfect visualization of your goal. Indeed, why use the naughty word “rebuild” at all? It doesn’t carry any meaning about clear progress to a future goal, and it certainly isn’t something that teams have gone through in order to become playoff teams. After all, the front office didn’t rebuild anything when the regime change happened in 2006; that would suggest there was something there previously. Perhaps the plan is to scorch the Kauffman earth for so long that the “re” part of rebuild is gone and there’s just rubble to build from like the good ol’ days!Finally, and most potently, the Royals’ quest to win the division is in no way hampered by the Royals’ approach to payroll and free agency. There aren’t any free agents available at all that could be of any help to the Royals should they actually be interested in winning the division. None like Mike Moustakas, a dependable Major League player who might be willing to take a discounted rate to play for a team with which he has an emotional connection. And absolutely none like Bryce Harper or Manny Machado, both of whom could be had on creative deals and bring both eyeballs and wins to the team. It’s a shame, really.When we’re watching baseball in October, we can look back and nod our heads that Moore was right and that, yes, the Royals’ expectation to win the division was totally founded on a realistic outlook and not one of blathering nonsense. BOSTON (AP) — Aces were out early in the World Series, where four-plus innings for starters is becoming the new norm.The outings of the Dodgers’ Clayton Kershaw and Boston’s Chris Sale turned into short stories . Each failed to get an out in the fifth inning Tuesday night Sammy Sosa Jersey , just the fourth time both starting pitchers were chased that early in a Series opener and the first since 2004 — also at Fenway Park.They were long gone by the time Boston won 8-4 in what became a predictable postseason battle of bullpens.“I say it all the time, and I say it to my son, I’ve never seen an ugly win,” Sale explained in a packed Boston clubhouse. “Obviously the stat line isn’t the prettiest thing. It’s not exactly how you draw it up or dream about it, but we got a win, so I’m good to go.”For a century, aces were baseball’s studs, grabbing the mound for Game 1 as if by birthright and not letting go easily. Think Bob Gibson 50 years ago, pitching a five-hit shutout for St. Louis against Detroit with 17 strikeouts and one walk.But no pitcher has thrown a complete game in the opener since Philadelphia’s Cliff Lee beat the New York Yankees in 2009. The last complete-game shutout in Game 1 was thrown by Oakland’s Dave Stewart against San Francisco in 1989, part of a tradition of opening gems that included complete-game shutouts for Boston by Luis Tiant in 1975 and Babe Ruth in 1918.Complete game shutouts have gone the way of flannel uniforms and spittoons, the sport transforming at its most rapid pace since the live-ball era began nearly a century ago.The first meeting of seven-time All-Stars in a World Series opener was far from a pitcher’s duel. Sale lasted 91 pitches and Kershaw 79.Boston used six relievers and the Dodgers four. Matt Barnes followed Sale, threw just 14 pitches and gave up the tying run but wound up with the victory because the Red Sox went back ahead in the bottom of the fifth.“Both teams have the ability to work pitch counts and get pitch counts higher, so you’re going to have to go to the ‘pen and play matchups,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said.Kershaw dropped to 9-9 in postseason play. Pitching off the first-base side of the rubber with his high arm reach and double leg kick, he allowed five runs, seven hits and three walks. Andrew Benintendi became just the second left-handed hitter to go 3 for 3 in a game against the three-time Cy Young Award winner, after Miami’s Christian Yelich on June 27, 2015.“I didn’t pitch very well Joe Maddon Jersey ,” Kershaw said. “The slider wasn’t very good tonight. I didn’t have the depth there. Kind of flat in the zone and they made me pay for it.”Sale, a lanky lefty, pitched off the extreme third-base side of the rubber and fared little better, giving up three runs, five hits and two walks against the first batting order in Series history that included nine right-handed hitters, none of them switch hitters . Sale was pitching for the first time since a one-night hospital stint due to a stomach illness during the AL Championship Series.Not since Boston knuckleballer Tim Wakefield (3 2/3 innings) and St. Louis right-hander Woody Williams (2 1/3 innings) in 2004 had both starters exited so quickly, an 11-9 win that started the Red Sox to a four-game sweep and their first title since 1918.The only others were the Dodgers’ Don Drysdale (two innings) and Baltimore’s Dave McNally (2 1/3 innings) in the Orioles’ 5-2 win in 1966 and the New York Yankees’ Waite Hoyt (2 1/3 innings) and the New York Giants’ Mule Watson (two innings) in the Giants 5-4 win in the first Series game at Yankee Stadium in 1923.But this is the pitcher’s game of the present, and it seems the future.“Everybody is taking the ball at any time,” said Boston Nathan Eovaldi, a usual starter who pitched a perfect eighth inning. “You might be going out there for multiple innings. It might just be one hitter. You’ve just got to be ready to go.”It was the 26th Series game in which both starters failed to get an out in the fifth and the second in a row after the Dodgers’ Yu Darvish exited in the second inning in Game 7 last year and Houston’s Lance McCullers Jr. departed in the third. Before now, the only back-to-back double short outings were by Brooklyn and the Yankees all the way back in the Games 6 and 7 of 1947.Baseball has become “Match Game,” decisions dictated by printouts and spreadsheets.“I love it. I love it. It’s a challenge,” Boston manager Alex Cora said. “They’re going to mix and match. They’re going to pinch hit. They’re going to bring their relievers. … I hate managing the other team, but actually you have to manage them and see who they have, and where they’re going to come in, and when is going to be the point that the matchup is going to benefit us.”