We're Not in Omaha Anymore, Toto!

Four outs, four runs.  As this is being written, that’s Luke Hochevar’s line. 

I had planned on putting together a post about the Soria/Hochevar/Ponson move prior to now, but life interfered. Still, I can’t say I was surprised. 

Luke has never impressed me as having “stuff,” i.e. pitches that move, miss bats, and allow a pitcher to get out of tough spots.  That said, let’s dive into this thing now.

First, Soria: Not surprised at all. 

Soria has obviously not been 100 percent from the first day, and we need to find out what’s wrong.  Rany has an excellent blog post on the need to correctly diagnose the problem and solve it, rather than go into this rest–activity–rest cycle. 

I still believe that INactivity, rather than activity, might be the cause of Soria’s shoulder problems–but it’s hard to say, given that Hillman has already lied about his injury once.  If there is a silver lining to this cloud, it could be that at some point, the powers that be might decide that Soria is better used every fifth day as a starter than sporadically as a reliever.  He’s just too good as a pitcher to only throw 50 innings a year, with about 10 of them being high-leverage.

Bringing up Luke:  Luke’s dominance in AAA reminds me of early season dominance by another O-Royals pitcher a few years ago, and that dominance also caused clamors to be brought up to KC. 

The pitcher won his first seven decisions, and was just smoking the PCL.  The year was 2004, and the pitcher was Jamey Wright. No question, Jamey would have been better than the stiffs occupying our mound that year–but nobody considered him to be the savior.

Whoops–we’re down 5-0 now with 2 outs in the second inning to the worst hitting team in the AL.  Activity in the bullpen. 

You guessed it–it’s Sidney Ponson.  Crap, nevermind. 

Jack Cust just destroyed another crapball from Hochevar; it’s 8-0 Oakland.  Whatever Hochevar is throwing, it’s being left down the middle, pecker high, as Whitey Herzog would say.

Coco Crisp just dropped what would have been the third out.  Not like it matters.

If you’re wondering, Ponson’s worst outing of the year was 7 runs in 4-1/3 innings.  Up until tonight, that was the worst outing by a Royals starter this year.  Ponson will probably get to pitch in this one; he’ll just be down a bunch of runs with no hope of winning the game.

What we’re seeing is the difference between AAA and MLB, I think.  In AAA, pitchers can get away with some mistake pitches because the hitters there simply aren’t as good. 

In MLB–and even Oakland’s hitters are still MLB quality–hitters jump all over mistakes, and Luke has given them plenty.  Keep in mind that this early-season stretch in AAA was Luke’s first taste of success in professional baseball. 

I’m still of the opinion that he should have been left there to win 15. It’ll be fun to listen to all the “experts” explain this one away, as they’ve been screaming for Ponson’s head since the first of the year.

Do I think Luke will make a major league starter?  Maybe–although I still worry that maybe we were the victim of a great Scott Boras sales job in picking him up. 

I still just don’t see anything special when he pitches.  We have a lot of pitchers who throw balls that do things and miss bats. 

Luke isn’t one of them.  For the sake of our team, I really want to be wrong.

Now, there are a few other topics worth hitting on.  We’re now 1/5 of the way into the season, and it’s worth taking a look at how the team, and some of its members, are doing thus far.

Billy Butler is a concern.  As he’s worked to emulate Doug Mientkiewicz with the glove, he’s also doing a fair job of imitating Doug Mientkiewicz with the bat, too. 

His line of .284/.371/.431 is improved over last year (the walk rate is particularly nice), but the long ball simply isn’t coming around.  He’s pacing for 10 homers, 45 doubles, and 65 RBI–a decidedly Minky-in-his-prime kinda year. 

At some point, the Royals have to wonder whether the power hitting aspect will come together with this kid.  On the other hand, nobody in the minors is pushing him hard.

Kila is hitting in the .230s while Ryan Shealy hits .345 with nary a home run so far.  He has his job, but he is giving every indication of being a very average first baseman.  That spot could become questionable when Alex Gordon comes back.

(NOTE) – we interrupt this blog to note that Sidney Ponson has come out for the third inning.  Butler makes a nice range play for the first out, with Ponson sprinting to cover.

Tonight, John Buck allowed his 15th stolen base against one caught stealing.  Oakland hardly ever steals. 

Supppose they read the blog?  On another note, Buck’s hitting line has now dropped to .233/.299/.500. 

Fool’s gold.  JR House is still hitting well up I-29.

Alex Gordon has to be feeling like Wally Pipp right now (for those who don’t know, Wally Pipp was the guy who sat out a game with a sore foot; replacing him was Lou Gehrig who started his streak of consecutive games).  Mark Teahen is looking more and more like the player he was supposed to be when we traded for him. 

.302/.386/.474 is a nice start, and he’s pacing for 20 homers and 40 doubles.  Alex who?

Ponson has now loaded the bases with one out.  Somehow I doubt that he feels very invested in this game.  It’s now 9-0 on a sac fly.

By the way, listening to sports radio after the Angels series has shown me two things: 

1.  Royals fans are used to being losers, and relate best to that sort of team; and

2.  KC sports fans have been taken over by football and are used to the weekly ebb and flow of a football season.

Patience, grasshoppers.  The good teams lose games. 

In fact, every team will lose 60 or more this year.  And even the great Royals teams of the past were swept from time to time. 

However, this team badly needs to rebound.  Assuming a loss tonight (and it’s now 10-0), we’re pacing for 91 wins and 71 losses. 

I would like to note that I was the only writer out there who saw 90 wins as a realistic possibility; how many fans would have been delighted with an 18-15 pace after 33 games?  And in terms of Grienke losing 1-0, even guys like Busby, Leonard, and Saberhagen lost 1-0 games back in the day.  The sky is NOT, repeat NOT, falling.

However, this team badly needs someone to hoist the team on his shoulders right now.  I’m on record as thinking that bringing Hochevar up on a small sample size was a bad move.

I’ll go on record now as saying that making him the starter after a tough weekend sweep was a worse move.  Hillman had as options Bannister, Ponson, or Hochevar, and he chose the guy least likely to hold up to the pressure.

It will also be interesting to see how Luke responds in his next start.  Luke will get at least three starts while Soria is on the DL. 

That’s important because Soria’s DL spot means that the Royals don’t have to make a permanent decision regarding Sidney Ponson.  Despite fan sentiment to just release him, that would not be a smart move at this point. 

We are still not a pitching-deep organization, and even a 5 ERA guy has value if he’s your 5th starter.  The consequences are simply too great. 

If Hochevar washes out (and I saw nothing tonight to make me think he won’t; nary even a single-hitter flash of brilliance), we’ll need Ponson to be plugged back in.  I’m still comfortable predicting that Jamey Wright will get some starts before the year is over.

1-2-3 for the Royals in the 4th.  That’s a good place to leave this one.