The state of Kansas City
I took in the Cards/Royals game in KC on Saturday night. It's always a nice day when you take in the Kauffman Stadium. But the baseball forecast continues to be bad in western Missouri. The Royals' healthy pitchers are poor. The injured pitchers were poor when they were healthy. It remains to be seen what team CEO David Glass has done with the luxury tax he's collected from the Yankees and Red Sox over the past two years. The money's clearly not being spent on the field, though I suspect a large chunk of it goes towards keeping all the grass outside of the stadium freshly mowed.The stadium issue is a dicey one in KC. Kauffman is a great park-- good sightlines, majestic scoreboard, those famous fountains in left- and right-center field, but it's located far from the city's center in the northeast suburbs. The location allows the team to control nearly all of the parking, and causes a football game-like traffic jam after each home game.
Royals executives claim that the stadium needs more luxury suites, and that it lacks the types of amenities necessary to make the team a financial success. And while Missouri voters denied the Cardinals the tax money they sought to build the new ballpark on the state's east coast, Kansas City residents still bitterly resent the state money that went into the NFL-ready domed stadium in St. Louis in the mid-90s. The Royals are currently seeking taxpayer support for upgrades to Kauffman.
It becomes the chicken and the egg conundrum. You need money to build a winning team, but you can't make money until you have a winner. Frankly, the Royals' baseball operation is in shambles, and the onus appears to have fallen on the player development people at the Major League level. The farm system has produced heralded rookie players like Carlos Beltran, Mike Sweeney, Bob Hamelin, Carlos Febles, Mark Quinn, Ken Harvey, Mike MacDougal, Jeremy Affeldt, and Angel Berroa. But with the exception of Beltran- who became too expensive to keep, and Sweeney, these players' careers have all flat-lined after the first season.
The team's attempts to fill slots with free agent players and add veteran influence have been met with frequent failure. Benito Santiago and Juan Gonzalez were horrendous signings prior to last year, and this year's top free agent, opening day starting pitcher Jose Lima, was best described by Jim Edmonds this weekend as a "clown."
Even at the time, I knew the Royals (under previous ownership) made a colossal mistake by passing on a move to the National League in 1997. (The Milwaukee Brewers took advantage of the second choice.) I completely understand the impulse to stick with tradition, and at the time, many other radical changes were taking place in the game, such as expansion and the six-division realignment, but the Royals wound up sacrificing 18 games with the Cardinals and 18 games with the Cubs, in essence, so that they could keep six games with the Yankees. Taking into account the excitement surrounding these Cards/Royals weekends, I truly believe you'd be looking at a successful, competitive team in KC if they had made the switch.
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The Cubs simply cannot stay away from ridiculous headlines. Two starts removed from a 136 pitch outing, and one start from the detection of elbow soreness, Cubs officials early Sunday were suggesting that Carlos Zambrano's arm pain was linked to the amount of time he spends typing e-mails to his brother in Venezuela. By Sunday night, team trainer Mark O'Neal was stressing that the pain was linked to tennis elbow, and not Carpal Tunnel Syndrome, but by then, the Chicago Sun-Times was already running with comments made by GM Jim Hendry and manager Dusty Baker, in which each reiterated that Zambrano had been asked to scale back his e-mailing.
The Cubs, under Dusty Baker, have been so remarkably vulnerable to distraction that it defies explanation. Isn't it time for him to go? Cubs fans, let's hear from you on this one. I don't know how in the world this guy ever got his golden reputation. All he's ever done is blow pennants. His Giants won 100 games, but lost out to the Braves on the final day in 1993. (They were the losers of the Last Great Pennant Race before the Wild Card system would wreck baseball's regular season forever.) The Giants then folded annually under Baker-- and behind Barry Bonds-- before finally reaching the World Series in 2002, but even then, they proceeded to blow a five run lead in what should have been a clinching Game 6 against the Angels. And then you've got the Steve Bartman fiasco and the parade of damaged right arms in Chicago.
I say show him the door.
But then again, it's none of my business.
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HBO's Jim Lampley is blogging on Arianna Huffington's site. He writes today about the Pat Tillman affair.
posted by CM @ 10:27 PM
3 Comments:
Yes, Dusty Baker does have to go. He has no control over his players and his laid-back California attitude doesn't play well in the hard-working heartland.
I'll admit that when the Cubs first hired him, I was pumped up. He had a reputation as a great players manager and he had success in SF (even without a WS). But he has done nothing to impress me the last few years. It seems he is basing recent managerial decisions (pulling Zambrano after only 7 strong innings against White Sox) based on avoiding a beating in the media.
Steve Stone as much as admitted that he left Chicago because of Baker and his lack of professionalism during the whole fiasco last year (which any good manager would have squashed before it ever made it into the media).
He has produced back-to-back winning seasons, but almost anyone could have done that with the talent on the team. The real issue is he has this amount of talent and is still underperforming expectations and ability. His players are emulating his non-chalant attitude instead of going out there and taking what is rightfully theirs - the Central Division crown.
I'm thrilled that we agree, though I fear we differ on the definition of what is "rightfully theirs."
The Zambrano move on Saturday struck me as well as something done to avoid further media scrutiny.
But consider this, if the guy is so laid-back, why does he wear wristbands? He's probably sweating buckets underneath that undershirt. He just doesn't let on.
Any good managerial candidates out there? Wouldn't Mark Grace make a good manager? And with Sammy gone, there's no personality conflict. But maybe Grace is committed to a career in broadcasting.
Well, with my MLB Extra Innings package, I've heard Grace do broadcasts when the Cubs were in Arizona. He would certainly be better as a manager than he sounds in the booth. But, he apparently wasn't happy with the way he was treated on his way out the door, so he probably won't be back in the Chicago dugout anytime soon.
They need someone like a Phil Jackson - somebody who knows how to motivate the superstars and keep them focused on their goal. They need someone who will shield them from the outside distractions and just get them to play some hardball.
I have no suggestions, other than to say it has to be someone with experience that the players will respect. Sandberg threw his hat in the ring before the Cubs hired Dusty. He has been a spring training coach since retiring, so the players should know him. But, he probably doesn't have the right personality to be under the gun as a manager. Maybe we should bring back Zimmer so he can get some revenge on Pedro when the Cubs play the Mets.
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