Kansas City Royals: Growing Up Before Our Eyes
The Kansas City Royals celebrate the win – Mandatory Credit: Jerome Miron-USA TODAY Sports
Coming off a 4-game set in Minnesota into the heart of a long road trip and facing a terrible Rockies team who’ve had more bad breaks this season than you can count, this was a classic opportunity for the Royals of old to find a way to steal defeat from the jaws of victory.
If it weren’t for some exceptional defense and some old-fashioned good luck, this game would very likely have gotten away, but it didn’t. For the 22nd time in the last 27 games, this team found a way to grind it out and win the game.
This was significant, and it was indicative of how the Royals have been playing since this whole magical run to the top began. Something just seems to have clicked.
The Royals are truly a modern baseball oddity. Not only are they last in the major leagues in both walks and home runs, but they are historically inept in both areas.
For all the naysayers in the national press who deride this team for not having any stars and not having any power, and for not being built like a conventional team, it’s becoming apparent this team truly isn’t a conventional team.
In fact, one could argue they are a team from a by-gone era…perhaps the early 1900s, when the game was about more than hitting 3-run homers.
The Royals are truly a modern baseball oddity. Not only are they last in the major leagues in both walks and home runs, but they are historically inept in both areas.
Their walk rate is 6.04%, the lowest mark in the major leagues since 1969 when major league baseball redefined the strike zone following Bob Gibson‘s historic campaign in which he posted a 1.12 ERA.