KC Royals: Five Series To Watch In 2016
By Scott Dillon
Chicago White Sox: End of May
In 2015, the Royals didn’t have to wait long for the bad blood to start with the White Sox.
Jeff Samardzija threw a temper tantrum after giving up a home run to Mike Moustakas and decided to throw at Lorenzo Cain. The Royals responded by winning the game in blowout fashion.
Later in the season the Royals were called troublemakers after benches cleared with the White Sox. Everyone was focused on Adam Eaton exchanging words with Yordano Ventura, but no one seemed to catch that Eaton started it. Royals’ players were already on edge as Chris Sale decided to deliver a pitch up by Moustakas’ head.
The White Sox seemed ready to let the feud fall to the wayside this off-season as they didn’t make an attempt to re-sign Samardzija. Perhaps not quite ready to let bygones be bygones, the White Sox went out and traded for Brett Lawrie.
Brett Lawrie may be public enemy number one in Kansas City.
Brett Lawrie may be public enemy number one in Kansas City. His self-defined ‘clean’ slide into Alcides Escobar started a chain of events that led to numerous ejections when the Oakland A’s came to Kauffman last season.
Controversy surrounded Lawrie as he claimed to have made amends only to have that claim denied by Escobar.
The bad feelings between Lawrie and the Royals is unlikely to be forgotten. Issues like that one don’t die easily and now the Royals get to face Lawrie 19 teams per season. You can bet that Lawrie will be a little uncomfortable stepping in to bat against Kelvin Herrera.
Will these series turn into bean-ball wars? Will the players let last season remain in the past? I’m sure it won’t take long to answer these questions once the series begins.
Next: Honorable Mention