KC Royals: Rotation is Why Team Will Not Make Playoffs

The KC Royals proved last year that they could win the World Series with a mediocre starting rotation, but this year is looking more and more unlikely that the team can repeat with that strategy.

The Kansas City Royals‘ starting rotation has been less than stellar so far this season. The best starter is a guy who wasn’t even in the rotation before the season began, and that’s Danny Duffy.

To be fair, I wrote the majority of this article before Duffy went and completely dealt against the St. Louis Cardinals on Monday night. Duffy went eight innings and only allowed two runs during that stretch. He’s slowly turning into the dominant lefty that we all thought he could be and that he was looking like during the 2014 season.

Duffy has been a breath of fresh air for the Royals, and as good as he was on Monday night, that certainly can’t be said for anyone else in the rotation. Duffy can’t carry the entire load, and the rest of the starting rotation has not been impressive in the least bit.

Edinson Volquez, who was the team’s ace for the duration of the season, has not been good in 2016. He’s currently sporting a 5.15 ERA and had one of the worst starts in Major League Baseball history on Friday, when he gave up 11 earned runs (12 total) in one innings worth of work. It was not a pretty sight.

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Chris Young didn’t fare much better the following day, giving up seven runs in 2.1 innings on the mound. Young has been a huge disappoint this season, posting a 6.54 ERA. The only reason Young hasn’t been put into the bullpen (where he performs much better) is because there really aren’t any other options for the Royals at the moment.

Yordano Ventura had been showing improvement since his brawl in Baltimore, but hurt the team by having to miss a start due to suspension. He has an ERA of 4.54 and has had a nice string of performances lately.

With all of the struggles this starting rotation has had and the lack of young arms ready to come up from the farm system, I don’t think the Kansas City Royals will be making it to the postseason this year.

The problem with Ventura has been that he hasn’t lived up to the ace role the KC Royals wanted him to. He’s been inconsistent on the mound and his attitude tends to make the rest of the team look bad at times.

Ian Kennedy has just been meh. He was signed to one of the largest contracts in Royals history this offseason, and at times, he’s fantastic. The rest… He’s just meh, as I mentioned before. He has a 3.96 with the Royals right now and is coming off a great start against the Astros, where he struck out 11 batters.

Kennedy has probably been the second best member of the rotation after Duffy, but he’s still no “number two” in most rotations.

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The spot that Duffy took was formerly filled by Kris Medlen, who has been a disappointment since coming to Kansas City last year. Medlen looked awful this year and went on the disabled list with a 7.77 ERA. I wouldn’t be surprised if he doesn’t start another game for the Royals.

With all of the struggles this starting rotation has had and the lack of young arms ready to come up from the farm system, I don’t think the Kansas City Royals will be making it to the postseason this year.

The postseason consists of great teams, most of whom have great, if not at least above average, rotations. The Royals might have a tremendous bullpen, but they can’t show it off if the starter has given up more than five runs and is out of the game after two innings.

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Hopefully, the starting rotation can began to pick up the pieces and figure out where they’re going wrong. They need to do it quickly too, because it seems like the Cleveland Indians (a team with a spectacular rotation) can’t lose anymore.

The biggest thing that comes to mind when looking at the KC Royals’ rotation is that they’re all really a bunch of three, four, and five guys in a regular rotation. That’s not exactly the strategy you want to play if you want to repeat as World Series champs.