Kansas City Royals: Opening Week Disaster Vs Twins
By Ben Almquist
Kansas City Royals Series Grades
Player Spotlights
It wouldn’t be fair to let the performance of the Kansas City Royals as a whole overshadow individual efforts. Not everyone had a bad series, and some may have been worse individually than the team as a whole. Here are some of the highlight performances from the series:
A. 4-13 (.308),<br /> 2 R,<br /> 2 RBI,<br /> 2 HR. 3B. Kansas City Royals. MIKE MOUSTAKAS
Mike Moustakas can call his return to the field a successful one. The third baseman put on a nice display of power for the Royals. A pair of homeruns is a nice start to the season, and “Moose” is the only player to come out of the series hitting over .300.
Kansas City Royals. BRANDON MOSS. F. 0-8 (.000), 1 BB, 3 SO. DH
The Royals signed Brandon Moss to bring some more power to the lineup. Well, he’ll have to actually hit the ball first for that to happen. The debut of Moss in KC blue was an utter failure. The highlight of his first two games for Kansas City was a walk.
SP. Kansas City Royals. DANNY DUFFY. B+. 6 IP, 1 R, 1 ER (1.50), 3 H, 3 BB, 8 SO
It was a pretty strong opening to the year for Royals ace Danny Duffy. Apart from an early homerun, he dominated the Twins batters. Unfortunately, it looks as though Kansas City isn’t going to be able to limit his innings this year. KC will need Duffy to go seven or eight deep on a regular basis.
F. .2 IP, 6 R, 6 ER (81.00), 3 H, 3 BB, 0 SO. RP. Kansas City Royals. MATT STRAHM
Matt Strahm was just plain awful. He gave up four runs on just 11 pitches in the season opener. Then he followed that up with another two runs on just 17 pitches. Strahm has actually given up more earned runs than hits this year! This was a miserable performance, and will likely create some major changes to the bullpen rotation.
Next: Kansas City Royals: 10 Bold Predictions For 2017
The Kansas City Royals couldn’t have looked much worse than what we saw in this series. It was a complete tragedy from start to finish. There will undoubtedly be a renewed focus on the Royals trade options from many in the media. I wish I could say that was unwarranted…but I wouldn’t believe it.