Kansas City Royals: Brandon Maurer is the new Joakim Soria
The Kansas City Royals lost on Sunday thanks to Brandon Maurer allowing the game winning home run. He’s already the least favorite Royal to many and we’re less than two weeks into the season.
The Brandon Maurer era has not been a good one for the Kansas City Royals. He cost the team yet another win on Sunday and the fans, already not fond of Maurer, have no faith in the former eighth inning pitcher.
Maurer has been so bad that he already lost his eighth inning job and is now just another arm in the bullpen. He was given the call on Sunday because the game was tied in the bottom of the ninth and he hadn’t pitched since the weekend prior.
The last game he had appeared in was when he surrendered three runs to the White Sox. Well, in his first call back to the mound since then, he gave up the game winner to Yan Gomes and now we’re all comparing Maurer to Joakim Soria of the 2016 and 2017 seasons.
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Maurer has been awful since coming to Kansas City. Last year, he had notched 20 saves with the Padres, but couldn’t do anything as a Royal, ending his second half campaign with an 8.10 ERA and allowing 18 runs in 20 innings.
Many of us hoped that Maurer would turn things around this season, but that hasn’t happened. He’s appeared in three games and has allowed five runs in two innings of work, good for an ERA of 22.50.
It may still be early, but even Joakim Soria wasn’t this bad. He actually had a nice stretch of relief appearances in 2016 and had an ERA under four in 2017. Maurer is a whole new kind of Soria and with the Royals needing every little win they can get, it’s getting to the point where Maurer should only be put on the mound in blowout situations. He is not good.
At least in Soria’s defense, he pitched with the Royals before returning to them in 2016 and was a two-time All-Star during that time. Maurer has been terrible since his arrival to Kansas City.
What’s even more frustrating about Brandon Maurer is that he thought his performance last year was good enough that he deserved a raise. He broke Dayton Moore’s streak of not going to arbitration, lost the hearing, and somehow still earned a million dollar raise. The nerve of this guy, right?
The season is still young, but fans have already grown tired of Brandon Maurer and it’s 100% understandable as to why. He has been awful and there’s no faith in him anytime he gets the call out of the bullpen.
I still respect Dayton Moore’s decision to go for it last year at the trade deadline, but trading for Brandon Maurer has been a total disaster. Hopefully the trade pieces the team got for Ryan Buchter pan out, otherwise that could go down as one of the worst trades of all-time.