This is starting to get really old, really fast. Another night,
another loss, and another notes article where I talk about why the game got away (again)...
Brian Anderson was having a very nice night in the early-going of his start retiring the first eight Twins who came to bat, but I noticed that he fell behind in the count quite a bit during those 2.2 innings. Knowing that poor hitters generally become All-Star hitters when they have the advantage in the count, I predicted that Anderson's run of success wouldn't last, and he unfortunately proved me right. Including his allowing six earned runs in six-plus innings against the Twins, Anderson's 1-2 with a 7.54 ERA, suggesting that 2004 might not have been a fluke after all.Continuing to display the offensive approach every Royals hitter should be taking in every plate appearance, David DeJesus had another fine game, going 2-4 with a double and a walk. However, his lack of basestealing ability showed again when Joe Mauer -- despite throwing the ball to the third base side of second base -- pegged him in the third inning. Sooner or later, the Royals are going to have to accept that DDJ's value lies solely in his ability to get on base.Relief pitchers are often characterized as being extremely weird individuals (Turk Wendell and Steve Kline come to mind), but many of them could also be classified as flaky, at least in a performance sense. In other words, the pitchers who aren't dominant closers like Eric Gagne, John Smoltz, and Mariano Rivera simply can't be counted on to put together solid seasons back-to-back.
Unfortunately, Shawn Camp's become the latest casualty. A year after having one heck of a good season with the Royals, Shawn's gone from being Jason Grimsley with control to Albie Lopez in the matter of a few months. Last night, Tony Pena called on him to pitch out of a jam in the 7th inning, and this was the result:
Hit batter
Wild pitch
Triple
In zero innings of work, Camp allowed two earned runs on one hit, bringing his season ERA to a robust 12.15 in 6.2 innings. I really hate to write off a guy who rode the "keep it down and throw strikes" philosophy to quite a bit of success a year ago, but the Royals badly need another position player, and Camp isn't a part of the team's future anyway. His roster spot would be much better used on a guy like, I don't know ... Calvin Pickering, perhaps.Does anybody else wonder how Jaime Cerda throughly dominated his minor-league competition with the very ordinary stuff he has?The Royals have seen a whole lot of talented pitchers derail their careers while with the club, and I'm afraid that the wheels are going to fall off Mike MacDougal's pretty soon. It's a shame, too, because A) As usual, his slider buckled the knees of right-handed hitters. Matt LeCroy and Michael Cuddyer bailed out multiple times, and B) He appears to have cleaned up his delivery. However, as Baseball Prospectus once wrote about Doogie, there's more sizzle there than steak.Speaking of Royals pitchers who've seen more cloudy days than sunny ones, Kyle Snyder got in an inning of mop-up duty in the ninth, and really did a hell of a job. Before striking out Torii Hunter to end the inning, Snyder threw a Zack Greinke-esque sloooow curve that just kept dropping. With his track record, I still hold out hope that he can become a very good back-of-the-rotation starter with Greinke, Denny Bautista, Andy Sisco, and Runelvys Hernandez down the road.
This entry was posted
on Thursday, April 28, 2005 at 4/28/2005 12:00:00 AM.
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