So I finish up with the bowling league last night, open up the phone, and can't believe that I got not one, but two text messages saying "season done" after the latest Boyz n Blue's defeat. And I thought really? Really? You're throwing in the towel now? We're two months in! There's still four months and a sh*tload of games to go! (Not to mention many a quality Sunday tailgate to go!)
But for those of you who think 5 1/2 games in early June is an insurmountable obstacle, an unachievable goal, I got news for you. You're wrong.
Because I'm a stats and research geek like this, I am choosing to focus on the three most thrilling Royals teams of the last 20 some odd years (non-strike seasons; I'm not analyzing 1994 because the season never finished).
(all research and stats courtesy baseball-reference.com)
Yes, this is lengthy. This is your first, old school, classic "Inside the Numbers" post of the season. Hell, I think its the first time I've analyzed a baseball team this much, usually I leave the heavy research for football. Not today though. The 2009 Royals are not "done". They are not "finished". They're just getting warmed up ...
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* Let's start with oldest first, the 1985 World Championship team.
For 1985, I chose July 4 as the starting point:
California 45-33 ---
Oakland 41-37 4.0
Seattle 40-38 5.0
Chicago 38-37 5.5
ROYALS 39-38 5.5
On our nation's greatest day, the future World Champs stood 5 1/2 games back, with not one, not two, not even three, but four teams to overcome. And its not like these were the mediocre squads we're staring at today -- the Angels were a freaking powerhouse (its still amazing to me none of those great 1980s Angels teams made a Series), the A's were the beginning of the dynasty that would win the AL West 4 of the next 6 years and reach the Series three straight times, and the White Sox were still a viable bunch, the remnant of the 1983 team that won the division and the 1984 team that should have won the division.
The Royals had a tough hill to climb. And it only got worse, as they slid to 46-44, 7 1/2 games back on July 21. 7 1/2 games back with 62 to play. The odds of making that up are nearly insurmountable. Especially with multiple teams to climb over.
Off the top of my head, I can only think of four teams in the last 20 some odd years that have overcome a deficit of 7 plus games after the All Star Break, to go on and win the division. The 1993 Atlanta Braves, in the last true pennant race we'll ever see. The 1995 Seattle Mariners, who were actually 12 back with 50 to play and won the division in a playoff. The 2003 Minnesota Twins, who overcame the Royals 7 1/2 game lead at the All Star break and went on to run away with the division.
And the 1985 Kansas City Royals.
In doing the research on that team, I realized three things:
1. The 1985 Royals may have been the worst club of my lifetime to win a World Series. Seriously, look at the roster sometime. You can make a legitimate argument our current team is more talented than that one was.
2. Its probably good I was 8, because if the 2009 club gives me a summer like 1985 gave us, I'll be in a mental institution. Because ...
3. you can never, ever, ever!, give up hope on a ballclub, until its officially over. Consider the following:
* The Royals spent 27 straight days in August stuck at 1 1/2 to 3 games out. Its amazing. For 27 straight days, they couldn't gain (or lose) any position in the standings. I mean, how does that happen? How do you spend four straight weeks unable to move up or down in the standings?
* They started September on an 8 game winning streak to go from 2 1/2 out to 1 1/2 up in the division. Peaking at the right time, right? You want to be playing your best ball when it counts, right? Well, its the Royals. Because ...
* They dropped 9 of 12 after that winning streak, to go from 1 1/2 up, to 1 back entering the final week of the season.
Fortunately, the schedule makers set up a do-or-die four game series against the division leading Angels in Kansas City that final week. The Royals took 3 of 4, then took the first two against the A's, to clinch the AL West. But man, what a roller coaster to get there.
7 1/2 back with 60 to play. 3 back entering September. Whizzing away the divisional lead with a week to play. Finally emerging as champs. A roller coaster like that, and yet fans are worried over being 5 1/2 back in June?
* next up, the first Royals team I really remember living and dying with every day, the 1989 squad.
I chose July 24th as the starting point, because the Royals were set to play their 100th game of the season that day.
California 59-38 ---
Oakland 59-40 1.0
Texas 54-44 5.5
ROYALS 54-45 6.0
The summer of 1989 was a friggin blast for me. I was 12. Its the first summer I really remember going to a ton of games, the first summer I remember getting caught up in a pennant race. (So see, it really has been 20 years of sitting in left field GA every Sunday! Holy God, I'm old).
The '89 team was part of a great three-way pennant race, with the A's and Angels. The division was ridiculously loaded -- 4 of the 6 best records, and the 3 best records, in baseball that year were in the AL West. It made for an amazing summer and month of September.
The '89 Royals never led the division. Amazing, yet true. They were tied for first four separate times, the last being May 15th. But they never had the outright lead, at any point in time, during the season. Like the 1985 squad, they too had a four week stretch where they were stuck in neutral -- from June 12th to July 1st, the Royals sat between 1 and 3 games out every day. July was a rough month for the Royals, as they fell from only 2 games out, to 7 1/2 out entering August.
But then, the fun begun!
After treading water for a couple weeks (from July 30th to August 15, the Royals sat between 5 1/2 and 7 1/2 out every day, yet another multiple week stretch of no movement in the standings), the Royals went on their longest winning streak of the season, to cut the lead from 7 1/2 to 2 1/2. In fact, after a 12 inning win over the Rangers, the Royals entered September only 1 game out. And they had what I believed would be the best way to start the month ahead of them, 3 games against a horrible Tigers team that was on its way to losing 100 games.
Three days later, the dream of playoff baseball was all but dead. The roars of August, gave way to the sweep in Detroit, to fall 4 1/2 back with 20 to play. The Royals closed decently, but the damage was done. The A's had pulled away, and unlike 1985's late collapse, the Royals didn't have a home series left against Oakland to make the ground back up.
7 1/2 back with 62 to play. And they got it back to within 1 with four weeks to play. A rally like that, and yet fans are worried about being 5 1/2 back in June?
* finally, let's flash back to this day (June 3) in baseball history, the last time the Royals were serious contenders, in 2003:
Minnesota 32-25 ---
ROYALS 27-28 4.5
Yes, we were one game closer to first on this day six years ago ... but we were fading faster than a joint at a Dave concert. After winning a 14 inning thriller over the Twins on May 15 to get to 24-15, we'd lost 13 of our last 16 to drop below .500. And as if that wasn't bad enough, we'd won once in the previous 10 games. Yikes.
Plus, since it was a mere 6 summers ago, most of you no doubt remember that team. Specifically the pitching. It was atrocious. Runelvys Hernandez was on the DL, never to be the same. Jeremy Affeldt was our staff ace. Darrell May was our number two guy. Albie Lopez was our number three. And on June 4, the Royals, so desperate for a healthy body to simply eat up innings, reached into the freaking Independent League and signed Jose Lima. To start. Immediately.
After splitting two against the Dodgers to fall another game back, then came the break that jump started the season that was to come. The Royals fell behind 6-0 in Colorado after three innings on June 6 ... only then the heavens opened and the rains fell, cancelling the game. (Its almost as if God knew we'd suffered enough tragedy and bad times on June 6, 2003, in a park that evening, so he spared us from another one at Coors Field.)
The Royals swept the double header the next day, and tread water for a week, staying 5 games back until Fathers Day 2003. Arguably the single most exciting Royals game I've ever attended. Jose Lima's debut. Barry Bonds hits it off the roof of the old right field GA concession stand. And Mike Sweeney wins it with a 0-2, 2 out double to the gap in the bottom of the 9th. The win got the Royals back over .500, set up a tremendous week in which they went from 5 back to tied for first, and set the stage for the most thrilling summer we've seen around here in a while.
What I found most interesting about the 2003 squad, is that they never really hit a two, three, four week stretch where they were stagnant. They opened 9-0. They lost 13 of 16. They got hot again, going from 6 back to 7 up at the All Star Break. And promptly hit another losing streak, going from 7 up to tied in the span of 12 days.
The last day the '03 Royals saw first place was August 29th. They began a slow fade from that point on, ultimately finishing 7 behind the Twins in third place.
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So, what does all this mean?
Probably not a damned thing.
But to me, I'm fired up again. The best Royals teams of our lifetime, all of them, were in FAR worse shape later in the season, than the 2009 Royals are right now. (I didn't delve into 1994, but that team was 9 1/2 back on July 22. One little 14 game winning streak later, they were within a game of the divisional lead, and in peak position to be the first ever AL Wild Card).
Every single one of them overcame a late May / early June slump to vault into contention. Every single one of them rewarded the folks who kept the faith by giving them a summer and September to remember.
Every single one of them, at some point in June, made you think it was over. And every single one of them hung in the race for the long haul.
Look at it this way: we've taken the worst shots we're gonna take already. Fall from first place? check. Losing streak(s)? check. Ridiculous rash of injuries? check. Ace of the staff struggling? check. Idiotic managerial decisions? check. (I swear to God, explain to me ANY circumstance in which a sacrifice bunt in the second inning is a justifiable decision in the AL. Just one circumstance. I've got all day).
We start to get healthy over the next few weeks. We got Soria back yesterday. We should have Alex Gordon and Mike Aviles back soon. Jose Guillen won't stay ice cold at the plate forever. And I still believe, however stupid and stubborn it might seem, I still believe that when -- not if, when -- when this team is in it at the All Star break, that Dayton Moore will get the green light from ownership, and go out and get us what we need to get over the hump.
There's still four months of baseball to go folks! Four months! 111 games! Until and unless this team is mathematically elimiated from postseason consideration, I refuse to give up! Way too much season to play to pull the plug in June. First place is just one winning streak away!
In the words of the late, great Jim Valvano: "Don't give up. Don't ever give up!"
Or more eloquently, more articulately, more straight and to the point ... in the words of Steve: "season still f*cking on!"
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