A New Low

If sweeping the Yankees was the highlight of the season, how close does getting swept by the Colorado Rockies rank towards the lowlight of the season? And to see the Rockies put up 25 runs in three games left little doubt about whether the sweep was a fluke or not. Our offense is getting shut down by the best in the game and the worst. And we've lost six games in a row, dropping our record to 25-49. Even Colorado has a better record now at 25-48.

There's plenty of blame to go around. Jose Lima didn't fool anybody today. The Rockies hit several liners back up the box, nearly decapitating him on more than one occasion. Sixteen starts into the season and he's got an ERA sitting at 7.81. How much longer can Bell keep giving him the ball? I know our options are limited, but isn't this the time to give a young guy a shot? How much worse could he pitch than Lima has?

The Royals staff in general was horrible in Denver this weekend—walking 23 batters in the series, giving up 32 hits, and the aforementioned 25 runs. Looking at numbers like that, you'd think this was college baseball (if you can really equate the use of aluminum bats with the term baseball—I certainly don't) or little league.

The team is now 12-12 under Buddy Bell and it looks like the boost he brought to the club has worn off. The Royals have 88 games left. Even if they played .500 from here on out, winning 44 of those games, they'd still end up with a 69-93 record and does anybody really expect that to happen?

We keep hearing that this is a rebuilding year, and it is. But rebuilding year or not, 23 walks in three games is so unacceptable at any level that I don't have words for it when a major league pitching staff does it. Going into the game this afternoon, our staff ERA was 5.49, 13th in the American League, ahead of only Tampa Bay who has a laughable 5.83 ERA. Our WHIP was 1.51, again ahead of only Tampa Bay. How does a team ever win when their pitching staff is allowing 1 ½ runners per inning?

And obviously, the pitching staff is only part of the problem. Going into the game today, the Royals were second to last in the AL in runs scored (321), third to last in home runs (60)—we don't even have a guy in double digits yet, fourth to last in batting average (.260), tied for second to last in on base percentage (.319), and third to last in bases on balls (196). Our offense is undisciplined and lacking in power. That equation equals poor run production and lots of loses.

I want the Royals to win as much as anybody and I'd love it if somehow Bell turned this team around. But at some point, maybe after this season is over and all of the rookies have been given ample AB's in which to evaluate them, somebody needs to be held responsible for the lack of talent in our system.

Yeah, we've had a couple of big guns who got away—Beltran and Damon. But we've also had way too many guys like Carlos Febles, Chris George, and Dee Brown who simply aren't good enough to play in the major leagues, but somebody was convinced that they were.

Well, enough of that.

Tomorrow, things won't get any easier as the Royals open a new series in Minnesota. Zack Greinke (1-8, 6.14) goes again Joe Mays (3-3, 4.22).