Your Double-A Kansas City Royals

You know that times are tough when the highlight video currently showing on the Royals website from the game last night is Terrence Long driving in two runners in the ninth inning to make the score 11-3 Seattle instead of 11-1 Seattle.

KC hitters managed just three hits off 19-year old Mariner, Felix Hernandez. To be fair to the Royals, Hernandez isn't pitching like an awestruck teenager. In his three major league starts, his ERA is 0.86, the opposition is hitting .151 against him, he's only walked three guys, and he's given up just 11 hits in 21 IP.

I can't help but wonder where our Felix Hernandez has been hiding all these years. His name is supposed to be Zack Greinke, but Zack is 21, and well, you know what type of season he is having (3-14, 6.09 ERA and an astronomical 1.59 WHIP).

Felix Hernandez is certainly the exception and he's only started three games, but we have so many guys in the majors right now who are older but have no business being here that you have to wonder about two things:

1. Our judge of talent, starting with Allard Baird, and filtering down to our scouts. We aren't developing solid major league prospects. We've had a few over the past decade—Johnny Damon, Mike Sweeney, Carlos Beltran, and I think we can put David DeJesus in the "solid" category. But then you think about players like Chris George, Jimmy Gobble, and Carlos Febles. And then throw in young guys we've traded for, players like Mark Teahen, John Buck, Angel Berroa, and Mike Wood…you've got to scratch your head and wonder. It almost seems like the law of averages would constitute at least one superstar every few years, but not with us.

2. Our organizational philosophy, which has changed repeatedly over the years, and frankly, probably needs to change again. This team is way too young. We only have four veterans: Lima, Sweeney, Long, and Stairs. Who is going to keep all of these young guys in line? Who is going to talk to them about situational baseball in between innings? Who is going to watch out for them? And who is going to tell them about the history of the club? Over the weekend you probably heard the reports that our young guys don't even care about the history of our team. As ridiculous as that is, who is going to correct it?

Baird is defending his current plan to go all young, all the time. And in doing so, he finally said something that all of us already know, "The reality is most of our players should be in Double-A or elsewhere in the minors," Baird is quoted as saying in Bob Dutton's column today. "If they were, people would be saying how good our minor-league system is."

So, if most of our players should be in Double-A, why aren't they? Why didn't we resign Joe Randa? Why did we trade Tony Graffanino? Why isn't Aaron Guiel (who is putting up big, crazy numbers in Omaha, and only has 1 error there) on the major league roster? Why didn't we keep Kevin Appier around for another season? In Spring Training we told Kevin that he wouldn't have a spot in our rotation, but we can't even find a fifth starter right now. And our top four starters aren't exactly competing for the Cy Young.

I don't buy the small market argument for this team being so bad. The Royals were ran better by the Kauffman Trust Fund Board of Directors than they have been under the Glass/Baird partnership. This team is bad because Glass and Baird have created a chaotic environment, failed to bring in the right players, got rid of the wrong players, hired the wrong manager (Pena), and now they want us to believe that we are on the right track. They want us to be patient as the rest of the baseball world laughs at us. But as the fans dwindle and the jokes increase, I've decided to be patient for another reason.

I'm waiting for the fans to turn on Glass and Baird. Hopefully causing Glass to sell the team to someone who understands baseball who will in turn hire a GM who knows what he is doing.