royalsandcelebs

Late in the afternoon yesterday, right before the Royals extended their surprising offensive splurge against weaker National League teams (also know as National League teams), José Guillén was asked a “simple” question.  It’s also a leading question, considering his now-infamous tirade he unleashed late last May, a calm yet still profane lambasting of his current team, the Kansas City Royals, playing like babies.  The big “F” was used 32 times.  Or 33.  Maybe 35 (and can we pleaaaaaaaaase stop calling it the “F” bomb?  Is the word really a bomb if we hear it every f-bombing day?).  No, the big “F” wasn’t used as all, just a couple horse “piles” where, when asked how he feels about the club’s recent success, he responded with mare droppings.  You know, horse crud.

I listened to 610 this morning for some foolish, ADD-inspired channel searching reasons, and heard Chris (or the Cowboy, or maybe Roger Twibell, whichever one is least boring) talk about how this rant was unnecessary and how this rant didn’t help the team.  Chris was talking about how this will “bring nothing good” to the organization, “nothing good will come from this.”  Really?  Nothing good will come from this?  Good Lord, Chrissy, you sound like we just pushed the Red Button, or one of the guys out of “The Happening” (which apparently is a movie about evil trees, or zookeepers, or something).  It’s not the apocalypse, for crying out loud!  In fact, it’s quite the opposite.  It’s yet another sign of a re-birth for the Royals (or birth, if you’re a Royals fan born in or after the mid-to-late eighties).

I can not count how many times during the last 10 miserable years of being a Royals fan we won something like 4 out of 5 games, and the entire town goes absolutely crazy with some type of Kansas City Royals fever (catch it!).  I have heard classmates, friends, parents, strangers at the bank, radio commentators, and even ballplayers and executives themselves talk about how everything is turned around because the Royals managed to catch some other team’s downswing and kind of, sort of, luck into capitalizing on it.  Remember Buddy Bell’s first three games as manager?  He (I mean, they) swept the Yankees.  The town went nuts.  Buddy Bell was named as some type of savior.  Tell me, how ridiculous does that sound now?  What exactly could Buddy Boy provide in his three first games with the worst team in baseball?  A shortstop’s manual for Angel Berroa?  Diet shakes for Ken Harvey?    Purple hair dye for José Lima time (believe it!).  No.  It was blind luck.  He conveniently caught a Yankees team, at home, in the middle of their first half swoon, and rode that wave to unearned praise.

Time and time again, this team has gone insane and confident over nothing.  Just look back at all the starting pitchers we’ve not just had, but had and fallen in love with for brief spells.  Chad Durbin was “the one.”  So was Shawn Sedleck, and Dan Reichert, and Runelvys “Hurricane” Hernandez, and so on, and so on.  Remember back in ’02 when David Glass claimed he was committed to winning by refusing to trade Jeremy Affeldt?  Really?  That’s your big stand?  “You see, that shows why the losing will stop.  We will remain committed to a marginally talented left-handed set-up reliever who doesn’t listen to coaches, habitually develops blisters on his pitching hand, arrives to his own rare starts late, and mouths off moments before getting pile-driven by an equally disappointing Detroit Tigers rental (the equally gaseous Kyle Farnsworth).”

Back to my original point, before I risk getting sidetracked again.  What I’m trying to say is that, for far too long, this organization has grown comfortable after the inevitable 4 out of 5 game stretch, thinking everything is okay, and then falling into back to back sweeps at the unsteady hands of the Rangers and the Orioles.  It was about time somebody spoke up to that, and when asked, dared the team not to stop trying.  José Guillén said what every fan should be thinking, what every mouth on the radio should be saying, and not just being satisfied with a few minuscule wins being strung together.  You can luck into two weeks of winning baseball.  You have to earn a season’s worth of .600 baseball.

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