Royals Killers

The Baseball Reference Play Index, one of the seven wonders of the modern world, has a new batting splits function (currently in beta) that I've of course fallen into a wormhole playing with. Below are a bunch of lists of the hitters who have faced the Royals the most or done the most damage against them. First up are the top 20 players by plate appearances against the Royals and their stats in those PAs:

Rk	Player	From	To	G	PA	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	BB	SO	BA	OBP	SLG	OPS
1	Paul Konerko	1999	2012	225	949	117	222	40	0	42	142	107	137	.271	.360	.473	.834
2	Paul Molitor	1978	1998	205	920	125	242	46	5	17	81	76	89	.293	.352	.423	.775
3	Cal Ripken	1981	2001	206	885	125	237	50	6	37	130	86	83	.303	.371	.524	.895
4	Reggie Jackson	1969	1987	223	873	105	196	32	1	37	126	97	172	.256	.340	.445	.785
5	Rod Carew	1969	1985	205	862	107	263	38	14	10	90	83	61	.345	.408	.471	.880
6	Rickey Henderson	1979	2002	189	853	143	199	35	2	17	62	133	98	.283	.401	.411	.812
7	Robin Yount	1974	1993	198	836	113	232	50	7	18	94	50	91	.303	.347	.458	.805
8	Harold Baines	1980	2000	203	824	91	220	42	2	27	101	71	114	.294	.353	.464	.817
9	Magglio Ordonez	1997	2011	190	823	112	234	45	0	31	131	52	85	.310	.355	.492	.847
10	Wade Boggs	1982	1999	183	808	100	230	34	5	7	62	106	43	.332	.418	.426	.844
11	Frank Thomas	1990	2007	182	802	120	199	45	0	37	121	122	86	.303	.411	.540	.952
12	Lou Whitaker	1978	1995	184	801	98	197	45	5	18	79	84	87	.283	.360	.440	.800
13	Omar Vizquel	1989	2012	199	790	101	190	23	3	7	57	76	61	.278	.347	.351	.698
14	Jim Thome	1992	2011	193	787	133	194	34	1	49	139	127	182	.299	.414	.582	.996
15	Brian Downing	1973	1992	201	777	88	176	27	4	25	95	94	92	.265	.361	.431	.792
16	Toby Harrah	1971	1986	195	771	85	167	33	5	15	68	84	77	.251	.342	.383	.726
17	Bert Campaneris	1969	1983	182	754	89	161	17	6	0	49	55	87	.238	.294	.281	.575
18	Rafael Palmeiro	1989	2005	172	747	110	191	53	2	41	126	92	83	.296	.383	.574	.958
19	Ivan Rodriguez	1991	2010	179	735	94	231	52	4	21	103	44	88	.337	.376	.516	.892
20	Carlton Fisk	1972	1993	182	734	98	178	40	7	26	100	59	100	.272	.338	.473	.811

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used

Generated 1/3/2013.

I compared the career OPS of those 20 players to their OPS against KC. Here are the five who improved the most against the Royals:

Player	OPS v KC	OPS	diff
Cal Ripken	0.895	0.788	0.107
Ivan Rodriguez	0.892	0.798	0.094
Rafael Palmeiro	0.958	0.885	0.073
Rod Carew	0.880	0.822	0.058
Jim Thome	0.996	0.956	0.040

And the five who performed the worst against the Royals compared to their career norm:

Player	OPS v KC	OPS	diff
Bert Campaneris	0.575	0.653	-0.078
Reggie Jackson	0.785	0.846	-0.061
Paul Molitor	0.775	0.817	-0.042
Toby Harrah	0.726	0.760	-0.034
Paul Konerko	0.834	0.858	-0.024

After the jump are many more lists of the top Royals nemeses.

A Disaster

Here is how I was guessing/projecting right field and the starting pitchers would shape up for 2013 before the Shields/Myers trade:

	PA	wOBA	WAR
Wil Myers	407	0.330	1.2
Jeff Francoeur	192	0.310	0.2
	IP	ERA	WAR
J. Guthrie	180	4.00	1.0
Ervin Santana	180	4.50	-0.1
Luis Mendoza	110	4.30	0.2
Jake Odorizzi	110	4.30	0.2
Bruce Chen	110	4.50	0.0
L. Hochevar	100	5.40	-1.0
Felipe Paulino	70	4.20	0.2
Danny Duffy	70	4.20	0.2
			2.1 total

And here are my guesses after the trade:

	PA	wOBA	WAR
Jeff Francoeur	590	0.310	0.7
x	40	0.315	0.1
	IP	ERA	WAR
James Shields	200	3.60	2.2
J. Guthrie	180	4.00	1.0
Ervin Santana	170	4.50	-0.1
Wade Davis	140	4.45	0.0
Bruce Chen	80	4.50	0.0
Felipe Paulino	60	4.20	0.2
Danny Duffy	60	4.20	0.2
Luis Mendoza	40	4.30	0.1
L. Hochevar	54	5.40	-0.5
			3.9 total

So that's a +1.8 win difference, but the increase in innings pitched by the starters decreases my prediction for bullpen WAR by -.5 for a grand total of +1.3 wins in 2013. My best guess is that the trade improved the Royals from roughly 80 wins to 81. If the Royals somehow figured they were sitting closer to 86-90 wins, a one win improvement would be significant since it could make the difference in winning the division. If my guess is closer to the truth, such a marginal improvement is meaningless. That's saying nothing of the 2015—2018 seasons after Shields's contract is up and Wil Myers is in his prime in Tampa Bay.

My knee jerk reaction to the trade was that it was terrible. After mulling it over for a day and trying to find the positives, I still think it was a disaster. I hope I'm wrong.

The Greatest WAR Seasons and MVPs

Just to satisfy my own curiosity, I whipped up the below chart of the 24 seasons in which a position player has put up 10.5+ rWAR since 1900 and how they fared in the MVP voting. Mike Trout is just the third player to put up that much rWAR but lose in an MVP vote. In five of the seasons, there were no MVP awards. And three times Babe Ruth had a 10.5+ rWAR season but was ineligible to win the MVP thanks to a bizarre rule at the time that players could only win one MVP award in their career.

Interesting that Willie Mays's 1964 is valued the same as Trout's 2012 and Mays finished all the way down at sixth in the voting. Obviously WAR wasn't a thing in 1964, but Mays did lead the NL with 47 homers. His 16th place finish in batting average may have done him in. Ken Boyer took the prize with a pedestrian-for-an-MVP 5.8 rWAR.

Rogers Hornsby's 12.0 rWAR in 1924 is the biggest rWAR season to lose an MVP vote. Hornsby hit .424/.507/.696 with a 222 OPS+, but he did lose the MVP to Dazzy Vance's historically great rWAR season of his own. Vance had a 2.16 ERA (174 ERA+) and 262 strikeouts, a total that almost doubled the second place finisher's strikeout tally.

So, if rWAR was the only factor—and I, like everyone else in the world, don't think it should be—Mays not winning the MVP in 1964 may have been the biggest miss among these 24 seasons. Trout losing in 2012 would be the second.

Alex Gordon 2012 Defense Highlights

Alex Gordon's all-around game has been the best part of Royals baseball for the past two seasons. In addition to a great combination of on-base skills and pop with the bat, he has turned himself into the best defensive left fielder in the game. His 2012 glove work has been recognized with a second straight Gold Glove and as the unanimous choice for the Fielding Bible Award. In honor of another stellar year by Our Alex, here are all the defensive highlights MLB.com has for him in 2012:

many more after the jump