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Dave Pond's avatar

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The Royals have enough that they should either be looking to move Andrew Benintendi, a pending free agent or look at put Taylor on the bench as a fantastic defensive fourth outfielder.

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Steve Yeakel's avatar

I sadly agree that Dozier and Santana and O'Hearn (at least for now) are hitting well enough to probably keep MJ off the Opening Day Lineup as DH. And I guess I am okay with that because I am okay if we do not quite make the playoffs this year, even if the reason why is because we favored should be bench vets like Dozier and O'Hearn over an obvious piece of our championship core, MJ, who realistically, would probably be better than their production from Opening Day, not to mention him getting started in the major leagues to hasten the day when he has gone through his adjustment period. MJ had a better year than Bobby last year, and deserves, just as much as him, to not be held back by around average other players. But I think that Dayton's pride as not being able to admit that, and that Dozier was not worthy of his contract (or maybe he is, but as a bench player behind MJ), is causing this. Now with Pratto, it looks like it was also a mistake, but only in retrospect, to give Santana a 2 year deal, but okay because no one could have predicted that MJ and Pratto would have the break out they did last year (which gives you cover, Dayton, to go ahead and get them up here). And, compared to Bobby and MJ, Pratto may also legitimately need a little more minors time to show he can strike out less.

With Zerpa, that first outing seemed like Bubic's, that these guys really can be consistent and successful in a major league rotation. Which means that we are not stuck trotting out a Singer or Keller if they cannot be. That we can do some attitude adjusting moves to the bullpen or AAA if someone is not getting the job done. When you have 9 pitchers for 5 or 6 starting spots, use that to create performance based competition. Reward those who respond to coaching to do what they are supposed to and have success. And punish those who do not.

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