MLB Kansas City Royals

Kansas City Royals Have Much Work To Do In World Series

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By @JordanWevers

Getty Images

Getty Images

It can’t be called luck, because the Kansas City Royals are a good ball club. They won the games they needed to win at precisely the right time of year, and that is why they find themselves playing in the 2014 World Series. So their luck has not ran out. Rather, they have come back down to earth and cooled off some.

It happens every season, even to the best of teams in the regular season. Streaks begin, are extended and then ended. Sometimes the losses even pile up on top of one another for a while afterwards.

The Royals’ eight-game win streak to start the 2014 postseason was an incredible feat. To say that the streak makes them one of the best teams ever to reach the World Series is a disruptive sentiment. Of course they will be memorable because of it — but historic? Only if they win.

The Royals have benefited greatly from their speed on the basepaths this October. Contrastingly, they did a great job of getting on base. The team’s on-base percentage in the Wild Card game against the Oakland Athletics was .375 to Oakland’s .358.

Then in the ALDS that pitted them against the deep lineup of the Los Angeles Angels, they experienced some regression. It just so happened that they could afford to because the Angels were about to go through a severe cold stretch of their own. Kansas City slashed only .198/.275/.349 in the series. They ultimately won it in a sweep thanks in large part to the Angels slashing a pathetic .170/.248/.311 in those three games.

Now I realize a lot of people will credit that to the Royals’ strong pitching and defense, which is fine, but the Angels are normally a better team at the plate than they were in the ALDS. In the AL West, Los Angeles routinely faced teams like the Athletics and Seattle Mariners, both of which have dominant rotations and bullpens statistically superior to the Royals’. So yes, Kansas City did pitch well and field well against the Angels, who were a cold team from October 2-5.

In the ALCS, the Royals heated up again. They slashed better than any of the other three teams in the two Championship Series, posting a line of .280/.362/.417. Those are great numbers for an individual player in a best-of-five series, nevermind an entire lineup.

Now that the World Series are in full swing, baseball’s grandest stage has been set. That means the Royals have to play the other team in MLB that has not been particularly prone to a cold streak thus far in October — or many Octobers in recent recollection for that matter. The results are mixed thus far for Kansas City, as they were humbled at home by the San Francisco Giants in Game 1.

In Game 1 against Madison Bumgarner, the Royals collectively slashed a paltry .133/.188.267.

Has the Royals’ luck dried up? No. They have just come back down to earth a bit. They were not getting on base, so their speed on offense had become irrelevant in Game 1. In order to beat the Giants, more of the production that surrounded the Royals in Game 2 at the plate and on the basepaths must follow them to the City by the Bay for game 3.

Jordan Wevers is a writer for www.RantSports.com. Follow him on Twitter @JordanWevers, “Like” him on Facebook, or add him to your network on Google.

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