Pasquatch Season

 The Kansas City Royals, from third place, have a better record than the Astros, Rangers, Padres, Diamondbacks, Cardinals and Rays. Even if they're not as overpoweringly great as they were in the first two months of the year, they've still won over 50 games. The Royals were lucky to get to that point in another few weeks or so last year.

The Royals' come-up is thanks to a few different aspects. A few more trusted pitching options, a fuller and more pronounced year from Bobby Witt, and, most importantly, the rise of a larger, cemented homegrown core. We've seen shades of it before but now it's actually interspersing and solidifying. Now the guys who broke through in 2022, like Michael Massey and Vinnie Pasquantino, are surging along with the guys who broke through in 2023, like Freddy Fermin and Maikel Garcia. And it's forming a more confident and more interesting team.

Right now, crucially, three Royals have over 59 RBIs. And they're three pillars of the Royals' growth. One is Salvador Perez, the symbol of the Royals' veteran presence, which has persisted since the last regime. The fact that Perez is still a crucial piece of this team, and can still hit, is very important. The other is Bobby Witt Jr., a symbol of getting big draft picks and them paying off. And the third is Vinnie Pasquantino, the symbol of good old fashioned developmental growth. Pasquantino went through the organization at a normal rate, had a big come-up in 2022, got hurt last year, kept 1st base, and now has 61 RBIs by July. The one knock against Pasquantino has been his relative one-dimensionality, but he's still a great hitter that's gotten a lot done for this Royals team this year. I think when he came up nobody really knew if he'd be a continuous thing going forward, but I think this year has been good for him. Same for Massey, he's looking like an everyday guy again, even if he's been hurt a few times.

I think the most telling factor in the smoothness of the mechanisms of this Royals team is the fact that Kris Bubic quietly got activated last week. Y'know, one of those guys that would be excellent in starting opportunities and then get injured and leave the Royals hanging. So he's been back, finally, after a year, and because the Singer-Ragans-Lugo-Marsh-Wacha rotation is doing so well...he's been working out of the pen. There's no room for Kris Bubic on this rotation. Even Alec Marsh is pitching well enough to not need to be bailed out by a guy who was like 2nd in the depth chart a couple years ago. I suppose a similar thing will happen to Kyle Wright if he's activated anytime soon. 

It's not completely a win yet, considering the Twins and Guardians are still ahead of them, and they need to completely get past their troublesome June, but the Royals have a lot of things working for them, and may leave the 2024 season with more optimism than they have in a while.

Coming Tonight: Remember, the Yankees picked him up several years ago to see if he had anything left, and now he's one of the best pitchers in Chicago. So, in a sense, he did have something left.