Results tagged ‘ Yuniesky Betancourt ’
Kansas City Royals 2012 Offseason Recap and Preview
This image pretty much sums up the Royals’ 2011 season. The amazing farm system finally gave us a peak last season and the Royals were able to move out of that cellar they had been dwelling pretty regularly over the past few years:
Grade: B
Notable Additions:
Jonathan Broxton, Yuniesky Betancourt, Jose Mijares, and Jonathan Sanchez.
Notable Subtractions:
Melky Cabrera.
Why?: I don’t really know. The Royals do have many more people in the plus column than they do in the subtraction (and a few years ago, I would have said getting rid of Melky would be a positive) side. However, the additions they made really don’t make the team THAT much better in my mind.
The two “impact” acquisitions are obviously Broxton and Sanchez, but even they aren’t THAT big of an impact on the team. I guess you can argue that Betancourt and Mijares are polishing touches, but they really don’t pop out to you.
Also, Jason Kendall and Jeff Francis are still on the market and could sign with another team, making them notable subtractions. This definitely stayed in the back of my head while grading them, because it is a very real possibility,’even if the two players aren’t really team changers by any stretch of the imagination.
Despite what I may write about the offseason not working out that well as far as improving the team, I do think that the 2012 squad will be better than that of the year previous, because this may be the year we see most of the Royals’ famed farm system. This alone could get them five more wins.
Predicted Record Range: 75-80 wins
Milwaukee Brewers 2012 Offseason Recap and Preview
Sorry to do this to you Brewers fans, but these two guys were the biggest story of the 2011 season, even with all the additions last offseason:
Grade: D-
Notable Additions:
Aramis Ramirez, Brooks Conrad, Cesar Izturis, Alex Gonzalez, and Jose Veras.
Notable Subtractions:
Prince Fielder, Cragi Counsell, Yuniesky Betancourt, Latroy Hawkins, Takashi Saito, Casey McGehee, Jerry Hariston Jr, and Mark Kotsay.
Why?: I know that considering they signed Aramis Ramirez and all, the Brewers look like they have had as good an offseason as they could with there being virtually no chance of signing Prince Fielder. However, you will see many more big MLB players on the “subtractions” list than the additions list.
Ah the McGehee trade. I don’t think we can evaluate this trade yet. If he returns to the level of two years ago, this will be a horrible deal for the Brewers, but if he continues at the level of last year, Doug Melvin looks like a genius.
There are names on both lists I could get into, but it doesn’t make any sense as the players only have an impact on the teams record as aggregate units and not as individuals. I would like to point out, however, that the Brewers are still a good team as they stand. I do see life after Prince for this club. I don’t see them slipping into the days where Jeff Cirillo was on the team and they were the league’s bottom feeder along with Detroit, Kansas City, Tampa Bay, and some other team I’m forgetting (the Expos maybe?).
Predicted Record Range: 81-86 wins
Next up: The World Series Champion, St. Louis Cardinals, but what division would you like to see next?
Kansas City Royals Offseason Recap and Preview
Well they didn’t do that well in 2010:
… again but the Royals have never been about winning today (seriously, have they won since George Brett was there?). They are building for tomorrow. Take that into this preview with you.
Grade: B
Notable Additions:
Vin Mazzaro, Joaquin Arias, Jeff Francoeur, Melky Cabrera, Alcides Escobar, Jeremy Jeffress, Lorenzo Cain, Zack Miner, Jeff Francis, and Pedro Feliz.
Notable Subtractions:
Zack Greinke, David DeJesus, Gil Meche, Yuniesky Betancourt, and Brandon Duckworth.
Why?: I know that they lost Zack Greinke this off-season. However, even though the grade is for how well the team set up for their immediate future, I lessen the penalty of losing a star player if the team got something good in return. The Royals definite deserved this slight bump for what they got back for Greinke. Also, they added some crazy depth everywhere. Although, am I the only one to notice that Robinson Cano’s best year came after Melky left? We’ll see what impact he has on players like Alcides Escobar.
I would like to point out that KC’s rotation overall did improve because of names like Vin Mazzaro amongst others. Although they did come in last in their division last year and lost their ace in the offseason, I see a solid transistion year. Let me make an argument for a better rotation in 2011. They traded for Vin Mazzaro and must have seen something in him to give up a piece like David DeJesus. Zack Miner is a solid back of the rotation starter that constantly hovers around 4.00 ERA.
Now… the Jeff Francis case. Does anyone remember that he was the ace of the Rockies’ World Series run in 2007? Anyone? Well, he was. He had 17 wins and had an ERA of 2.21 until the World Series (where the whole Rockie team shut down). He did horribly in 2008 but it was later revealed that he had an injury in his shoulder. He didn’t pitch in 2009 because of arthtoscopic surgery. Pitched badly again in 2010 with an ERA of 5.00 on the dot. I think that this may have been because of the recovery from the surgery. For most shoulder surgeries, it is usually takes a few years to fully recover. If he can get anywhere close to where he was before, the Royals have a much better staff than last year.
Predicted Record Range: 68-73 wins Like I said, this depends on the pitching staff because their young defense will be unpredictable and can fluctuate ( so their wins will fluctuate). We have yet to see how the offense will come together but with solid pitching they can improve a bit on their win total last year.
For those of you who did a little link clicking and wonder why I am so behind on game recaps, I have a lot of homework which is also why this entry took so much time. I have yet to see how baseball will affect my blogging but I can’t post the game recaps of games last weekend until next Monday because my pictures for those games are in a computer that I do not have access to.
Recent Comments