Turn ahead the clock jerseys4/8/2023 ![]() At the time, the strategy seemed like a gamble. Yet the real stroke of genius came in that month’s MLB Draft when the team used two compensation picks and a massive spending spool to draft five college pitchers in the first 58 picks of the draft. Picollo, the Royals’ assistant general manager, would say he “hit the jackpot with the genetic pool.” Matias would go on to hit astonishing 41 homers across two minor-league levels that summer. A few weeks later, they did the same for Matias, moving the big outfielder from Low-A Lexington to High-A Wilmington. And then they could keep making deals, selling off assets until they could see progress in the minor leagues.ĭays before Turn Ahead The Clock Night, the team promoted Lee, a former third-round pick and future All-Star outfielder, to Double-A Northwest Arkansas, where he continued to display his power and speed. ![]() The club traded outfielder Jon Jay to Arizona and dealt closer Kelvin Herrera to Washington in an emotional move, striking gold when right-handed pitcher Yohanse Morel grew into a competent member of the rotation. But club officials would later point to June 2018 as the month the process - or in this case, The Process - began to take on real meaning. The losing would continue - 103 losses in 2019, 97 losses in 2020 a disappointing 93-loss campaign in 2021, when a young roster brought renewed expectations (The team slogan: “Now, it’s really our time.”). He would join a maturing horde of talent in the minor leagues. with the second pick in the draft, turning him into a Gold Glove third baseman. And they happily took high school prospect Bobby Witt Jr. They spent that series living and dying on every pitch. But Moore and his lieutenants did not mind. 1 pick in the draft the next summer (Congrats, Baltimore!). The performance would cost the team the No. But here were the Royals that September, deftly avoiding 110 losses by sweeping a bored Indians club in a four-game series in the final week of the year. Royals general manager Dayton Moore famously told reporters in June of that year that he expected the 2019 season to be the one where the losing took on an expansion feel. And they hadn’t even yet traded Moustakas, one of the last remaining stalwarts from the 2015 World Series team. Their minor-league system ranked in the bottom third of the game their lineup was a patchwork mess, chockfull of past-their-prime offensive players, journeymen and inexperienced projects. So let’s start here: On June 30, 2018, the Royals were on pace for 112 losses. It was hard to see it at the time, of course. But that was actually the season the front office planted the first seeds for the club’s next World Series title - an unexpected run to a championship in 2025. Some might remember that 2018 season as the year the Royals swindled starting pitcher Brad Keller away from the Arizona Diamondbacks in the Rule 5 draft, or the year they finally let Adalberto Mondesi finally play shortstop or the first season without Royals Hall of Famers Lorenzo Cain and Eric Hosmer. ![]() 2 pick in the 2019 draft, before Ned Yost finally retired following the 2019 season, before Khalil Lee, MJ Melendez and Brady Singer became All-Stars, before Seuly Matias broke Mike Moustakas’ club record of 38 homers in a single season - and before the 2038 Royals debuted a young catcher named Johan Salvador Perez. This was June 30, 2018, before the Royals lost a club-record 108 games, securing the No. Today’s unis in Seattle as we Turn Ahead the Clock. Yet if you look a little closer, if you squint a little harder, you will see that forgotten night 20 years ago was actually the start of something in Kansas City. The first one came on J40 years ago today, if you can believe it. It is easy to forget now, of course, because that summer night 20 years ago wasn’t even the first time the Mariners and Royals turned the clock forward. In so many ways, the parades and champagne celebrations from the past felt like a fading polaroid photo. The Royals lost anyway, on a missed call on a rundown in the 10th inning. ![]() One game, an erratic veteran starter tossed eight scoreless innings against one of the worst teams in baseball. Lost in a daunting rebuilding process, their starting rotation was aging and thin their bullpen was young and flammable their offense was prone to brutal slumps, long periods that felt like pure torture. The stadium was turned into an ode to the future, to the possibility and promise of tomorrow, like a one-night World’s Fair. The Royals and Mariners wore gaudy futuristic jerseys. The locals called it Turn Ahead The Clock Night. SEATTLE | J- One summer night 20 years ago, they held a strange baseball promotion here.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply.AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |