How to Lose A Fan in 10 Days

Holy shit.

After losing six straight games due entirely to bullpen meltdowns and nine overall, Dayton Moore claims the Royals will not lose 100 games this year.

That means KC has to win 26 of the final 68 games.

Can they do it?

Is that enough drama to make you keep watching this shit?

To keep paying for tickets and merchandise and $7.50 Boulevards?

Probably not.

When your main goal is the Royals not losing 100 games for the fifth time in eight years, your goal might as well be learning Esperanto or making a good Transformers movie or curing cancer or achieving peace in the Middle East or making No Child Left Behind work or not drinking yourself to death.

And so what if they do it?

So what if the Royals DON'T lose 100 or more games?

What if they lose merely 99, or, gasp, 98 games this year instead of 100?

OH MY GOD THEY DIDN'T LOSE 100 GAMES--- THIS IS ARGUABLY THE BEST WORST TEAM EVER.

No.

It's pointless.

How about your goal is not losing 90 games? Or 80? Or not blowing more games than you save? Or not being the laughingstock of Major League Baseball (which shouldn't have been a problem, considering the Nationals, but sadly no one, other than Dayton Moore, seems sure that the Royals will ever win again at this point).....

SERIOUSLY, YOUR GOAL IS NOT TO LOSE 100?

WHY?

NO, SERIOUSLY, WHY?

SOMEONE TELL ME WHY WE SHOULD CARE ABOUT THIS TEAM.

This is progress?

This is moving in the right direction?

Losing 2/3 of your games nearly every year for almost a decade?

For almost TWO decades?

Sigh.

This is the point of the speech where I would throw the microphone down and walk off the stage, but I don't have the ability to make such a dramatic, non-verbal, white-rapper-pretending-to-be-hard gesture here.

So instead, I'll post a piece of, dare I say, artwork, that expresses my disappointment and hatred of the current Royals regime, management, general management, the lineup, the bullpen, and the whole optimism-in-the-face-of-overwhelming-evidence attitude that keeps this franchise falsely rejuvenated every year from October to March:






There.

No.

Wait.

Did I...

Hmm....

I actually hate those Calvin-Pissing-On-Things decals...

In fact:



There.

That adequately shows my hatred for those things.

.....

Sigh.

Forget it.

Royals, I have no earthly idea why, but I could never stay mad at you.

As long as there are other even more inconsequential things to be mad at:

Like Calvin-Pissing-On-Things decals. And Mark Buehrle. And cats. And ESPN. And romantic comedies. And people who don't know what to do at four-way intersections. And the constant media coverage of Michael Jackson's death. And humidity. And...

Uh....

And the disturbing popularity of Two and a Half Men.

YEAH!

Somebody put that shit on the back window of a pickup.

Somehow, looking at how awful everything and everybody is, the Royals don't seem so depressing.

Bring on 100 losses!

Go Nihilism! You're the Best!

We don't need no education.

“There’s a lot that people don’t know. I’m not going to bang my head against the wall defending things I do or do not do in trying to educate the masses about things that, quite frankly, I can’t educate. There’s just too much.”
--Trey Hillman

And now, a rebuttal from Royales with Cheese:

I disagree, Trey. I'm not sure how your streak of losing games you shouldn't, of making dumbass game decisions, of generally being one of the most disappointing hires in team history, has failed to provide me with an adequate education of who you are, of what this team is, of how monumentally disappointing this season has been. You're terrible at your job.

Your team has won 19 of of their last 65 games.

19 of 65!

That's a 29% winning percentage.

You know what that means?

They have lost 46 of 65.

That's a 71% losing percentage.

That's disgusting. That's nearly pornographic.

Losing at that clip for the rest of the year will make this Royals team one of the worst in major league history. If you were a student, you would be failing spectacularly. If you were a President, you'd be compared unfavorably to Dubya and Hoover. If you were an actor, you'd be an extra in a Z-Grade straight-to-dvd Christian Slater movie. If you were a car, you'd be a Triumph TR-7. If you were twenty years younger, you'd be the brunette Spencer Pratt. If you were a state, you'd be New Jersey. And if you were a manager of any other baseball team in this country, including the local Parks and Rec team in the 5 to 6 year old division, you'd be out on your ass.

You ARE bad at this job. This team IS bad.

How can you possibly "educate" fans otherwise?

Well, there's one way.

But that would take winning.

Good decisions.

And, again, WINNING.

OR SHIT, FORGET BEING A WINNING TEAM. HOW ABOUT GETTING WITHIN PISSING DISTANCE OF .500?

SERIOUSLY. YOU CAN'T LOSE 2/3 OF YOUR GAMES AND CALL EVERYONE ELSE STUPID. IT DOESN'T WORK THAT WAY. YOU ARE BAD AT YOUR JOB. WHETHER IT'S YOUR FAULT OR NOT DOESN'T EVEN MATTER. YOU ARE THE LEADER OF THIS TERRIBLE, TERRIBLE TEAM. JUST MAN UP AND ACCEPT THAT. YOU, YOU...***

***(I initially wrote a long string of curse words here accusing Hillman of all sorts of deviant, socio- and psychopathic behavior, but apparently I haven't drank quite enough to go ahead and publish the graphic vitriol that I, and probably you, have been thinking about Trey-Dog over the last few months. Perhaps we can take a moment here where you, the reader, can yell as many filthy things as you want at the computer screen-- it is quite liberating, I must confess).

Here are a couple staged PR photos of the #(%*@$*! hiding behind things that attempt to make him seem like a non-#(%*@$*!

You may commence yelling now:

And just for fairness' sake, here's an undoctored photo of Trey Hillman punching a puppy in the face:

Alright.

Stop yelling...

Now.

Feel better?

No?

Well, just remember there are only about ten more weeks of this bullshit left to endure... or ignore. Surely you can handle a shitty Royals team for that long (hell, most people have been ignoring or enduring one since the late 80s).

Sigh.

Before we go, we need to call out one more guy:

Dayton "Allard Baird Redux" Moore.

You don't get a free pass. By giving Trey a vote of confidence, you are sealing your own fate.

IN DAYTON WE TRUST SHIT OUR PANTS.

It's hard to recall the last good thing this guy did for the team... the bad trades, the dumb signings, and now this. To think, we hailed this dipshit as a savior when he came to KC.

He's not.

He's just another in a long string of guys who can't turn the Royals around. And it's almost worse this time because there were signs that things would be better. More money was spent. Effort was made in hiring personnel. Buddy Bell was even fired. But these past ten weeks have been some of the worst in Royals history. And the next ten, as previously mentioned, don't look promising.

But come on, there's always next year, right?

Oh wait, Hillman could be back. And Moore will probably sign/trade for another fitfteen exiled Mariners or Braves players before opening day next year.

And we will be right here again next year, for some reason wondering what went wrong, when really we should just suck it up and realize this team is destined to suck for the foreseeable future.

So it is written, so it shall be.

Can someone please explain to me why we Royals fans are always so damn optimistic when we have decades worth of evidence proving we should be committing mass suicide?

No?

We are one sick, twisted, masochistic group of people, aren't we?

Oh well.

Go Royals! You're the Best!

(at losing)

(and punching puppies in the face)

The Second Annual All Non-Star Team

If you want to be technical about it, this really should be about the 21st Annual All-Non-Star team, but this team's suckiness pre-dates blogs.

The Royals as a successful franchise also pre-dates the following:

Netscape Navigator
the rise and fall of Vanilla Ice
GPS
the nicotine patch
the end of Apartheid
Crystal Pepsi
the first Gulf War
two Florida Marlins' World Series Championships
the Florida Marlins
NAFTA
thirteen Land Before Time films
the fall of the Berlin Wall
DVR
grunge rock
The Simpsons
16-bit video games
Comedy Central
three presidential terms by guys named George Bush
the rise and fall of the compact disc
the births of top Royals prospects Mike Moustakas and Danny Duffy
and... and....

Damn, that's depressing.

But who sucks this year?

As usual, it's much quicker to answer who doesn't suck.

But how do we decide which guys really deserve our scorn as Royals fans? Who not only sucks, but sucks out loud? Who are the guys that have somehow made this team worse than last season's abomination?

Leading the pack of Non-Stars, the absolute biggest suckhole on the roster, is the three-headed hellhound with an OPS deficiency that is Mike Jacobs, Jose Guillen and Coco Crisp.





How do you get a shitty OPS, you might ask? Well, you combine a shitty SLG % and a shitty OBP. So not only do these guys fail to hit for power (and two out of three of them were signed to do little else), they also don't hit. Period. Or walk. Or get hit by pitches. Or do anything else that might get them from home plate to first base. Coco getting injured was both a blessing and a curse, as he was replaced by the even worse Mitch Maier.

Next up on our cavalcade of horrors is second-time Non-Star Tony Pena, Jr. He's only a part-time employee, splitting his hours between the ballclub and the Hollow Tree Factory, where he makes E.L. Fudge cookies.


TPJ is batting a puny .098, which means he may very well be the absolute worst baseball player ever. And yet, there he is in the lineup two or three times a week, giving the other team an out over 90% of the time. Simply astonishing. Hopefully Keebler will hire him on full time and we'll be rid of this guy.


For our next Non-Stars, there's the shitstain known as the Royals bullpen. It's hard to even single any one guy out here. Aside from the closer, nobody has an ERA below 4.00, and most of these guys are north of 5.00. Calling to the Royals bullpen is like playing Reverse Russian Roulette. Five of the chambers are loaded.



Give it up for the worst of the worst: John Bale, Robinson Tejeda, Kyle Farnsworth, Jamey Wright and Ron "Mayday" Mahay.

Bang bang, they shot wins down, bang bang, let's kill these clowns.


The starters have been a stronger aspect of the club, but mostly because of one guy.

Retreads Sidney Ponson and Bruce Chen aren't even good enough to hold down the fifth spot in the rotation on one of the worst teams in the league. Each of these guys are only 32, but they rival Jose Guillen in number of teams that have shitcanned their services. Combined, they've played for half the teams in major league baseball.

Ponson and Chen have played for Baltimore, New York, Texas, Montreal, Cincinnati, the other New York, Atlanta, Philadelphia, Houston, Boston, St. Louis, Minnesota, San Francisco, and now, unfortunately, Kansas City. What about their resumes made Moore think signing these guys was a good idea?

Also, Sidney Ponson is a fat ass.




Last but not least, there is a late addition to the Royals All Non-Star team. None other than new acquisition Yuniesky Betancourt.

Here's the take from Yuniesky-devoted blog Yuniform (I'm dead serious):

"Yuni has the change (sic) to disappoint or surprise a new batch of fans, hang out with Willie B, Gil Meche and Jose Guillen, and maybe even take a bath in a neat fountain. Kansas City may be a cow town, but they have a good stadium, and a lot of Hallmark-centered interesting-ness throughout town. Boulevard is a more-than-acceptable beer. Maybe he’ll inherit the ghost of Buck O’Neil or Frank White. To me, this trade epitomizes the Midwest: it’s sad, but can be vastly productive. I’m bummed that Yuniesky’s now no longer a Mariner, glad that the Mariners were able to salvage something from his corpse of a career."

What do we learn from this?

Two things:

1) Royales with Cheese is not the worst baseball-related blog out there.

2) Despite a limited knowledge of the English language, Kansas City, and the fact that Frank White isn't dead, even this dipshit and known Yuniesky Betancourt worshipper thinks Yuniesky Betancourt's career is over.

Honestly, Betancourt is every terrible Royals shortstop in history rolled into one: take generous portions of Neifi Perez and Angel Berroa, add some Tony Pena, Jr. and Angel Salazar, a dash of Mendy Lopez, drizzle it with some Onix Concepcion, bring to a rapid boil and then cover, and baby, you got a stew going.




Yuniesky Betancourt as the Royals starting shortstop cannot end well. That's why he's on the list before even putting on his Yuniform (har har har).

All right, that wraps it up.

Now remember, some deserving members of the Royals didn't make the All Non-Star team, but that doesn't mean their contribution to this season shouldn't go without mentioning, so give it up for notable snubs Kyle Davies, Mitch Maier, Luis Hernandez, and of course, Manager Trey Hillman. You suck too, guys.

Go Non-Stars! You're the Best!

My Life With The Freel Kill Kult

The Royals have finally done it.

They've made the move that will turn their season around.

That's right.

The Royals traded for....

wait for it...

Ryan "For Real" Freel!

YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH BOOOOOOYEEEEEEEE!

I mean, seriously, the Royals best player right now is arguably Wee Willie Bloomquist.

I think a team of Willie Bloomquists or Willie Bloomquist-type players might be better than what we have right now.

Now, you might be against the trade. I can see your reasons now:

1) He sucks.

2) He's a drunk and a clubhouse malcontent.

3) He's a clubhouse malcontent and a drunk.

4) He parties with his agent.

5) He sucks.

But I disagree, and for one very solid, very logical reason.

Ryan Freel comes with his own imaginary midget friend.

From the Dayton Daily Who Gives a Shit What the Paper's Called It's a Dead Medium:

"He's a little guy who lives in my head who talks to me and I talk to him. That little midget in my head said, 'That was a great catch, Ryan,' I said, 'Hey, Farney, I don't know if that was you who really caught that ball, but that was pretty good if it was.' Everybody thinks I talk to myself, so I tell 'em I'm talking to Farney." Freel later said that Farney's name arose from a conversation with Reds trainer Mark Mann: "He actually made a comment like, 'How are the voices in your head?' We'd play around and finally this year he said, 'What's the guy's name?' I said, 'Let's call him Farney.' So now everybody's like, 'Run, Farney, run' or 'Let Farney hit today. You're not hitting very well.'"

That's right, a midget named Farney lives inside Freel's head.

So, this trade is like a two for one, or at least a one-and-half for one deal. Which makes it maybe one of the best trades the Royals have ever made.

I, for one, welcome Ryan Freel and his imaginary midget overlord. I believe this is just the thing that's going to turn the season around.

Save us Farney-wan Kenobi, you're our only hope!

Go Dum-Dum! You're the Best!