Built for Speed?

Or so you would think, if you watched the Kansas City Royals at all during their 2009 campaign.

According to a recent chat Dayton Moore did over at MLBTR...he is focused on pitching, speed, and defense...much like the Angels (although with much different results).

Notice out of the three things mentioned, one was SPEED. Really? By speed, I assume he means fast players. Because slow is a speed, too. But why would he want slow players? So...giving him the benefit of the doubt, we'll assume when he says "speed," he means fast.

My question: Where are these fast players? I'm going to run down everyone who was on the roster at some point this season and compile a list of players I think are fast. Ok...here we go:

1. Coco Crisp
2. Willie Bloomquist
3. Mark Teahen
4. Mitch Maier
5. Josh Anderson

I refuse to count Tony Pena, Jr., since he's no longer around (and is being turned into a pitcher now).

So that's five guys. You could make arguments for guys like DeJesus, Gordon, etc., but the five above are the guys I'm looking at for speed on the bases. Those five players gave us 67 steals in 2009. Not terrible, especially when you consider Coco only played 49 games before his season ending injury (and Anderson - a late season addition to the team - only played 44 games in KC).

As a team, the Royals were able to swipe 88 bases, putting them at ninth place in the American League. Horrible? Nah...I guess not. Especially in an era where speed isn't a part of the game like it once was (back in the days of Rickey Henderson, Vince Coleman, Tim Raines, and so on). But for a GM who claims speed is one of the building blocks...well...it's not good.

Moore has claimed speed is a focus of this team before, and in the chat at MLBTR, reinforced his belief in its importance. I am curious, how do players like Mike Jacobs, Jose Guillen help the cause? Hell, they can't even get on base (but that's a topic for another day). What's next? Maybe we'll bring David Oritz over as a pinch runner.

I'm not going to be completely negative here...but if we are focusing on speed, defense, and pitching - let's actually focus on these things, not just talk about focusing on them. And let's not focus to a fault, and turn a blind eye to some of the other skills that make a player succesful. Is Willie Bloomquist fast? No doubt about it. But how much can he utilize his speed when he can only muster a .308 OBP? Not very often by my estimation. What about stretching hits into doubles and triples? Well, if you can't hit the ball hard (and far), you can't utilize your speed that way either. Out of 115 hits (well, let's subtract his four homers and make it 111), Bloomquist managed to run his way all the way to 11 doubles and 8 triples - that's 19 extra base hits out of the 111 that didn't clear the wall.

The above statistics tell me that Bloomquist is not able to utilize his speed because:

A) He's not getting on base.

B) He's not hitting the ball far. Or, if he is, he's not a very smart baserunner.

All this talk about speed on the bases, and you're probably thinking..."Well, I bet all this alleged speed the Royals have compiled has really helped on defense." Have you seen the Royals play defense? I mean....seriously.

Speed is great. But it only adds as much to a team as the other primary skills (ability to get on base, instincts on the bases and in the field) allow. How about we scrap speed as one-third of our foundation and replace it with OBP? Sound good? Don't worry Dayton. We're still going to use speed, but it will come later.

And so begins my overhual of the plan to turn this team around. Who am I to overhaul this plan, you ask? Well, nobody really. Just a guy who watches a lot of baseball (and more spefically, a lot of Royals baseball).

Foundation ingredient number one: Get on base!

While we're at it...let's go ahead and make a note that another ingredient for success should be the ability to hit for power/extra bases.

So that means, really...the first and most important part of our foundation should be OPS (On Base Plus Slugging).

Now here are some numbers we can really crunch. Stay tuned for more of my nonsense (or so the Royals' staff would have you believe) as I analyze players using...GASP...statistics!