2006 Kansas City Royals Predictions 

The 2005 Kansas City Royals were the definition of a bottom feeder if there ever was one. They’ll be looking to improve on last season’s dismal 56-106 record but they may be looking all season. I do expect Kansas City to improve on last year’s record, but I don’t foresee anything drastic. Even if they could manage a surprise winning season as they did 3 years ago, they would still likely finish 4th in the difficult American League Central. The Royals have dropped more than 100 games 3 of the last 4 years and their young guns aren’t maturing at a fast enough to pace to make major gains this season. They tried the old trick of bringing in veterans to mix with the youngsters, but most experts have these guys slated as all washed up.

As if we haven’t already ragged on Kansas City enough, it only gets worse when we look at their pitching staff. The Royals’ starting pitching has been dreadful and it will continue to be so in 2006. The Royals brought in veterans like Mark Redman from the Pittsburgh Pirates and Joe Mays from the division rival Minnesota Twins as well as Scott Elarton from the Cleveland Indians. If the Royals are hoping these veterans can join with the young arms of Grinke and Hernandez and start a major turnaround in 2006, they’ve got another thing coming. Redman was just 5-15 at Pittsburgh last season and Mays was 6-10 with an E.R.A of nearly 6. I’m not even sure these guys could reach double digit wins for the Yankees.

The Royals were better at the plate in comparison to their pitching, which rarely gave them a chance, but they still had problems supporting their starters. Mike Sweeney has been the best stick on the Royals year after year, but year after year he can’t stay healthy and he would be the third best hitter on many teams throughout the league. The Royals will hope the ageless Reggie Sanders doesn’t get old on them this season. I can’t see him putting up big enough numbers to make much of a difference this season. The rest of the guys on the squad probably aren’t even worth mentioning so I won’t. I doubt you would recognize their names anyway, and I don’t expect any of the unnamed to produce enough to make a name for themselves by the season’s end.

Many poor teams have trouble winning the first game of a series as was the case with Kansas City last season. The Royals dropped 38 of 51 series openers and 20 of them were on the road out of a total of just 25 road openers. This trend should once again be strong in 2006. Look to cash in by going against Kansas City in the first game of a series.

I don’t expect the 2006 Royals to be quite as bad in the second game of the series as they were in 2005. Last season, they went on to drop the second game of a series 28 of 38 times after losing the first. If you went against the Royals in the first 2 games of a series last season you would have went 62-23 for a huge positive outcome.

2006 Baseball Predictions