The Royals Broke All the Rules (And Won) | Baseball Bits

What does a winning baseball team look like? This analysis is gonna blow your mind, but they usually have good pitching and good hitting which allows them to score more runs than their opponents. I say usually because the 1987 twins managed to win a world series with a negative run differential in the regular season. But beyond that, what are winning teams good at? Is it stealing bases? Is it just hitting home runs? Babe Ruth did a lot of winning after he said, you know what, I'ma just hit that sucker over that there fence. But the problem is, you make tradeoffs to hit for power. Home runs are good for scoring runs, but strikeouts, I think you'll find, are bad for scoring runs. Enter the 2014 and 2015 Kansas City Royals. They weren't a dynasty, but they captured lightning in a bottle twice, winning two pennants in a world series whilst being portrayed as a scrappy throwback. They weren't just a collection of good ballplayers, they had an identity and played a specific brand of baseball. But can today's teams hope to replicate their winning formula, or did Kansas City break the rules of winning at baseball? Let's talk about roll ball. Roll ball. Royal ball. That's actually hard to say. Some would say that the Statcast era and its consequences have been a disaster for baseball. Introduced in 2015, this high-speed camera system quickly changed the vocabulary of our national pastime, popularizing phrases like launch angle, exit velocity, and spin rate, aka three things that have always existed, but only now have given folks a reason to shake their fists in the air. Statcast was introduced in the middle of Kansas City's terrific run, but their team didn't yet embody its values. You know who soon did? The Houston Astros, who rose to prominence in the American League as the Royals fell off. In 2017, Astros pitchers threw over 1,400 high-spin curveballs. Then they hopped on baseball savant and tried to trade for anyone with a red circle on their page. The Mets were like, I'm not falling for that one. That's how the Mets talk. The Royals, on the other hand, combined to throw 68 such pitches. They were arguably the last great team before Statcast changed the game. The Statcast era has also been associated with accelerated growth of three-true-outcome baseball. Between 2009 and 2014, so pre-Statcast, the league's three-true-outcome rate grew by 1%. But between 2014 and 2019, oh boy. Yet, at the convergence of this, we have the Kansas City Royals outright refusing to participate. In 2014, they hit 95 home runs. 95. In 162 games. And then they won the pennant, mind you. You'd have to go back 30 years to find another American League team that hit fewer homers than that in a season. They didn't care for walks or strikeouts either. Between 2014 and 2015, no team even came close to the Royals' 24.3% three-true-outcome rate. They were a massive outlier. Second place Oakland was closer to 28th place Washington than first place Kansas City. So, should today's teams adopt this strategy? It would mean fewer strikeouts, but also fewer walks and home runs. It works for Michael Brantley. Would it work for your favorite team? Maybe? Maybe not. In 2021, there was basically zero correlation between three-true-outcome percentage and winning. The same can be said about strikeout rate on its own. The Giants and Diamondbacks posted nearly identical strikeout rates, but were worlds apart in wins and losses. So where can we find a moderate correlation? Home runs. Here's a graph of home runs and wins in 2021. It makes sense. These are run-scoring plays, and runs are synonymous with wins. And while there are exceptions to the rule, like the Orioles out-homering the Brewers last year, hitting homers is good, and not hitting homers is bad. And yet here we have those pesky Royals, breaking the rules of what a winning baseball team looks like. In 2014, they had just three guys with double-digit homers, and none of them reached 20. The last team to win a pennant without a 20-homer hitter was the 1982 Cardinals, who maxed out at 19 with right fielder George Hendrick. Talk about a throwback. Yet, it's the 1987 Cardinals who have the most in common with Royal Ball, because they too won the pennant, finishing last in homers, and first in steals. Maniacs! The Kansas City Royals were maniacs on the base pass. But they were thoughtful maniacs, because not only did they lead MLB in steals during their pennant years, they stole with efficiency, comfortably leading the league in weighted stolen bases, where attempts are normalized to the league average success rate. Their playoff conquests were chock full of memorable base running. They swiped seven bags versus the Oakland Athletics during their frantic comeback in the 2014 wildcard game, tied for the most in a playoff game by any team in MLB history. Gerard Dyson's steal of third in the bottom of the ninth set up Norie Aoki's game-tying sacrifice fly, which sent the game to extras. In the 12th inning, Christian Cologne's steal of second base set up Salvador Perez's walk-off single, sending the Royals through to the division series. In the 9th inning of Game 5 of the 2015 World Series, Lorenzo Cain stole second, which made scoring on Eric Hosmer's double trivial. But the most memorable bit of base running from that game wasn't a steal at all. It was Hosmer's mad dash toward home after a Salvador Perez groundout, which forced extra innings. The Royals would clinch the series over the Mets in the 12th after a five-run rally. With that pedigree, it's shocking that they didn't try to send Alex Gordon around the bases in Game 7 of the 2014 series. Sure, the Crawford-Deposy relay would've definitely beaten him home, but there's always the possibility of a dropped ball. Instead, they got absolutely bum-garnered beyond belief. There were a couple of players who best personified this level of base running aggression. One of them was Gerard Dyson, who, fun fact, was a 50th round draft pick by the Royals in 2006. He was the 1,475th player off the board. I'm pretty sure you got drafted before him. Anyways, among players with at least 300 stolen base attempts since caught stealings were tracked, Dyson is third all-time in success rate behind Tim Raines and Carlos Beltran. Of course, the other memorable base stealer is Terrence Gore, who has now been rostered by multiple franchises exclusively as a playoff pinch runner. In the postseason, he has five career stolen bases, yet only two career plate appearances. Making him the only player in MLB history with more steals than plate appearances, minimum five stolen bags. So the Royals were all about stealing bases, but does that actually correlate with winning? Certainly didn't last season. In fact, the top five base stealing teams all finished with a below 500 record. Okay, yes, I am using a free trial of this graphing program, so I'm gonna get my zero money's worth. Nevertheless, the Royals thrived, and this continues to be an element of their play style. Whit Merrifield has led the American League in steals in three of the last five seasons, but perhaps more impressively, he's stolen third base 52 times in his career to only four caught stealings. Byron Buxton, meanwhile, hasn't attempted a single steal of third base since 2016. Base running aggression isn't just about swiping bags, either. When a single was hit, runners on second scored 70% of the time for the 2015 Royals versus 57% for the league average. Over the course of the year, that's 23 extra runs that didn't get held up at third. Speed is a desirable quality for Royals players. After all, they have a lot of ground to cover. Kauffman Stadium's outfield is huge. In January 2015, its total surface area was calculated to be 98,000 square feet, which is 7,000 more square feet to cover than the average MLB outfield. This is what a 7,000 square foot house looks like. That's a healthy piece of real estate. Look at the home office. Who's gonna catch a deep drive in the home office? The Royals were able to build an outfield that could cover these green pastures. It started with Alex Gordon, a former top prospect drafted second overall out of the University of Nebraska in 2005. He spent his first few years in the majors struggling to establish himself both offensively and defensively. In 2010, he became a permanent left fielder, and in 2011, he broke out with a monster season at age 27. Gordon roamed left field in Kauffman for a decade, retiring with 109 defensive runs saved, the third most of anyone at the position in MLB history. After Gordon's breakout, Lorenzo Cain joined the fray. Acquired via trade with the Brewers in December 2010, he patrolled mainly center field during 2014 and 2015. He was 9th among all MLB hitters in war during that time frame. In right field, the Royals had Norie Aoki, then Alex Rios, but they weren't really playing royal ball until Gerard Dyson entered the game. In 2014, Gordon, Cain, and Dyson finished 2, 3, and 4 among all MLB outfielders in ultimate zone rating, trailing only Jason Hayworth. This is despite the fact that Dyson made only 66 starts during the entire season. Together, they were arguably the greatest defensive outfield ever assembled. In terms of team-wide defensive value, the Royals easily led MLB during their World Series years, finishing 55 runs better than the 2nd place Orioles. Here's the thing. Good defense is timeless. There's nothing modern or old school about getting a quick jump and taking an efficient route to a fly ball. People don't typically say, oh you thought Lorenzo Cain's nice? Should've seen old Jimmy Pearsall flash the leather. Put that in your stat cast. Stat cast outs above average is becoming the public facing defensive metric of choice. It wasn't available when the Royals were rolling, but it's here now. Here are the top teams in MLB by outs above average in 2021. Yeah, this checks out. The Cardinals are on top. But in terms of a correlation between great defense and winning, there wasn't much to talk about in 2021. Inevitably, many of the great defenders aren't great hitters and vice versa. It's not to say that great defense isn't important. It is. It just isn't a requirement to win. If you want to see a stat with a strong correlation to winning, look at fielding independent pitching, which removes defense from the equation by looking only at strikeouts, walks, and home runs. It just shows that defense can't really make up for poor pitching. But there was one more area of the game that the Royals dominated, so much so that teams around the league took notice. Most of Kansas City's success seems inimitable in today's game, but their bullpen was a whole different story. Whether you're a GM trying to add a fireballer to the bullpen or perhaps a humble YouTuber trying to fill up your Honda, gas is expensive these days. Last year's trade deadline was headlined by the White Sox trading Nick Madrigal and Cody Hoyer for Craig Kimbrel and his big ol' honkin' contract. Then the Dodgers swapped him and A.J. Pollock. The 2014-15 Royals certainly didn't invent the concept of the mega bullpen, but they did demonstrate its value. Kansas City was defined by their triumvirate, Wade Davis, Greg Holland, and Kelvin Herrera. Let's start with Wade Davis. In Major League History, only 18 pitchers have thrown at least 50 innings with an ERA of 1 or lower. From Tim Keefe in 1880 to Aaron Loop in 2021 and Blake Trinan in 2018, but Wade Davis is the only pitcher to do it twice. Then there's Greg Holland, who wasn't available for the 2015 playoff run due to a torn UCL, but saved 7 games in 2014, tying him for the all-time lead for a single postseason. And then they got bum-garnered. But they wouldn't be complete without Kelvin Herrera. In 2014, the Royals became the only team in the live ball era to have a trio of pitchers with ERAs under 1.5. Over the course of the 2014 and 2015 playoffs, the Big 3 combined to throw 64 innings, allowing 8 runs in total, only 6 of which were earned. Luke Hocheber contributed an additional 10 scoreless innings during the 2015 title run in Greg Holland's absence. See, the Royals' high-contact, high-stolen-base approach was a relic of the past, but their mega bullpen was a glimpse at the future. In 2016, Andrew Miller dominated as a high-volume stopper. In 2017, the Yankees rode their bullpen for 26 outs to get past the Twins in the wildcard game. And in 2021, the Braves utilized the night shift, leaning heavily on their top 4 bullpen arms for all the high-leverage outs. It's not surprising that there's a solid correlation between wins and bullpen fifth, but it's cool to see a stronger correlation to winning than home runs. Maybe the Royals had it right all along. Power hitters are more expensive than failed starters like Wade Davis. So, what went wrong at the end? Why weren't these years the onset of a Royals dynasty? Well, despite their success, Kansas City never went above the 15th highest opening day payroll. In Major League Baseball, if teams don't spin, they have to live in a state of perpetual roster churn. Lorenzo Cain's contract expired and he got paid elsewhere. Eric Hosmer's contract expired and he got paid elsewhere. A winning franchise on a shoestring budget like the Rays would have traded them for prospects before that happened. Although KC's heavy contact, heavy base stealing approach was a scrappy throwback to the 1980s, their elite defense was timeless and their mega bullpen was forward thinking. Now, several years after the fact, fans still clamored a Royal ball. Yeah, these super teams are fun, but seriously, what's the deal with the mid-2010s Royals? They represent a rebellion against homogeny in the hope that there are still plenty of ways to win a World Series.