Before we start, two questions:
1. Can I get some love for figuring out how to post a picture? I know this is the equivalent of learning how to count to 10 -- um, maybe 5 -- but I'm taking victories where I can get them.
2. Can anybody tell me who that was pitching for the Royals in the 9th inning last night? I know he got in a little trouble, but man, he looked pretty good. They should let him pitch more often.
OK. Anyway. Poz will take care of the Brian Bannister part of your Royals blogging needs, surely, so we're gonna focus here on the offense. Specifically Mike Aviles. And specifically whether Royals fans should be concerned.
The short answer: yes.
Longer answer follows.
Whenever guys get off to slow starts, the easy thing is to not worry, to think, well, long season, everybody has slumps, you're just noticing this because it happens to come at the beginning.
Except that Mike Aviles is hitting .173/.185/.212 so far after 54 plate appearances.
As best I can tell from Baseball-Reference, Aviles' worst stretch of similar length came in 57 plate appearances from June 25 to July 9 last year, when he hit .232/.246/.286 in 57 tries at the plate.
Maybe it's worth noting that the above stretch was looking much worse, but Aviles had seven hits in two games at the end of it, so if that form holds true maybe we're about to see Aviles break out in a big way.
But regardless, and small sample size or not, this is the worst stretch of Aviles' big league career.
The context of Aviles' 2009 season, and the importance of Aviles' performance this year mean it's more than worth looking at.
Nobody -- not even Aviles -- expected him to hit .325 and win the Royals' player of the year award after being called up only because the team was desperate and without better options*.
* And by "better options," I mean, "any other option short of calling coach Jim Degraw at Rockhurst High and begging for an infielder."
There are holes in his swing, and everyone with the Royals knows it, but how can you tell a guy to change something when he's been having that kind of success?
And when you never believed the guy could be a productive everyday player -- and to be fair, no other team did either -- does it change the dynamic when now you want him to change the swing that proved you wrong in the first place?
Those are philosophical questions perhaps for another time. What we do know is that everybody was aware of the possibility of a sophomore jinx here, of Aviles' rookie season turning into Bob Hamelin's or Angel Berroa's second season.
The Royals, actually, have a terrible history with sophomore jinxes, including uber-talented guys like Carlos Beltran and Zack Greinke.
They say the key is adjustments, always adjustments, and Aviles knew this in spring training, comparing it to chess -- "I don't play chess, but that's what it's like," he said -- and acknowledging that this season would be even more difficult than last.
With the help of Fan Graphs, we see that teams are perhaps throwing Aviles fewer fastballs so far than they did in 2008. I say "perhaps" because Fan Graphs -- a terrific website -- charts a drop of 62.4% fastballs last year to 57.4% this year, but a rise in cutters from 3.1% to 7.1%.
Cutters are sometimes categorized as fastballs, so maybe the difference is negligible, plus 9.4% of the pitches Aviles has seen are categorized as "unknown," compared to just 3.6% last year, and maybe this is the problem -- he's seeing pitches that earthlings just aren't accustomed to. Ahem.
Anyway, what's weird about the Fan Graphs data is that Aviles' plate discipline numbers are actually much better this year. He's swinging at fewer pitches outside the strike zone (35.5% last year, now 24.7%), and he's being more selective overall (swinging at 44.4% compared to 52.7% last year). Teams appear to be pitching him more carefully now, just 48.3% in the strike zone now compared to 54.7% last year.
One of the problems, and we're back to Baseball Reference now, is that Aviles has just been terrible with two strikes -- 2-for-23, which is nearly half his at bats, and good for a .087/.125/.130 line.
So just looking at numbers, maybe that's the problem. He got in a lot of two-strike counts last year, too -- 204 of his 441 plate appearances -- but hit a very solid .237/.265/.314. The league average last year was .196/.267/.292.
That could be a confidence issue, or it could be opposing teams having a better idea of how to exploit the holes in Aviles' swing. My amateur eye sees a problem with Aviles' hips when he swings, sometimes it seems like he's pulling out toward third, leaving himself vulnerable to anything on the outer part of the plate. But that's Kevin Seitzer's area, not mine.
The Royals are 8-6 now, and if the good Banny is in the rotation to stay, there is a very real possibility that the Royals are going to stay in this race for a very long time -- whether Aviles turns into 2008 or into Berroa.
But for all of the reasons listed in those links above, Aviles remains an important part of this team. I think I wrote here a while back that if fans could get to know Kyle Davies, that he'd be among the most popular players on the team. Well, Aviles is the exact same way. He has exactly the kind of outlook on baseball that both executives and fans fall in love with.
It's probably not fair, but Aviles' background -- D-2 player, $1,000 signing, unclaimed in the Rule 5 -- means that he will always be viewed by some with a skeptical eye.
If he was a first-round pick, the conversation among scouts and evaluators would be totally different. Alex Gordon, you remember, was hitting below .200 into June of his rookie year.
If the Royals feel like they have better options, Aviles might not get that long to struggle.
Whether they'll admit it or not, we're far enough into the season that it's fair to be concerned.
Was at the game tonight ... Mike just isn't getting good swings. It's almost Pena-esque. I hope he gets it together soon.