Royals record for 2007? Predictions anyone?

[Leland Dempsey]

Is anyone up to making a win/loss prediction for the 2007 Royals? We've almost totally revamped the pitching staff. Could we improve significantly in such a short period of time? What would be the effects of having even a pitching staff with an average team ERA? Could it propel us to a 72-90 record? Your thoughts?

Leland Dempsey

[KC Royals Nation]

Perhaps to provide a light of perspective on the annual predictions for Royals record, here is Robert Dvorak's post on the Yahoo! Royals ListServe.

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Maybe I'm being overly optimistic, but I believe we are going to see some improvement from our younger players - Teahen, DeJesus, Shealy, as well as some of our younger pitchers. I
wouldn't even be suprised that John Buck will step up, since I believe Jason LaRue is a more significant challenger for his job. I also don't believe that Dayton Moore is finished -- I have been basically impressed with what he has accomplished thus far. My prediction is 80-82, with a chance to finish at .500.

[KC Royals Nation]

To shed some light on even more perspectives on this topic, I'll paste several responses to this topic over on the Yahoo! Royals ListServe. Enjoy!

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Hi. We'll win 80 to 90 games I think. Why not be a little optimistic.
Mark Teahen hits over 20 homers.

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82-80 and "in it" 'til the last 8-10 games of the season. Being in
the "toughest Division in baseball" isn't going to help any of the
teams in the AL Central as they are all going to beat eachother up a bit. BUT... I agree with ____ in that it will be a very nice building season after which our "key" guys will be youngsters (and Meche/Teahen/ DeJesus - all of which can't themselves be "youngsters" much longer)! Go Royals!!!

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Quite obviously everyone is entitled to their opinion and the fact is none of us can foresee the future. But, while I see improvement I don't believe it will be quite that dramatic. To go from 62-100 to the positive side of .500 and contend for the division would indeed be a dramatic turn around.

The pitching has improved but other than that it is virtually the same team we saw last year. I don't think the pitching has improved to the point it will turn things around by 20 games or more. Gil Meche on most teams would be around a third starter. The Royals are evidently looking to him as their number one guy.

Plus, I think the reason I am cautiously optimistic is I got burned
badly last year. I thought I saw improvement last year and predicted 75-80 wins. Well, that prediction failed miserably. With the improved pitching and the youngsters are a year older I am a little more inclined to believe it will be more what I was thinking last year and that is something like 75-87. But, if it is that it will be nice improvement.

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I'm going to go with 73-89.

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77-85

[dejesus9]

Optimism is good for the soul. *grin*

88-74.

[ror1fan]

87-75 2nd or 3rd in Central
Ryan Shealy turns in to a monster and hits 35+Homers.

[royalsfan2008]

I'm going to be optimistic and guess that we'll win 81 games this year, which would be a great improvement over what we did last season. I think Teahen and Gordon will both hit 30 home runs, Gordon will win the AL ROY Award, Shealy will hit about 25 jacks too, and Butler will come up mid-season and hit around 10.

[dean]

.500 is possible. But what do I know, I said the Mets would never win the Series in 69.

[RoyalLoyal]

I think that the Dotel signing could be huge. The Royals blew 31 saves last season! If they can cut that # to 20 or so - there's 11 more victories. With the improvements in the pitching staff and the possible emergence of some of the young players (Shealy, Gordon, Teahen) - isn't it possible that the Royals could win 80-85 games? Maybe I'm dreaming... aw, what the hell. 85-77

Mike

[dejesus9]

mdemps said:

I think that the Dotel signing could be huge. The Royals blew 31 saves last season!

Yeah, just having a reliable closer will be big. Say as a team we blow just 15 of those, 18 more wins puts us at... 80-82. That's a big improvement. (Oh yeah, not to nitpick but I think we blew 33...)

royalsfan2008 said:

I think Teahen and Gordon will both hit 30 home runs, Gordon will win the AL ROY Award, Shealy will hit about 25 jacks too, and Butler will come up mid-season and hit around 10.

I agree with all that.

[royalsfan2008]

Yeah and don't forget Riske and Bale replacing Sisco and Burgos. Compare Riske's numbers to Burgos and it's not even close.

[RoyalLoyal]

(Oh yeah, not to nitpick but I think we blew 33...)

tinyurl.com/ygo2fq

[busymom4kc]

As an eternal optimist I go into every season knowing we're making the World Series. ;D

In the real world I'm happy with a .500 season this year.

[dejesus9]

Hmmm... I'm certain I read somewhere that we blew 33... it was a guy on the kcroyals.com message board, and he listed our pitchers and how many saves and added them, he probably just added them wrong... my apologies. : )

[57in07]

I'd like to believewe will win 100 games this year.

[dejesus9]

Mmmm, so would I...