‘Never say it can’t get worse’: KC Royals’ 4-15 start offers scant hope for improvement

When I moved to Kansas City in 2013, the Royals hadn’t been to the postseason since 1985 and had mustered one winning record since 1993. But considering the heralded young nucleus and apparent possibilities in the making, I remember arriving at Kauffman Stadium for my first game that season with anticipation of all that might be.

Who knew what was to come next: an 86-76 finish that year. The unforgettable 2014 American League wild-card game that became the gateway to the enchanted run to Game 7 of the World Series. The sheer magic of winning it all in 2015.

Gradually at first and then precipitously, it hasn’t been the same since. Excluding the pandemic-shortened 2020 season, the Royals averaged 98 losses in their last four full regular seasons to compel chairman and CEO John Sherman to make sweeping changes last year.

Even through all the discouraging moments of the last few seasons, though, even against ample evidence otherwise, I always came to Kauffman feeling anything was possible.

Heck, even expecting to see something promising, whether in the immediate or merely harkening to a better future.

Until Wednesday, that is.

When I got out of my car and started walking to the entrance, I realized something felt off.

Because all I could think about was what sort of misery awaited this time for a team that was 4-14 entering the game and 1-11 at home.

Just over an hour before the game, that hollow sensation echoed through an empty corridor to the elevator. It was amplified by the sparse crowd, announced as 10,388 (sold) but surely fewer than 5,000 by game’s end. And it was emphatically driven home by a 12-3 loss to the Texas Rangers — their sixth in a row on a home stand in which they were outscored 52-11.

The would-be fresh start to 2023 has evaporated into the second-worst 19-game start in franchise history (behind only a 3-16 opening faceplant in 1992). Suddenly, it’s hard not to feel the fateful words of former Royals manager Buddy Bell hovering over the proceedings:

“I never say it can’t get worse,” he said after the 10th loss of an 11-game losing streak in the 62-100 2005 season.

In fact, it now seems clear it will only get worse before it gets better.

Which is quite a statement considering where this team has been the last few years, and all the optimism we were supposed to feel after the changes in the front office and managerial staff and presumed coming of age of a promising young lineup.

Look, there are still 143 games to go. And we understand that the season is a marathon and that sometimes momentum swings are just a bloop or a blast away. And I’d really like to find some hope in the unseen and be reassured about the impending impact of the new staff and culture implemented by manager Matt Quatraro.

Heck, after the Royals’ opening day dud, I felt the need to write about how that game was just a snapshot that didn’t necessarily reveal anything about what was ahead.

Oof.

And now the vibes are no more heartening than the results on the field, which include being the worst team in MLB with runners in scoring position, the lowest batting average in MLB (.204 entering the game Wednesday) and being 24th in ERA (5.15 entering Wednesday).

This team already has been shut out four times and — just when you dared feel the pitching was meaningfully improved — has surrendered 10 or more runs four times in the last nine games.

The Royals seldom get ahead early, having been outscored 36-17 in the first three innings, and they almost never can rally late considering their 1-14 record when trailing after six innings.

It’s never a good time to be bad, of course. But this looms as particularly problematic for an organization trying to rally support for a move downtown when fans reasonably might wonder why such money as the Royals will commit wouldn’t be more urgently invested in players in their prime.

We like and respect Quatraro, and we understand that at least part of his appeal to the Royals was the calm and tolerant demeanor he exudes in contrast to the intensity of predecessor Mike Matheny.

The most important impact he can have is on his players, not media and fans, and that’s what ultimately will be the measure of his work.

But that being said …

It’s surely unsatisfying, if not unpalatable, to a fanbase feeling some combination of apathy and anger to hear his casual process-focused message.

“You don’t want to get beat, you don’t want to get embarrassed, especially at home in front of your fans,” he said following Wednesday’s loss. “But there’s nothing you can do about what just happened.”

Well, actually, he could go on a rant or flip over a table in the clubhouse or flash some other time-honored baseball tantrum. Maybe “the fury of the patient man,” as the poet John Dryden put it, could resonate.

“Maybe somebody wants Earl Weaver or something like that; I don’t know,” Quatraro said. “But that’s not me. So if I went in there and tried to be Earl Weaver, I think that’s disingenuous. And I don’t think they would see it as something that is natural for me to present that way.”

Fair enough. And in the long haul that could well be just what the franchise needs.

But on the near horizon, it’s part of an unsettling atmosphere that suggests transition or development or whatever this phase is has relegated the precious present moment secondary.

Yes, the Royals will project hope and refer to the ups and downs of the exceedingly long season. But … just when are the ups coming?

“It’s not like we ever feel like, ‘Oh, here we go (again),’” Quatraro said.

Alas, though, we do.

And as much as I hope I’m quickly proven wrong, it’s time to face the fact it’s going to be a while until it feels otherwise.