I decided it was time to update my blog as a new baseball season is underway, but when I looked at the existing site I saw everything from 2025 was no longer available as well as several previous columns. I am not exactly sure what happened: possibly I didn’t save them correctly; possibly aliens from space taking control of limited-view blog posts or maybe the universe was just telling me those stories weren’t remembering. If I were to guess, I would choose the last possibility, it makes me feel more significant.
As I sit in Kansas City Royals press box, I now remember that it has been 50 years since I first stepped foot in the place. Formerly known as Royals Stadium, Kauffman Stadium is still a beautiful marvel. While I haven’t visited all of the ballparks, I have visited many which are considered among the best in the game and while each have elements one might consider the best, many of which I agree with, I still think there is no place better to watch a game than at The K in Kansas City.
Unfortunately, over the course of five decades I am in much worse shape physically and sadly the same is true of The K. I am not one longing for a new ballpark, especially a downtown park, but sadly even with the improvements of a few years ago Kauffman is showing signs of age. And it gets to the point that one has to decide do we want to keep putting money into a middle-aged structure hoping it can become classic like Wrigley or Fenway or do we do what most others have done and accepted the reality its time for a newer, more-modern facility. Once the park was nearly seamless, now you can walk around and find cracks and spots that obviously indicate patching of plumbing or electrical areas or, for example, in the press box today there are four buckets placed on the floor with lines feeding in, obviously catching water from a leak somewhere. It does seem reminiscent of old-time ballparks, but not in a good way.
I now need to get back on track because my intent was not to go on about the great stadium debate, but instead to share memories of 50 years hanging out, and writing about the Royals
Today the Royals and Brewers are playing a doubleheader. I’m not really sure when split doubleheaders became a thing, in fact a couple twin bills might be regularly scheduled in addition to any of the weather-induced type. I guess there is more money in two separate gates than in hoping to keep fans for 18 innings. Probably there is hope a new set of customers will have more room for concessions. I wish there was an analytic as to how split doubleheaders pay vs. the old kind. In markets that sell out every game, it would be obvious, but for the traditional 15,000 to 25,000 per game teams, I don’t know if it really pays. But baseball keeps doing them so there must be a logic behind it.
Back in the day I lived for doubleheaders. I couldn’t get enough baseball and if they wanted to play three it would have been OK with me. And by golly, we can’t be late for the start of the first game and can’t go home until the whole nine of the second contest has concluded. Extra innings were just more time to love baseball. Any more, it is sometimes hard to make it through nine innings, let alone 18 innings, especially with two hours between games. However, the Royals dropped the first game after a bad first two innings of the first game, so now I am enticed to hang around for the second just in case.
With the loss the Royals drop to 3-4 on the year. Although way too early to read too much into things, it appears the Royals can be a very good team this year because the starting pitching, with the exception of today, has been exceptional, but the offense has been pretty dismal. With Bobby Witt, Jr. Maikel Garcia and Vinnie Pasquantino all starting slowly, we can stay enthusiastic because they don’t seem to be the type of players who will go through extended slumps. When they heat up we could be very good. Kyle Isbel has been a stud in the nine hole, but the line up from six through eight needs some shoring up.
Even on a chilly April afternoon, The K is still one of the greatest places in the world to be.
Thoughts after game two: The Royals finally managed to put together a big inning to capture a 6-2 win. Carter Jensen pinch hit in the first game after missing a Thursday afternoon game because he had slept through his alarm clock. After little work in two games, Jensen started at catcher in game two of the twin bill and went two-for-three with a walk and drove in the first two runs. He is proving to be very valuable tool let oversleep.
I don’t know if it is the first time in Kansas City or not, probably not, but it was the first game I can remember that Jen Pawol umpired a game here. Jen is the first female umpire in MLB history and was the third base ump for the nightcap contest.
Ironically, it was a tad warmer at gametime for the second game than for the first plus the wind had died down so it actually was a cool, but pleasant April evening and the game concluded with the first Friday night fireworks of the season, even though it was Saturday night.
The winning pitcher was Nick Mears, who the Royals acquired from Milwaukee last winter. He pitched just one inning, but it was the inning the Royals broke a 2-2 tie with six runs and he gained his first KC victory.
