Three Cheers for Clear Thinking

NPH is relieved at the sanity that is surfacing now that the dust has started to settled from our home town team's trade over the weekend, in which we acquired the guy there on the left and got rid of a taco-snarfing pitcher.

For example, Clark Fosler at the Royals Authority blog says this:

My take, is simply that this was another shot across the bow of the entire organization. Just a year ago, former GM Allard Baird pretty much labeled relievers Mike MacDougal, Burgos and Sisco as untouchable and building block for the future. Today, all three are gone. The message: potential and ‘plus projections’ are great, but you better be able to perform and you better have a mentality focused squarely on winning. Oh, and by the way, you are just relievers.

And a reader calling him/herself "Howserfan" at Royals Review points out that

This move shows the importance GMDM [General Manager Dayton Moore] places on two things difficult to measure and therefore often dismissed even by attentive baseball fans.

Namely, defense and attitude.

GMDM's first principle is that you have to get 27 outs a game to win. You can win [or lose] with one run, or three, or ten but you must get 27 outs to win a regulation game.

His second principle seems to be that attitude & character matter. Without it, players are unlikely to help build a winner long-term.

Just about all of the moves so far have been about getting more outs or getting players with better charcter/work habits.

Imagine, a leader in an organization making decisions based on work habits and attitude. When you're a small-market operation, you simply can't afford the weighing down effect of star players' bad attitudes; you have to try to be the little engine that could. And for that to happen, everybody's got to be "all aboard."

Ooh, NPH apologizes for that.