Yes, we are that predictable

The double meaning embedded in the title goes both for the Royals and the Powder Blue Room, yes we're going to talk about the Jeff Francouer and Melky Cabrera signings, because that is just what a reputable Royals blogger does, even if they know full well that the item has already been talked about to death.  Only within this micro realm of sports news would the signing of two outfielders for less than the price of Carl Crawford's bonus garner so much attention and scorn.  There is no way to spin this in a positive light; we are that pathetic, predictable and hopeless (both the Royals and their followers), but in the long run this signing won't affect anyone.  Apparently we've added two more of the worst offensive players to our already inept battling line-up, probably because that is just the best we could do. It hurts to be so helpless.

The problem really isn't the money or the production of these two players, it is just the fact that we are so frickin obvious; not only is there the whole ex-Brave & Dayton Moore combo, but we did the EXACT same thing last year.  What happened here is just a classic case of boredom at the GM meetings, when people stopped calling Dayton Moore to ask about Zach Grienke because he was asking for the entire AA starting line-up from the teams' minor league system, he noticed the reminder on his Outlook calendar telling him to call Francouer's agent. His agent probably had this standard one-year $2.5 mil package that he offered every team in need of an outfielder, Dayton simply said "I'll take it!" Then when Melky's agent noticed this he called Dayton and offered Cabrera for the last minute half price blue light special and Dayton couldn't say no.  Most likely our beloved owner told Moore that his budget was no more that what he saved on the DeJesus contract and thus Dayton took that to mean that he Had to spend somewhere around $5 mil, basically what Theo Epstein and Brian Cashman had as a travel and food budget to sign free agents.  Working with this in mind, Dayton took his Wal-Mart allowance money and weighed his options; old middle relievers, back-up catchers, fourth outfielders, hmmmm???  He took deep personal stock of his previous actions and judged that his relief pitcher and catcher track record of signings hadn't worked out so well, but he felt that with last year's minor success of Scott Posednik (and to a much lesser degree Rick Ankiel) he was on a roll with outfielders and pulled the trigger on these two guys.

Really what options did the guy poor guy have?  I wan't to mock him, but he couldn't even have afforded to resign either of the two catchers he let go last year, would you rather see him bring in another Juan Cruz?  Should we have opened up the bank and signed, let's say...Juan Uribe for 3 yrs $25 mil, if he would accept the generous offer to come play for our awful team instead of the Dodgers?  We're a long way from even being able to consider going crazy and throwing $125 mil at a premier free agent and most mid tier free agents would ask for an extra year or 20% on their contract  because we have become about the least attractive place to sign in all of baseball. So I'm not sure what the hell you do with that kind of money in this insane market.  We now have complied an outfield consisting of the biggest group of sad-sack losers that you could possibly put together.  Melky, Alex and Frenchy have fallen so far from the big time promise they once held that maybe this collective group therapy will just work. Most likely it will not work and if they all play the whole season the Royals will be contending for the worst outfield ever assembled (I know there is someone out there who's got this stat???).

I wish that I could be angry about this, but I'm just not that concerned with who will be roaming the Royals outfield this year because more likely than not, they will not be very good; be it Mitch Maier, Gregor Blanco, Jarrod Dyson, Melky or Frenchy.  I just hope that one day we'll be able to do something as crazy as offering 32 year old outfielders with two years of big league experience $127 mil, but for now this is the best we can do.  Please don't trade Greinke!!!