Royals to Win AL Central in 2026 According To Some Proprietary Algorithm That Knows Way More About Baseball Than I Do
Baseball’s back. Like any competent middle-aged man wanting to feel understood, but without the emotional intelligence to make it happen, I’m really looking forward to lambasting my wife and son with acronyms they don’t know and stats they couldn’t care less about.
Anyway.
How ‘bout them Royals?
Baseball Prospectus’ PECOTA has predicted the Royals are going to take the AL Central and I’m already looking to trademark my Party Like It’s 2015 t-shirt idea because A) I’m unoriginal, B) I’m not funny, and C) I could use the money.
Those of us who remember the These O’s Ain’t Royal tee from the 2014 World Series run-and-loss know that Kansas City fans, God bless us, are always ready to drop $30 on a shirt that we’ll never wear again and probably won’t even reach our mailboxes until the series is already over.
I’m sure Tarik Skubal, Framber Valdez, and Justin Verlander will have nothing to say about the prediction.
Anyway.
MLB.tv has offered a pretty sweet deal for veterans the last few years by dropping 35% off a season subscription. Not the case this time around, but that’s okay. I’ll scrounge the extra 50-ish bucks I’m expected to pay this year by canceling my kid’s Xbox Game Pass subscription. Because, per the above-point concerning my need to feel understood by my family, I’m going to need him to free-up his time.
While I’m on the subject (complaining), I seem to remember an MLB.tv purchase coming with a complementary subscription to At Bat. Now, access to the MLB Network and At Bat are a joint-subscription, and MLB.tv is buried under an ESPN subscription and further-convoluted by the various TEAMNAMEHERE.tv offerings.
I’ll cease the whining for a moment and share that the ESPN subscription is free for 30 days and you can cancel it right away. No harm no foul, but still pretty annoying.
ESPN is likely betting on folks signing up for ESPN so they can sign up for MLB.tv so they can forget they signed up for ESPN and end up paying for ESPN for 5 months until they realize their mistake and then spending an hour-or-so Googling how do I cancel my ESPN subscription? and then scrolling past some bad AI advice until you find a Reddit article that breaks it down for you.
Anyway.
Read a couple new books and wrote a 100-word review on both. Check it out below. Enjoy.
Why We Love Baseball — Joe Posnanski
Great book. Storytelling favored over analytics. Love stats, but love a good story more. Posnanski invites other subject matter experts to weigh-in to great effect. Expands on often-heard stories with fun caveats and personal anecdotes in an easy-to-read style. Lighthearted and funny and informative and accessible. Enjoyed hearing bits about the Kansas City Royals (Posnanski wrote for the Kansas City Star once upon a time). Loved the author’s perspective on infamous stories that may or may not be true. “You will believe what you choose to believe because that’s the beauty of art and movies and baseball.”
A Fan’s Guide to Baseball Analytics — Anthony Castrovince
Interesting read. Learned a lot. Castrovince has a funny and accessible writing style, which is especially important when discussing math and statistics. Avoids getting too in-the-weeds with the math, but is more than willing to go in-depth on viability or otherwise of common baseball stats like RBI (don’t call them RBI’s or ribbies in front of Castrovince) and OBS. If you’re looking for quick explanations of different stats then this book works, but Google works quicker. If you want to learn the stats and read about some of the prevailing opinions concerning different stats though this book is second-to-none.
That’s all. Bye.
