This week marked the final week that Dayton Moore was in charge of the Kansas City Royals. His tenure with the club will be remembered as the architect of back-to-back American League Championships and the 2015 World Series Champions. His tenure will also be remembered as the architect of a lot of losses before and after.
While generally hailed by Royals fans as a good move, owner John Sherman really had no other options. He had gone as far as he could with the losing. The Royals won’t lose 100 games this season, but they’ll get darn close. An overhaul at the trade deadline by bringing up nearly an entire minor league team from AAA was the final signal that a change was brewing. And now, the ring leader is gone.
In his stead, JJ Picollo. The number two man to Moore for over a dozen years. So what will really be changing? Reportedly, quite a lot.
I had to go to the bank the other day. Remember banks? I probably hadn’t stepped in an actual bank in five years. But the experience was identical to the one five years ago – and the five years before that – and the five years before that. The people who run the banks don’t need to improve. They don’t need to advance. They have your money. You have to stand in line to get it. It works. Oh sure, there have been advances such as online checking and the like, but the actual experience of using a bank is the same as it ever was.
Dayton Moore is a bank general manager. He counts the receipts at the end of the day, he unlocks the vault in the morning – and in general, it works. What he hasn’t been asked to do is disrupt or revolutionize. Moore was all about pitching and pitching prospects. In 2013 and 2014, that philosophy paid off in spades – resulting in 2014 and 2015 championships. But in most of the other years, it didn’t. Highly touted prospects like Kyle Snyder and names you’ve likely forgotten like Ashe Russell and Nolan Watson never panned out and ultimately cost Moore his job.
But you will also hear Moore touted for the cultural change with the Royals. He implemented regimented discipline in his minor leagues famously upon his hiring. Stirrups up in the minor leagues. No sunglasses covering the logo on your hat. But it carried too far, in my opinion, to morality judgments like his vehement defense of Luke Heimlich, a pitcher who Moore considered drafting after Heimlich was accused of sexual abuse of a minor. Over the past several years, you’d hear about Moore going after his type of guys – typically Christian, typically white, and typically “clubhouse guys.”
Well, a lot of those “clubhouse guys” couldn’t hit their way out of a wet paper bag. Things got even worse with the split of that same clubhouse due to MLB’s COVID rules around immunization. A split that found long-time fan favorite Whit Merrifield shipped off to Toronto (ironically). The man steering the ship lost control and hit an iceberg.
So what is changing with his number two man in charge? We hope to find out. Rumors are that less cultural bias and more of a focus on metrics will rule the day. You have a guy who hits for average but doesn’t read the Bible every night? Sign him up. You have a fella who won’t reach 90 pitches by the third inning, but might be kind of a grump in the clubhouse? Let’s see how he does. Results over culture.
Eventually, banks will evolve, too. Maybe with Bitcoin or NFT’s or Zuckerberg Bucks or whatever is the next thing to come down the line. Or, maybe Dayton Moore and the bank general managers have it right all along and simply stay the course as long as you can. Time will tell with how long it takes to raise another banner over Kauffman Stadium.
(He’s not a bank manager but you could trust Chris Kamler with your money. Follow him for more tips on Twitter, where he is known as @TheFakeNed)