Bobby Witt Jr. finished 3rd in AL MVP voting:
Houston’s Yordan Alvarez won the award unanimously, while Tampa Bay’s Junior Caminero finished second. Witt received 188 points, including two second-place votes and 11 third-place votes. He finished ahead of New York’s Cam Schlittler (181), who won the AL Cy Young Award on Wednesday night…
Witt’s latest MVP finish follows his third consecutive All-MLB First Team selection at shortstop and his third MLBPAA’s Heart & Hustle Award — he’s the first player
to earn the latter honor three times.
Unless I’m mistaken, Witt finished 4th in Rookie of the Year voting in his first season. He has followed that up with 7th, 2nd, 4th, and 3rd in MVP voting. Not a bad start to a career.
Speaking of the Royals, Matt Snyder dropped this nugget in his CBS Sports article about the AL MVP:
The only players in MLB history to lead the majors in all three triple slash categories:
[Yordan] Alvarez, 2026
Aaron Judge, 2025
Miguel Cabrera, 2013
Barry Bonds, 2002
Larry Walker, 1999
George Brett, 1980
Remember last week, when we talked about Teruaki Sato? C’mon! It wasn’t that long ago! At MLB.com, Mark Feinsand had an article about him. Tucked into that article were some comments by JJ about the Royals:
“We’ve got a pretty good core here, so we don’t look at ‘27 as a rebuild,” Royals general manager J.J. Picollo said. “We don’t have time to rebuild; we went through that. We need to figure out how to get our pitching better right now so we can capitalize on the years that Bobby’s with us. We’re definitely very aware of that…”
“We are very aware of the years with Bobby – and it’s not just Bobby,” Picollo said. “You’ve got Maikel Garcia, [Jac] Caglianone, [Carter] Jensen; there are some talented players on our roster that we’re excited about. It’s the collective nature of those guys that creates that urgency for us.”
Congrats to Tyler Tolbert!
To finish off our official stories, we have a pair from Fox 4.
Marko Jerkovic says Elevate was chosen as a new ballpark partner for the Royals:
The Kansas City Royals announced a multi-year partnership on Thursday with entertainment company Elevate to help shape the fan experience at the Royals new downtown ballpark.
Elevate will be involved in the planning and development of the premium seating design, signage, ticket pricing, as well as food and beverage pricing.
It sounds like the company that will help the Royals maximize profits. Whee? Oh, hey, here’s the Royals press release about this partnership.
Finally, Jonathan Ketz is reporting that new Jackson County Executive Stacy Lake has made some interesting comments:
“Our first priority is to see if we can keep the teams from leaving Truman Sports Complex,” Lake said in a statement to FOX4 Thursday. “If that is not a possibility, we must have a study done on the best use of Truman Sports Complex and significant community outreach completed before any decisions on demolition of the Complex is made.”
I think that ship has sailed. The very next line in the article:
“The teams are not staying at the Truman Sports Complex,” Current Jackson County Executive Phil LeVota said in response to Lake’s statement Thursday.
Not a lot of blogginess going on today, but we’ll highlight what’s out there!
Over at Royals Keep, Yirsandy Rodriguez posts about “Four Mid-Rotation Free-Agent Starters Who Won’t Break The Bank”. For instance:
Tyler Mahle, RHP
This starting point seems interesting to me: Steamer projects Mahle for 154 innings, a 4.10 ERA, a 4.11 FIP, and 2.1 WAR for 2027. It is an estimate that seems to represent a midpoint between his two versions of 2026. First, he had a terrible stint with the San Francisco Giants, where he recorded a 5.13 ERA with a 4.38 FIP, but then he managed to leave some doubts behind by recording a 1.99 ERA and a 3.32 FIP after recovering and moving to the Atlanta Braves at the trade deadline. The expectation with Mahle is that he can remain a mid-value starter, not that he necessarily reproduces the level of his best stretch with Atlanta.
That said, it would also be worth analyzing his injury history, since Mahle underwent Tommy John surgery in 2023 and has had other physical problems since then. If he is healthy, he could provide the ability to get strikeouts and a repertoire combination that can work better when he attacks the strike zone. So, for the Royals, a good deal could also be in the range of $30-32 million over a couple of seasons.
Blog Roundup:
- Steve Drumwright at Royals Keep: Royals’ President J.J. Picollo Quotes From GM Meetings: Coaching Staff Changes, Confidence In Bounce Backs
- Matthew Swigonski at KOK: J.J. Picollo just offered up a sobering take on Royals’ roster heading into 2027
- Also, Matthew Swigonski at KOK: This Royals prospect could be the team’s top candidate to win Rookie of the Year in 2027
I know this isn’t your traditional blog post entry, but I’ll give Patrick Glancy a plug as he often writes about the Royals at Powder Blue Nostalgia. A while ago, he opened up a companion site called Powder Blue Pulp, where he writes about non-baseball topics. I enjoyed his most recent entry about a castaway Lego minifigure.
Wait? Create an entirely new blog to write about off-topic things? That sounds like a lot of needless work. Speaking of which…
For last week’s OT (link above in the part about Sato), we started on the Asia Baseball Recaps with the NPB. This week we’re onto the KBO.
Here was part of the midseason update:
For those who don’t remember, the top 5 teams in the 10-team KBO qualify for the playoffs. However, it’s a ladder playoff, so the higher you finish, the more byes you get. Currently, the powerhouse Samsung Lions are in 1st at 55-42-2, but the KT Wiz are charging fast with 7 wins in a row and are only 2.5 GB. Meanwhile, the 3rd-place LG Twins have lost(!) 7 in a row and are 4 GB (part of that is that the Wiz swept a 4-game series from the Twins). The Kia Tigers and Doosan Bears are the other teams above .500 and occupy the last two playoff spots.
Those were the teams that qualified for the playoffs. The Wiz were the big story here. They started out a respectable 44-35-1. From that point on, they went 46-14-4 and took the regular-season crown by 8 games. Their final record was 90-49-5, basically a 105-win MLB team. The Samsung Lions were definitively the second-best team in the league at 83-58-3, a 95-win MLB team. The Kia Tigers (79-63-2), LG Twins (78-65-1), and Doosan Bears (73-66-5) were the other teams above .500 and they all made the playoffs.
The following teams were out of the players and are listed in order of finish: SSG Landers, Lotte Giants, NC Dinos, Hanwha Eagles, and Kiwoom Heroes. I had this note about our rooting interest, the 9th place Eagles, back in July:
We didn’t mention this back in the spring, but “Eagles slugger Roh Si-hwan signs most lucrative deal in KBO history”. He’s only 25 and signed an 11-year contract worth just north of $21M. It goes into effect starting in 2027, however, he has an opt-out to post to MLB this offseason.
Well, Si Hwan Roh opted out and posted to MLB. Michael Clair at MLB.com wrote an article about current and future KBO players who could make their way to MLB. Roh is probably the only player who will move the needle this year, but others could be coming in the next couple of years.
With Roh officially being made available via the posting process as of Sunday, our scout likes the power, calling him “a big power bat from third base,” that should play at the MLB level. However, while he has the arm strength to stay at the position, “he’s a little bit weak defensively.”
A member of the national team at the World Baseball Classic this spring, his potential trip to the Majors may depend on if teams value his bat enough to consider him as a DH and if they can match the value of his KBO contract valued at approximately $21.3 million. The negotiating window for Roh will expire on Dec. 1 at 5 p.m. ET.
The only thing hotter than the Wiz was the weather. In August, some fans collapsed from heat-related illness and the league cancelled 15 games as part of a “heat wave break”.
For the Wild Card game, the Doosan Bears met the LG Twins at Jamsil Baseball Stadium. This is notable for two reasons. First, the two teams share Jamsil during the regular season, so it’s a derby. Second, Seoul Sports Complex Baseball Stadium, as it’s also known, is scheduled to be demolished after the 2026 season.
By virtue of their better regular-season record, the Twins get a 1-0 lead in their best-of-three series. However, they only needed one game to advance. In the regular season, former MLB player and current LG Twins 1B Austin Dean hit .331/.427/.635 with 41 HR, 127 RBI, and 114 R. He’s in the running for league MVP. Here’s the first inning play-by-play courtesy of MyKBOStats:
Batter #1: Hong Chang-ki
Hit by pitch
Batter #2: Park Hae-min
Reached base on a fielder’s choice (ground ball to first baseman)
– First base runner Hong Chang-ki: Force out at second base
Batter #3: Austin Dean
Pitcher disengaged
Pitcher disengaged
Pitcher disengaged
Pitcher disengaged
Pitcher disengaged
Home run to left field (Distance: 120m / 395ft)
That was more than enough for 39-year-old Carlos Carrasco, who scattered 4 hits and a walk across 6 innings in the Twins 4-1 win. Gwak Been was the hard-luck loser. Those were the only 2 runs he gave up in 6 innings, allowing just 3 hits, and striking out 10. He was only 11-7 on the season, but led the league in ERA (2.24) and Ks (197). He’s listed in the KBO-to-MLB article above, potentially in 2028.
They advanced to the semi-playoff to face the 3rd place Kia Tigers and another MVP candidate, Kim Do-yeong. He hit .308/.413/.647 with 45 HR, 118 RBI, and 120 R. Dean and Kim were two of three players with an OPS over 1.000 for the season. The third was Koo Ja-wook of the Samsung Lions. He didn’t have the prodigious power numbers of the two sluggers, though his 15 HR and 31 2B weren’t too shabby, particularly as he only played in 114 games due to injuries. He got his OPS over 1.000 the “old-fashioned” way: with a .371 average to go along with .458 OBP and .581 SLG. But we’ll get to him later
Kim got the best of Dean in the semi-playoff, winning MVP in the 3-game sweep. He hit 3 home runs and reached base another 3 times in the short series. The Tigers won 5-1, 6-3, and 13-1 with strong pitching performances from starters James Naile, Adam Oller, and Shirakawa Keisho. Naile and Oller both had cups of MLB coffee and finished in the top 5 in KBO ERA, while “Shirakawa was the first Japanese player without NPB experience to pitch in KBO” (per b-r). Game 3 was the final game in Jamsil Stadium’s history.
In the Playoff, the Tigers faced the Samsung Lions. It was a series that went the maximum five games, but none were particularly close or dramatic. There was only 1 game with a run scored after the 7th, and it was a meaningless insurance run in the Tigers 5-1 win in Game 1. In Game 2, Ariel Jurado locked down the Tigers and the Lions roughed up Oller in an 8-3 equalizer. Games 3 and 4 were 2-run games, one won by each team. Game 3 was a 6-4 Lions win and Game 4 was a 4-2 Tigers win. Oller got roughed up again in Game 5, giving up 4 in the first two innings. Meanwhile, Jurado threw 7 innings and gave up only 1 unearned run. He was named the Playoff MVP. And this set up the highly anticipated #1 vs #2 matchup in the Korean Series.
The Wiz attack was led by former MLB’er Sam Hilliard (.304/.374/.593 with 44 HR, 116 R, league-leading 139 RBI) and Choi Won-jun’s .356 average. On the pitching side, Ko Young-pyo will challenge Gwak as KBO’s best pitcher, going 15-7 with a 3.28 ERA, and 183 K and only 22BB in 172.2 IP.
In Game 1, the Wiz jumped out to a big lead with 3 in the 1st, 2 in the 3rd, 1 in the 5th, and 2 in the 6th. But the Lions plated 5 in the 7th and 2 more in the 8th to make it a one-run game. Wiz closer Park Yeong-hyun shut the door with a 4-out save.
Game 2 was a pitcher’s duel as former MLB’er Chris Paddack dueled Ko to a draw, each giving up a single run in seven innings. In the 10th, both teams had the bases loaded and each only came away with one run. The Lions picked up an unearned run with 2 outs in the 11th and the Wiz could not answer. The series was even at 1 game apiece.
That loss seemed to deflate the Wiz. Well, that and the Samsung offense. The Wiz scored in the top of the 1st each of the next two games. But the Lions matched them. In Game 3, they got 1 in the 1st and 3 in the second and, in Game 4, they played 6. Game 5 saw the Wiz score 1st with a run in the 3rd, but the Lions once again answered: 3 in the bottom of the 3rd and then an 8-spot in the 5th basically ended the series.
The Lions won their 9th Korean Series title and Koo was named MVP. Heck, this was an easy-ish one to write. A lot of the players with big regular seasons played major roles in the postseason so it made the storytelling easy. Next week, we’re onto the CPBL.
Somehow my wife was one of only 14 parents in the United States who hadn’t seen KPop Demon Hunters. Well, that changed this week. This would even be topical as we were just talking about the KBO. And Lord knows I’m not getting those songs out of my head for another couple of days. So we’re just going to cheat and claim anime is video game adjacent, especially since it’s Sony-animated.
Spoiler alert: If you somehow haven’t seen the movie, “What is Sounds Like” is the finale. Did you know that being yourself is good and that love and friendship can help conquer evil, especially with the help of super catchy hooks? Cool. I’m glad we had this talk.
