Before the season began, I predicted (wisely?; boldly?; naively?) that the Royals would win 90 games. I hedged by adding a wish list of what would likely be needed:
(i) the deep starting pitching staff stays healthy (lots of injuries last year); (ii) the relief staff lives up to its billing; (iii) Witt, Garcia and Pasquantino build on last year’s excellence; (iv) somebody steps up to be at least an average second baseman; (v) Carter Jensen and Jac Caglianone become new stars; (vi) Salvy Perez proves again to be ageless and hits lots of homers; and (vii) the new outfielders click and fix the biggest weak spot.
How has it gone? I will generalize by saying the Royals have not excelled in any of the items on this wish list. Nor have they improved in what should have been on my list: (viii) better baserunning (poor in 2025 and still poor so far in 2026).
Injuries have played a major role, knocking out three of the five starting pitchers and last year’s league leader in saves. Three starters in the batting lineup are currently out.
Bobby Witt Jr. is again in the MVP discussion, leading the American League in WAR, but it doesn’t yet feel like an MVP season (the Royals record may have something to do with that). Jac Caglianone and Michael Massey have recently been hot. Every other regular in the lineup is below average in OPS. With their current record, it will take a mighty run for the Royals to snag a wild card slot.
The Royals are not the only AL Central team not playing according to plan. Here is what Baseball Prospectus predicted before the season started:
How its’s going (as of Sunday’s games)…
The exact opposite of what was predicted.
It’s Still Baseball: Winning is certainly more fun than losing, but it rarely governs why we are fans. We stick with the home team or have some other connection. And if our team is not in the playoffs, a lot of us root for the underdog or for a long-suffering fanbase (like this year’s Knicks in the NBA). I’m still most tied to baseball, not just for my Royals, but for the game.
In Hot Stove #307, I featured Big Fan, a new book from Joe Posnanski and Michael Schur. The authors explore why we are fans, and they have some quotes on baseball that I liked:
Sportswriter Sarah Langs: “I love baseball because it’s a never-ending story. It’s there to teach us something new each and every day. That also means endless fodder. The ability to seamlessly compare an individual or team in 2025 to one from 1925, or even 1885. It’s the best, and it’s always there for us.”
Actor Ellen: “I love baseball because it has the clarity of Greek drama, plus the mental intrigue of chess, plus the beauty of Renaissance painting, plus the mirror of historical narrative, plus the clean joy of Newtonian physics, plus a fractal spiral of statistical scrutiny as far down as you want to go.”
Outfield Help Is on the Way (Not): Hollis Hanover has been my good friend since we met in law school in the 1960s. Hollis likes to fiddle with new technology. Last year, he used a 3D printer to gift miniature head sculptures to each member of our monthly lunch group of UMKC law grads (the others being Walt Simpson, Lee Major, Mike Maloney and Jim Polsinelli). Rita found mine to be so creepy that she threw it in the trash.
The next project from Hollis was to use AI to portray me as a Royals outfielder. This looks much better than his “sculpture.” The five cheering me on to make the catch represent the rest of the lunch crew.
Royals #23 Trivia: The current Royal wearing #23 is Seth Lugo. Others who have worn #23 include Mark Gubiza, Zack Greinke and Danny Duffy.
The World Cup: This baseball newsletter will now address the elephant in our city. The World Cup.
When I went to high school, we had three varsity sports: track, football and basketball (that was the boys; the girls had field hockey). Baseball was played mostly in the 3&2 and Ban Johnson leagues. There were three primary pro leagues: NFL, NBA and MLB. NHL hockey was a niche sport played in six cities near the Canadian border. Soccer was something played almost entirely in foreign countries. [Style Note: I’m going to call it soccer, not the common global term of football (or futbol); too confusing with NFL football. John Cleese has on opinion on this (click here).]
So, I was not raised to be a hockey or soccer fan. And to this day, I lean to the same (uneducated) take on both: a lot of running/skating back and forth with little scoring. But I recognize that both sports have been successful in adding fans.
The NHL now has 32 teams, some playing in cities that never see ice outside the rink. It is considered one of the traditional “Big Four” of USA pro sports. I watched parts of two hockey games this year: (i) Last week’s final when Carolina won the Stanley Cup over Las Vegas, and (ii) the title game in the NCAA “Frozen Four” between Denver and Wisconsin. I watched the NCAA game after a heads-up from Denver alum David Von Drehle who was at the game in Las Vegas cheering for his Pioneers to win their record 11th NCAA title. They did!
Soccer? It’s now everywhere, from grade school to women’s and men’s pro leagues. And there are so many positive reasons to join in…
1. First and foremost, the kids. My late-in-life interest in soccer has not been for the game, but for the players. Grandchildren. This grandpa has enjoyed watching many of those fun games where everybody is able to play. Physical size is not relevant. If you can run and kick at a ball, you are in. No special equipment is needed, just a ball and a patch of ground to play. Few complex rules of the game compared to other team sports. Continuous play provides great exercise.
Below, a couple of soccer players in 2009. Seven-year-old Emersyn Shalton is sporting her Blue Valley Soccer Club kit (soccer lingo for uniform). She is now in law school. Four-year-old Ian Shalton still has great hair and will be 21 next month.
2. The average NBA player is 6’7” and hundreds of NFL players are over 300 pounds. Soccer is more like baseball in having players that are “normal size” humans. International star Lionel Messi – who scored a hat trick (3 goals) for Argentina last night in Kansas City – is 5’7” and weighs 148 pounds.
3. Championship teams also create fandom, and the USA women have delivered, winning the World Cup in 1991, 1999, 2015 and 2019. Remember Mia Hamm, Amy Wambach, Hope Solo, Brandie (sports-bra) Chastain, Alex Morgan, Megan Rapinoe, etc.? Below, from 1999 and 2019.
4. In Kansas City, we have two solid pro teams. In 2006, Lamar Hunt sold his MLS franchise (the Wizards) to local owners, Cerner’s Cliff Illig and Neal Patterson, who later rebranded the team as Sporting Kansas City (the team’s current principal owner is KC’s Peter Mallouk of Creative Planning). In 2021, Angie and Chris Long acquired an NWSL expansion franchise which today is called the Current, has Brittany and Patrick Mahomes as co-owners, and plays in CPKC Stadium, the first facility ever built for a women’s pro soccer team. In the process, redevelopment along the riverfront has blossomed.
5. Rita and I saw The Two Popes at the Telluride Film Festival in 2019. We loved the film, especially the well-written fictional (but fact-based) conversations between outgoing Pope Benedict (Anthony Hopkins) and incoming Pope Francis (Jonathan Pryce). Funny, insightful, intellectual, and…soccer. The closing scene is a delightful exchange between Benedict (from Germany) and Francis (from Argentina) as they watch their home countries play in the final of the 2014 World Cup. Germany defeated Argentina, 1-0. The movie is available on Netflix.
6. Ted Lasso (a/k/a local celebrity Jason Sudeikis) has added loads of humor, empathy and optimism to the soccer (football) world. New season starts August 5. He has a Visa commercial for the World Cup (click here).
7. The true test of being big league is TV money. And soccer has arrived on this count, not just for the domestic MLS teams, but international coverage of the Premier League, Champions League, World Cup, etc. I think most will agree that the “Big Four” has become the “Big Five.”
And gaining fast, the women of the NWSL and WNBA. Go Current! Go Fever!
8. In Big Fan, Michael Schur wrote a chapter on soccer and makes a persuasive case that “running back and forth” is what creates constant drama for soccer fans…
“When you are playing a rival…the minutes you are tied are excruciating. It doesn’t feel like you’re tied – it feels like you are about to be losing. European football is the most popular sport in the world and there isn’t a close second, and I think that largely has to do with the simplicity of its scoring units. There are no two-point conversions, three-point field goals, grand slams, six- or seven-point touchdowns. There are only single goals and nothing. A brutal binary code of joy and misery. The ebb and flow of football and the rarity of its scoring opportunities jangle my nerves. Football is like the famous depiction of war: long stretches of boredom punctuated by moments of sheer terror.”
But…
Notwithstanding this rich soccer background, I remain a dinosaur who still prefers the big three team sports of my high school days. But that’s generational. Those are the sports I played and how I built my fandom. However, I’m glad I’ve learned enough about soccer to appreciate the game (and its fans). So, I’ll be paying attention to the World Cup, and thanks to David Matson, I’m going to one of the games.
In the Wall Street Journal’s guide to the base camps for World Cup teams, KC was headlined as the “Most Desirable Location,” with Argentina, England and the Netherlands in the metro area and Rock Chalk Algeria in Lawrence.
There are soccer exhibits everywhere in KC. Below is one we see from our condo, an inflatable soccer ball on the roof of David Block’s Skelly Building on the Plaza. The tall building in the upper center of the photo is the home of the Polsinelli law firm where this retired guy still has an office (as a man cave, not for legal work).
At night…
Lonnie’s Jukebox – 45 RPM Anniversary Edition: On June 6, Rita and I celebrated our 45th anniversary at Tailleur Restaurant (French bistro at 3933 Main; good food, cool decor).
The ubiquitous Hollis Hanover suggested I give Rita either a diamond or maybe one of my 45 RPM records as an anniversary present. She has a diamond, so I went with the record. As I looked through my old record cases, I picked out three records from my high school days in the 1950s. Then I checked the case with Rita’s 45s and got five more. We played them while we opened our anniversary cards.
“Get a Job” by the Silhouettes (1957). We hosted a ‘50s party in the early ‘80s, and I assigned a record title to each invitee. Rita was between jobs at the time, so this was her song.
“16 Candles” by the Crests (1958). When I turned 50 in 1991, Rita threw me a party, and Mike and Alice White rewrote the lyrics to this song to make it “50 Candles.” I was serenaded at the party with the new lines, the most memorable being “Lonnie is the oldest naked guy Rita’s ever seen.”
“Queen of the Hop” by Bobby Darin (1958). Last year in New York, we saw the Broadway hit musical Just in Time, the story of Bobby Darin, then being played by Jonathan Groff (the original King George in Hamilton).
“Downtown” by Petula Clark (1964). Song still has major relevance. You know why.
“The Rain, the Park & Other Things” by the Cowsills (1967). I like the line “and she makes me happy, happy, happy…”
“Hey Jude” by the Beatles (1968). A must for Beatles fanatic Rita.
“I Got a Name” by Jim Croce (1973). Rita did not change her name when we married in 1981. Nor did Lonnie.
“Time In a Bottle” by Jim Croce (1973). As you can tell, Jim Croce is a favorite.
Walk-Off Story – The Knicks: We tuned in for each game of the NBA finals between the New York Knicks and San Antonio Spurs. The Spurs led all five games in the last four minutes but only won one of them. The Knicks championship was their first since 1973, and we were happy for their long-suffering fans.
Three starters on the Knicks were part of the Villanova NCAA champs in 2016: Mikal Bridges (25), Josh Hart (3) and finals MVP Jalen Brunson (11). Another Villanova alumnus – Pope Leo.
Some highlights from two of my favorite institutions. Hamilton and Seinfeld.
Game 3: After winning the first two games in San Antonio, the Knicks returned home to Madson Square Garden. Game 3 opened with members of the Broadway cast of Hamilton singing “The Schuyler Sisters,” which includes the tribute to New York City as “the greatest city in the world.” It’s a dazzling performance (click here).
Game 4: After the Knicks came back from a 29-point deficit to win by a point in Game 4, the celebrities on the court included Seinfeld co-creators Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David. A pundit online referenced the hilarious car rental scene from a 1991 Seinfeld episode (click here).
Game 5: After the Knicks won Game 5 to take the title, the cast of Hamilton ended their next show by honoring the team with Kander and Ebb’s “New York, New York” (click here).
It is the greatest city in the world.