After watching the Royals only score five runs this weekend and subsequently getting swept by the Athletics I couldn’t help but notice the imperfection of their lineup. I’ll fully admit there is no such thing because luck will play a bigger role from a day-to-day basis, but that doesn’t mean you can put yourself in the best chance to win over the course of a season.

First off, why is Chris Getz still playing every day? He’s a career .253/.308/.315 hitter in nearly 1,400 plate appearances. At this point we know who Getz is. Johnny Giavotella, who has a .323 batting average in nearly 1,100 plate appearances in triple-a, has nothing left to prove at that level and deserves an opportunity to play every day. The biggest reason why Getz is the preferred player is his defense is “superior”, which could be true, but Getz is merely a solid average defender.

What the Royals need is “out of the box” thinking with the construction of his lineup. Why not bat Alex Gordon, their best hitter, second? Why second? Keith Law wrote a great article about how your best hitter should bat second. Basically the two spot has the most impact and value over the course of the season. Eric Hosmer has not lived up the expectations he flashed during his rookie year, but at least he’s getting on-base at a sold clip. Why not bat him leadoff? Either way, Hosmer should not be batting ahead of Salvador Perez.

I love Alcides Escobar. He’s easily a plus defender and has enough contactability to be a solid contributor in a lineup, but there’s no way he should be batting second. I know he had the breakout year last year with a .293 batting average that was hugely BABIP driven. Since 2011 he has an OBP of .307! That’s a player who should be hitting in the eight or nine spot, not second in the order. The reason why he’s batting second is that he’s fast. Having fast runners is perceived to be highly valuable to scoring runs because they can score on a double while standing on first base. Or they can “jump start” an offense by getting on-base and stealing a base. That works if you’re Rickey Henderson or Tim Raines who were extremely fast and had really high career OPBs – .401 and .385 respectively.

Lastly, George Kottaras needs to have more than 15 at-bats. We’re 25 percent of the way through the season and he’s a solid hitter. I saw him single handily win games last year for the Athletics. There have been a few games this year where Yost has allowed Jeff Francoeur (he’s only hitting .231 against righties the past two seasons) to bat at the end of the game against a right handed pitcher with the game on the line.

I picked the Royals to win the division because I liked what Dayton Moore did this offseason, specifically, upgrading the pitching staff. It would be great for baseball and their fanbase if the Royals made the playoffs, but I’m afraid if the lineup continues to be mismanaged the roster is good enough to overcome it.

You can say what you want about Jeff Francoeur as a baseball player, but off the field he’s a cool dude. In 2011 he tossed a ball wrapped in a $100 bill into the bleacher creatures domain (right field bleachers), instructing fans to use it to buy bacon or beer. Bacon Tuesday was born. The next year the very same fans celebrated Bacon Tuesday and Francoeur sent over 20 pizzas to the bleacher creatures. This year he hung out with the bleacher creatures for 30 minutes. Check out the video below.