Slow Down, Refresh Your Memory: how far the Royals have come

I, like every other Royals fan, am absolutely depressed.  The Royals still are not good.  They are so not good they might go 0-10 on their first home stand of 2012.  A number of factors have contributed to this current debacle, but now is not the time to talk about that.  Now is also not the time to talk about firing anyone, especially the General Manager. 

Dayton Moore became the Royals GM in June of 2006, and has proceeded to completely overhaul the entire Royals organization.  To illustrate the progress of this Royals organization I want to take a look at the 2005 Royals roster and compare it to the current roster to show just how far the team has come over the past 6 seasons.  Not surprisingly, not a single player appears on both lists.  I honestly have no memory of the 2005 Royals (I count myself among the lucky ones) because I did not live in the United States at the time and I did not even remember a number of these guys ever being Royals.  I hope your stomach is ready, because this roster is going to make you feel sick.

Pos	Player
C	John Buck
1B	Matt Stairs
2B	Ruben Gotay
SS	Angel Berroa
3B	Mark Teahen
LF	Terrence Long
CF	David DeJesus
RF	Emil Brown
DH	Mike Sweeney
Bench	Tony Graffanino
	JoeMcEwing
	Chip Ambres
	Aaron Guiel
	Alberto Castillo
	Eli Marrero
	Ken Harvey
1	Zack Greinke
2	Jose Lima
3	Runelvys Hernandez
4	DJ Carrasco
5	JP Howell
Pen	Mike MacDougal
	Mike Wood
	Andy Sisco
	Ambiorix Burgos
	Jeremy Affeldt

Wow, by my count, I only see 6 legitimate Major League ballplayers out of 26 total.  Since 2005 only Buck, DeJesus, Sweeney, Greinke, Howell, and Affeldt have had any significant success in the big leagues, and only Greinke would be considered an above average player.  Mike Sweeney was great at one time, but he would never again play enough games to be of any value to his team.  Not exactly a murderers row, but the Royals did have one murderer on their team.  Ambiorix Burgos would go on to kill a woman in a hit and run accident and then was charged with the attempted murder of his wife.

If you think the Major League roster from 2005 looks bad, the minor league prospects are going to make you lose your mind.  Billy Butler was the top prospect (turned out alright), along with Denny Bautista, Shane Costa, Mark Teahen, Mitch Maier, and Chris Lubanski.  YUCK!

Now, let us look at the makeup of the current roster; I have inserted injured players (highlighted in yellow) in the positions they will fill when healthy:

Pos	Player
C	Salvador Perez
1B	Eric Hosmer
2B	Yuni Betancourt
SS	Alcides Escobar
3B	Mike Moustakas
LF	Alex Gordon
CF	Lorenzo Cain
RF	Jeff Francoeur
DH	Billy Butler
Bench	Brayan Pena
	Mitch Maier
	Chris Getz
	Jason Bourgeois
	Johnny Giavotella
1	Bruce Chen
2	Luke Hochevar
3	Jonathan Sanchez
4	Felipe Paulino
5	Danny Duffy
Pen	Jonathan Broxton
	Aaron Crow
	Greg Holland
	Tim Collins
	Everett Teaford
	Louis Coleman
	Kelvin Herrera
	Joakim Soria

If we had a time machine that would make all the players from 2005 the same age as their counterparts in 2012 there would not be a single player that would start for Royals, with the exception of  Zack Greinke and maybe David DeJesus.  The Royals really were that bad.  In 2005 they lost 106 games and nobody really knows how they managed to win 56.  If we as fans want to root for teams that take on enormous challenges we have to be patient and remember how far we have come.  I don't know if the this current group of players will ever become a consistent winner, but the future sure looks a lot brighter than it did 7 years ago.