| Name | G | AVG | OBP | SLG | OPS | H | R | HR | RBI | BB | SO |
| Yuniesky Betancourt | 71 | .240 | .269 | .370 | .639 | 59 | 25 | 4 | 27 | 11 | 26 |
| Tony Pena | 40 | .098 | .132 | .118 | .250 | 5 | 3 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 13 |
| Willie Bloomquist | 38 | .278 | .400 | .250 | .650 | 37 | 10 | 1 | 15 | 6 | 24 |
| Mike Aviles | 34 | .190 | .215 | .259 | .473 | 22 | 10 | 1 | 8 | 4 | 26 |
| Luis Hernandez | 23 | .196 | .250 | .214 | .464 | 11 | 3 | 0 | 4 | 3 | 13 |
| Alberto Callaspo | 1 | .250 | .307 | .391 | .698 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| Tug Hulett | 1 | .000 | .000 | .000 | .000 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Sigh.
Mike Aviles was the SS after his breakout 2008 season. Every rational fan expected a dropoff, but what happened was a Lehman Bros like drop. Baseball is a game of individual performances combined to provide a team outcome. While I cannot prove it, I believe that a single individual in baseball can improve a team moreso than in football (sans QB probably). Mike Aviles at SS in 2008 vs the trash the Royals threw out there in 2009 is an extremely big difference in total team outcome. It is this theory that I think the Royals could be best served over spending on one really good player instead of 4 or 5 decent or even below average players.
So using the wRC stat from www.fangraphs.com, how big of a change was the SS position from 2008 to 2009?
2009 - 36.7
2008 - 53.2
So the offensive production out of our SS position in 2009 is approximately 16.5 runs fewer than in 2008. By itself that is a big difference, but Mike Aviles in 2008 had 54 wRC in his 376 ABs and the other shortstops in 2008 had a combined -.8 in their 273 ABs.
So, is it a coincidence that the Royals had a winning record in 2008 from the time that Hillman finally let Aviles be the everyday SS? Maybe, but it certainly had something to do with it. The Royals were able in 2008 to upgrade from the worst everyday hitter in baseball to a very good one. That is the essence of these position reviews, where can the Royals upgrade the most and what positions are most in need of upgrade. Enough ranting on 2008.
So Aviles was hurt and fell off the map, the Royals turned to Bloomquist who was not great but not Pena either. I was in agreement that the Royals needed to upgrade from Bloomquist at the SS position, however Dayton went out and acquired via trade Yuniesky Betancourt.
It was a shocker, primarily becasue he WASN'T better than Bloomquist. It seemed insane at the time and still seems insane. When Dayton Moores tenure as GM ends, if it ends badly the Yuni trade will likely be the signature moment. This could be his Dye for Perez move (shockingly another SS blunder).
In baseball there seems to be a ledger somewhere that tells you what a player should be, and it cannot be changed. Somewhere that ledger shows that Yuniesky is a SS and that Bloomquist is not. No matter what you ever see in reality, those facts cannot be changed. This happens all the time. A guy gets pegged as something and he cannot change the establishments mind.
So in came Yuniesky, the blogosphere erupted into anger and Dayton defended the move the way he usually does: by telling people they are too dumb to understand. I wonder if anybody in the Royals front office realized that Bloomquist had a OBP as a SS of .400 while Yuni was .269. The only thing I saw Yuni do better than Bloomquist was hit homeruns.
So how did this ragtag group of SS compare to the league?
| Column1 | Split | BA | OBP | SLG | OPS | sOPS+ |
| Rays | as SS | .326 | .392 | .513 | .904 | 150 |
| Yankees | as SS | .332 | .401 | .467 | .868 | 141 |
| Angels | as SS | .315 | .360 | .422 | .783 | 117 |
| Blue Jays | as SS | .280 | .367 | .407 | .774 | 116 |
| Indians | as SS | .284 | .337 | .421 | .757 | 110 |
| White Sox | as SS | .273 | .337 | .399 | .736 | 104 |
| Athletics | as SS | .284 | .330 | .386 | .716 | 99 |
| Rangers | as SS | .268 | .330 | .371 | .701 | 95 |
| Twins | as SS | .263 | .309 | .374 | .683 | 89 |
| Red Sox | as SS | .234 | .297 | .358 | .655 | 82 |
| Tigers | as SS | .250 | .302 | .342 | .644 | 79 |
| Orioles | as SS | .249 | .290 | .323 | .613 | 71 |
| Mariners | as SS | .231 | .262 | .335 | .597 | 65 |
| Royals | as SS | .222 | .251 | .319 | .570 | 58 |
Yowzers. Having a position perform that poor compared to its peers is how you lose lots of games. Only the Mariners LF (57) and the Twins 2B (54) were worse in the AL. We know the Royals always seem to have terrible SS, so was this the worst group of the decade?
| Year | sOPS+ | Primary SS |
| 2003 | 114 | Berroa |
| 2004 | 90 | Berroa |
| 2005 | 88 | Berroa |
| 2001 | 84 | Sanchez |
| 2008 | 76 | Aviles |
| 2007 | 73 | Pena |
| 2000 | 71 | Sanchez |
| 2002 | 60 | Perez |
| 2009 | 58 | Betancourt |
| 2006 | 56 | Berroa |
Nope, somehow the 2006 crew of Berroa and Blanco was worse. I think this chart can be summed up as "be careful what you wish for". While Berroa went downhill on offense and was the primary SS in the worst season of the decade, he had 3 pretty good seasons at the plate.
So clearly the SS position is an obvious place to upgrade the team. It was so bad, that an upgrade merely to league average would be a huge boost. However, there seem to be no attempts by the Royals to make a change at the SS position. They are content with Yuniesky Betancourt for the time being and they might give Aviles a shot if he is recovered.
