News
A Royal Affair - KC Royals GM Dayton Moore -
Kyle Galdeira
03/14/07
One reason why players, fans and management look forward to Spring Training is
because everything that happened last year doesn't matter. The slate is wiped clean, and every team is even--as far as standings are concerned.
So, for Kansas City Royals general manager Dayton Moore, there is no better place to leave the team's recent history than where it should remain: a distant memory. As the first-year G.M. took a moment to discuss his plans for the Royals with HWB at the team's Spring Training facility in Surprise, Ariz., it became evident that he is taking a bottom-up approach to improving upon last year's 62-100 record.
"We need to develop from within, and need to build one of the very best scouting and player-development structures in all of baseball," Moore says of his most daunting long-term goals. "We've added a team at the lower level of our farm system, so we'll have three [minor league teams] in total. That's going to give us more of an opportunity to sign and develop younger players, and create more competition at the full-season level."
Moore has been a consistent supporter of the HWB League and currently sits on the league's executive committee. One of the reasons why he finds the league so attractive is the presence of International talent and untapped potential.
"We've been dead last in baseball in terms of the resources that we've allocated towards [tapping in to] International baseball," Moore says. "We're going to appropriate funds in the International areas to, hopefully, win the negotiations with good players, and then develop them properly."
This past season, Kansas City sent four players to the HWB League: right-handed pitchers Gilbert De la Vara and Jarod Plummer; and first basemen Brian McFall and Mike Stodolka. Moore hopes that the extra time spent honing their skills will pay off for both the players and organization.
"Winter Leagues are very important for the development of players and getting guys the chance to have more at-bats, and most importantly, compete," Moore says. "What we like about the Hawaii winter league is that it provides a great alternative for a lot of players who aren't ready to go and play [in other leagues like] the Caribbean Federation to develop their skills and be in a competitive league that they enjoy. But the bottom line is that it helps develop them as players."
Moore started in the Atlanta Braves organization as an area scouting supervisor, so he realizes the importance of finding, acquiring and molding young players. After two years, he was promoted to assistant director of scouting, and eventually climbed the ladder to director of scouting and player development. But, he felt that the opportunity to take over a struggling Royals organization was a worthy project to undertake.
After all, there is nowhere to go from the cellar but up.
