The streak is over. The American League completely ignored the 7-9 record and 1.62 WHIP of Cleveland's Aaron Laffey and named Kansas City's Zack Greinke as their 2009 Cy Young Award winner. With Greinke's accomplishment comes the realization that the Indians have no choice but to keep all of their pitchers next season and that my Tribe bobblehead collection is about to get fifteen more Grady Sizemores in occupational clothing.
Wednesday night's loss to the White Sox didn't help the Royals' playoff chances one bit. It was a sobering night for Royals fans, who now have to come to terms with the possibility that their team might not be playing baseball late into October.
Within four short years, Tony Pena, Jr. has mastered the art of hitting. 
Google has rendered private detectives largely unnecessary. The video game revolution has brought tough times upon jump rope manufacturers. And now, as Lackey reports, a pair of baseball-playing robots have been built. Yes, it's only a matter of time before today's baseball players are disenfranchised for the benefit of a weird-looking arm thing that sits on a table and chucks a baseball. 
This seriously happens to me every year.
Last Wednesday, esteemed reader Craig pointed me to a statistical pile of manure:You realize the Royals are 7-6, but 6-1 in games that Kyle Farnsworth has not appeared in?Entering Saturday, the Royals are now 8-2 without him. The Royals haven't been 8-2 in any context since, like, 1207. As a Royals fan and unconditional Farnsworth apologist, this is difficult for me to accept. It doesn't make sense. My guess is that they only trot Farnsworth out there because he's insufferable to be around in the bullpen. At least, that's what I've learned from spying on his chat room conversations over the last five years or so.
As longtime readers of The Dugout are aware, the Royals are one of our pet franchises. We tend to ignore teams like the Astros, mostly because we're too busy writing story arcs about an obscure Royals utility infielder possessing superhuman abilities, or the Royals' owner assuming the role of a contemporary Satan, or the Royals' manager living out of a grocery cart.
Watchmaker, Part One
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