Remember that ace Dayton Moore traded away his top prospects for? Yeah, well now he’s a mediocre starting pitcher for the Kansas City Royals.
James Shields now has the highest ERA and WHIP on the Royals starting staff, and after his former success it makes everyone think, “What happened to James Shields?”
James Shields started off the year as the team’s clear ace, but as the year has progressed, his ERA has risen from 2.02 on April 27th to 3.79 on June 26th. James Shields has made 12 starts during this span of time, and of those 12 starts, only four have been quality.
There are a few reasons why Shields has spun himself into the ground in the last two months:
He’s pitching for a contract-
James Shields is set to hit free agency at the end of the 2014. An explanation for Shields’ mediocricy could be that Shields is trying to earn himself a high paying contract by pitching really well in 2014. News flash, James: You’re sucking up the joint, and your pocket book is taking a hit nearly every time you pitch.
He wants out-
Although I feel like it would be beneath him to do this, maybe he wants out of Kansas City. Maybe he knows that the team isn’t going anywhere, and wants to be traded to somebody who has a better chance at winning a pennant. This brings up the point that nobody wants a pitcher who was supposed to be an ace, but ended up cowarding out because he didn’t like who he was playing for.
Dead arm-
James Shields isn’t exactly young. At 32 years of age, Shields has been in the bigs since 2006. In every year except 2006, Shields has thrown more than 200 innings in all of them. Over seven years, that would be almost 1500 innings. Maybe Ned Yost should give Bruce Chen, who was recently recalled from rehab a start in attempt to rest Shields.
There have been many James Shields supporters, but I cannot jump on that bandwagon. I want to like Shields because I feel like he’s a good guy, but while he is pitching so average (for lack of better word), I cannot.
Just when I think I can start to finally give some love to “Big Game” James, he makes a less than quality start that makes me re-think whether he is truly the ace of this starting staff.
I think somebody broke James Shields. I don’t know who, but somebody needs to fix him. Whether it’s pitching coach Dave Eiland, or it’s something that he needs to work out on his own, it needs to be done in a timely manner.
KC is going to have trouble continuing to compete in their division if Shields cannot get back to ace form.
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