It All Comes Down To Pitching

Pitching is everything in baseball. With PERFECT pitching, you might not win a game...but you certainly won't lose. The Royals haven't had the type of pitching staff that attracts any sort of respect or attention in a long time. This year COULD be different. Zack Greinke is coming off of a Cy-Young winning year, Gil Meche IS healthy by all accounts, Brian Bannister is also healthy, Aaron Crow did exactly what he needed to do Saturday, Noel Arguelles has the attention of club officials, Joakim Soria is still on the roster...the Royals have some very promising pitching in there organization this year.
Overall, I don't know if Dayton Moore is the right man for the Royals. A case can certainly be made that he has done his job thus far, however. Remember what kind of pitching this team had when he arrived in the summer of 2006 (from http://www.baseball-almanac.com/teamstats/roster.php?y=2006&t=KCA):

48	Jeremy Affeldt	6-04	185	Left	Left	1979-06-06
39	Steve Andrade	6-01	220	Right	Right	1978-02-06
27	Denny Bautista	6-05	170	Right	Right	1980-08-23
58	Adam Bernero	6-04	205	Right	Right	1976-11-28
38	Chris Booker	6-03	235	Right	Right	1976-12-09
47	Ryan Braun	6-01	215	Right	Right	1980-07-29
50	Ambiorix Burgos	6-03	225	Right	Right	1984-04-19
36	Jorge de la Rosa	6-01	190	Left	Left	1981-04-05
47	Elmer Dessens	6-00	190	Right	Right	1971-01-13
53	Jose Diaz	6-00	240	Right	Right	1980-04-13
52	Scott Dohmann	6-01	180	Right	Right	1978-02-13
38	Brandon Duckworth	6-02	185	Right	Both	1976-01-23
37	Scott Elarton	6-07	240	Right	Right	1976-02-23
36	Seth Etherton	6-01	200	Right	Right	1976-10-17
41	Jimmy Gobble	6-03	190	Left	Left	1981-07-19
23	Zack Greinke	6-02	200	Right	Right	1983-10-21
40	Runelvys Hernandez	6-01	205	Right	Right	1978-04-27
34	Luke Hudson	6-03	195	Right	Right	1977-05-02
22	Bobby Keppel	6-05	205	Right	Right	1982-06-11
54	Mike MacDougal	6-04	195	Right	Both	1977-03-05
22	Joe Mays	6-01	185	Right	Both	1975-12-10
55	Joe Nelson	6-01	210	Right	Right	1974-10-25
43	Leo Nunez	6-01	160	Right	Right	1983-08-14
57	Joel Peralta	5-11	170	Right	Right	1976-03-23
45	Odalis Perez	6-00	225	Left	Left	1977-06-11
21	Mark Redman	6-05	220	Left	Left	1974-01-05
51	Andrew Sisco	6-10	270	Left	Left	1983-01-13
39	Kyle Snyder	6-08	220	Right	Both	1977-09-09
36, 63	Steve Stemle	6-04	200	Right	Right	1977-05-20
56	Todd Wellemeyer	6-03	205	Right	Right	1978-08-30
46	Mike Wood	6-03	180	Right	Right	1980-04-26

What remains? Zack Greinke. And remember, it wasn't an easy decision to keep Greinke that year. I think if most fans and other GMs are being honest, that cannot easily say that they would have been patient with Zack. Moore's patience paid off and then some. He is responsible for Greinke's contract extension and his patience resulted in keeping around a Cy-Young Award winner. They don't teach that stuff in GM school.
The rest of Moore's positive pitching moves are:
-Traded Tony Graffanino for Jorge de la Rosa (hey, he showed SOME flashes)
-Traded Ambiorix Burgos for Brian Bannister (one of his best trades to date, in my opinion)
-Traded Daniel Christensen for Ramon Colon
-Traded Octavio Dotel for Kyle Davies
-Traded Future Considerations for Ramon Ramirez
- Signed Gil Meche (and signed him for "too much" at the time. A somewhat ballsy move that paid off)
-Picked up Robinson Tejeda
-Drafted Joakim Soria (who?? at the time) in the Rule 5 Draft
-2007, his first Amateur Draft with the Royals, he selected pitchers Sam Runion, Daniel Duffy, and Mitch Hodge (Runion...oops. Duffy is promising, ranked as the organization's #8 prospect, and I haven't heard much about Hodge, other than he is in the Rookie league)
-2008, he drafted pitchers Mike Montgomery, Tyler Sample, Tim Melville and John Lamb (Montgomery appears to be a good prospect, maybe Sample as well).
-2009, Aaron Crow, Chris Dwyer, and Louis Coleman (Aaron Crow looks as good as you could hope for thus far, and honestly I don't know enough about Dwyer or Coleman to make an educated statement).

There have been many bad signings and trades along the way, but look at the 2010 roster of pitchers:

	Pitchers	B/T	Ht	Wt	DOB
	45 Noel Arguelles	L/L	6-3	220	01/12/90
	19 Brian Bannister	R/R	6-1	215	02/28/81
	56 Roman Colon	R/R	6-5	245	08/13/79
	43 Aaron Crow	R/R	6-3	190	11/11/86
	37 Juan Cruz	R/R	6-1	165	10/15/78
	34 Kyle Davies	R/R	6-1	210	09/09/83
	40 Kyle Farnsworth	R/R	6-4	230	04/14/76
	23 Zack Greinke	R/R	6-2	190	10/21/83
	80 Gaby Hernandez	R/R	6-3	215	05/21/86
	44 Luke Hochevar	R/R	6-5	220	09/15/83
	31 Dusty Hughes	L/L	5-10	185	06/29/82
	54 Anthony Lerew	L/R	6-4	225	10/28/82
	47 Victor Marte	R/R	6-2	255	11/08/80
	55 Gil Meche	R/R	6-3	220	09/08/78
	49 Edgar Osuna	L/L	6-1	185	11/25/87
	53 Carlos Rosa	R/R	6-1	210	09/21/84
	48 Joakim Soria	R/R	6-3	200	05/18/84
	51 Robinson Tejeda	R/R	6-2	245	03/24/82
	38 Blake Wood	R/R	6-5	230	08/08/85

I don't know about you, but it looks a lot better to me. The potential rotations that have been thrown out lately would be the best since Moore took over. The Royals have legitimate 1 and 2 starters now in Zack Greinke and Gil Meche...looks pretty good compared to Mark Redman and Scott Elarton. In my opinion, there is real competition for the rest of the spots in the rotation...competition is a very welcomed and foreign idea in Royals Spring Training.