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Most of the press suggests that KC will have solid position players at multiple spots very soon. The problem is/will be the pitching. If Greinke can come back & Hochevnar lives up to the hype, that'd be two young starters. Meche is a gamble, but 1)you need a t least one veteran to take the ball every 5th day, and 2)they had to overpay to get anyone. I'd compare it to the Pudge/Magglio signings by Detroit in terms of trying to re-establish KC as a destination for free agents. Problem is those 3 represent the only arms I hear much about, other than retread bullpen projects.
OF-Gathright
OF-Dejesus
3B-Gordon
DH-Butler
OF-Teahan
1B-Shealy
2B-Grud.
C-Buck
SS-Berroa
Now I'm looking ahead, and commiting the sin of leaving Mike Sweeney out, but that lineup 1-7 has huge upside. Further, I'm not sold on Gathright, but Dejesus is competent leading off, and doing so can drop Butler in corner OF and put Sweeney's bat in the lineup. You can get away with marginal offensive production is at C & SS, but you have to be able to defend at those spots. Hence the faster they can get rid of Berroa the better. If (enormous if) Hochevnar and Greinke are legitimate and Meche is a 3 starter, this team might be able to compete in the relatively near future. That being said, until the pitching situation has fewer question marks I don't see .500 baseball in their future. But I have much greater trust in Moore than his predecessor, so hopefully in a few years they'll have graduated from spoiler to contender.
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