Royals aren't even the best at being the worst

The only possible way to salvage some good of mostly bad is to be the worst. If you're the worst, at least you're No. 1 at something.

That, my friends, is why I pity the Kansas City Royals. They don't stand a chance of being the worst ever, especially after their recent hot streak.

Now, I'm getting tired of hearing all this stuff about the 2003 Detroit Tigers and the 1962 New York Mets, especially the '62 Mets. But let me let you in on a little secret. The Mets aren't the worst team ever, not by a long shot.

Here's the thing about New York. When they're good, they have to be the best. At least in their mind or minds. When they're bad, they have to be the worst. So, the people of New York started this thing about the Mets being the worst team ever and the lap dog media of the United States, picked it up without ever looking it up to see if the Mets were really the worst team ever. They weren't. In the world of bad teams, they were in next-to-last place by a long shot.

Now, for your information, the worst team in baseball history was the Cleveland Spiders of 1899, who finished the 154-game schedule that year with an incredibly inept record of just 20 wins and 134 losses. Even our poor, once pathetic Royals don't rate with that club. They won their 20th game in late June.

In fact, things got so bad that the Spiders quit playing at home as they were drawing consistent crowds of 500 and such. They wound up playing just 41 home games.

But as bad as the Kansas City management and ownership has been over the past few years, nothing can remotely compare with what went on in turn-of-the-(20th)century Cleveland. Things were so messed up in those days that one owner could own more than one team. Now, that's innovative. The owner simply switched his good players to the St. Louis team and left Cleveland to flounder.

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Speak of St. Louis and bad baseball and the Browns come to mind. What I find odd is that the 2006 season marks the point in time that the team has spent more years in Baltimore than St. Louis, 53-52. It only took them two years to top their first home tenure as they began and ended their stay in Milwaukee after one campaign, then began that little lamented, long run at Sportsmen's Park.

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I wrote that piece a while back about the one-time Kansas City Royals who have died and found a list of 16 former members of that team who are deceased. I wondered if that was a bit high, so I also figured the other expansion teams that came in with the Royals in 1969, the Seattle Pilots-Milwaukee Brewers in the American League at first. And the National League's Montreal Expos and San Diego Padres. Guess what! In this, the Royals are in first place, having lost the following former players: Jerry Adair, Ken Brett, Al Cowens, Joe Foy, Vada Pinson, Juan Rios, Aurelio Monteagudo, Don O'Riley, Ken Sanders, Chris Zachary, Jerry May, Aurelio Lopez, Darrell Porter, Tony Solaita, Dan Quisenberry and recently, Moe Drabowsky.

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Well, well, Mizzou's new scheme didn't fit Thomas Gardner. There, friends, is one of the reasons the Tigers have struggled since the departure of Norm Stewart, who wouldn't have allowed selfish players who worried more about their stats then the two most important stats -- W's and L's -- for the team.

While Gardner averaged 19.7 points a game, he turned the ball over 92 times.

Coaches who recruit selfish players will recruit anybody who can run swiftly and put the ball in the hole. But, those coaches often lose their jobs. I won't name any specific coaches, however.