Lumber Jac? You know? I’m ok with it
If you were living under a rock or on the moon, perhaps you missed the news. Jac Caglianone hit his first career home run yesterday. Jaylon Thompson wrote about it for The Star:
In the second inning, Caglianone hit a 95.5 mph fastball off Rangers reliever Jacob Latz that landed in the Rangers’ bullpen. The homer traveled 387 feet and had a 106.5 mph exit velocity.
Caglianone waited 14 games before circling the bases. He generated headlines in the minor leagues for his raw power. The Royals are witnessing it firsthand following his MLB debut earlier this month.
Seriously. A foot above the strike zone!!!! 106.5 MPH and long gone.
— Hokius (Everspace 2) (@hokius.fromthehawkseye.com) 2025-06-19T19:01:28.574Z
That? That’s the pitch he hit?
After the homer, his teammates gave him the “silent treatment”:
“I didn’t realize until I went back to the video how far up I got him,” Caglianone said. “Off the bat, I wasn’t sure and I was booking it. I saw Adolis (Garcia) and Evan (Carter) look like they had a good bead on it. I just booked it out of the box and thankfully it went out.”
…Witt was all smiles postgame. He said the team orchestrated the silent treatment with a collective agreement. “We all wanted to do something fun,” Witt said. And it was well worth it.
Caglianone pretended to give high fives to his teammates. Then, he was swarmed by guys and received a big hug from Perez. Caglianone waited 14 games to hit a home run and felt the experience was something he would never forget.
And then he hit another bomb, becoming the first Royal “since Mark Quinn in 1999 to hit first two career homers in the same game”.
Thompson also wrote about how Maikel Garcia changed things this year and could be an All-Star:
Garcia made a major adjustment to his batting stance this past offseason. It came on the heels of a disappointing 2024 campaign. He admitted he was chasing home runs after hitting two in his first three games last season.
Garcia went back to the drawing board and added a toe-tap to his batting stance. He opted against playing playing winter ball, too, focusing instead on the looming 2025 season.
Jaylon’s a busy man. He also wrote about the Royals approach to the trade deadline:
“I think it’s going to be a lot of action late in July …” Royals general manager J.J. Picollo said on 96.5 The Fan’s Cody and Gold show. “If you have a bunch of teams that are 3-4 games out of the wild card — like the American League right now — there are all but three teams that should believe they are going to make the playoffs.
“You wouldn’t expect a lot of heavy trading to happen in early July.”
I guess this is “good” news. Anne Rogers’s headline confuses me: “Ragans (shoulder) gets positive second opinion, shut down until July”:
While in Texas this week, Ragans received a second opinion on his diagnosis, which is standard practice for players. The evaluation showed what the Royals originally thought: Ragans is dealing with a rotator cuff strain, but it isn’t severe enough to require more than rest and recovery…
“Could be a lot worse,” Ragans said. “Obviously, I don’t want to be on the IL. I want to be out there helping this team and these guys. But it could be a lot worse.”
Blog time!
The Royals Reporter, Kevin O’Brien, leads us off, writing about yesterday’s game:
The swing against Garcia is what Royals fans were used to seeing from Cags in Northwest Arkansas and Omaha this season: Relaxed, compact, and powerful. Not only did Cags produce an exit velocity of 110.2 MPH on the homer, but his swing speed was also 80.8 MPH, the third-fastest swing speed of the game (only Adolis Garcia and Kyle Isbel produced faster swings).
A significant source of fan frustration with Cags entering this game was his inability to launch the ball at the Major League level. Even though it’s a small sample, Cags is only averaging a launch angle of 4.6 degrees (subpar) and a LA Sweet-Spot% of 33.3% (which is around league average).
Both Craig Brown and David Lesky ($) had posts up about Wednesday’s game and Maikel Garcia.
Craig Brown had a post up about Wednesday’s game a:
Blog Roundup:
- Darin Watson at U.L.’s Toothpick: This Date In Royals History—1985 Edition: June 19 – Hal McRae breaks a 2-2 tie with an eighth-inning home run as KC defeats Minnesota
- Jacob Milham at KOK: Why Salvador Perez needs less time catching for KC Royals
- Caleb Moody at KOK: Jac Caglianone’s sensational showing caps off KC Royals’ major morale-boosting series
- Parker Buchele at KC Kingdom: Royals Midseason Reality Check: Maybe We Got Ahead of Ourselves
- Patrick Glancy at Powder Blue Nostalgia: Junk Wax – A lapsed collector looks back on the hobby
I’m going to be out the next couple of weeks as I’ll be witnessing the carnage of the Battle for Grass Creek in person. This seems like the right week to do the first half recap. Just looking over these, we had a bit of a radio theme going for these past few months.
2025.01.03 Christmas Movies (“White Christmas” – Bing Crosby)
2025.01.10 What would you take with you in an emergency? (“6pm” – Animal Crossing City Folk)
2025.01.17 The History of Rock and Roll (“The History of Rock and Roll” Timesweeps)
2025.01.24 Van Halen (2024 Sammy Hagar Concert in Houston)
2025.01.31 Superb Owl Facts (“Who Are You?” – The Who)
2025.02.07 Essential X-Men (“X-Men 97” intro)
2025.02.14 OUT
2025.02.21 Disney Plus Movie Reviews (“Field of Dreams” monologue)
2025.02.28 AI Poisoning (“Vivi’s Theme” – Final Fantasy IX)
2025.03.07 Backyard birds of Houston (Rockin’ Robin – Bobby Day)
2025.03.14 Asia Preview: CPBL (“Lycanthropy” – Cardi from “Just Shapes & Beats”)
2025.03.21 Asia Preview: KBO (“One Shining Moment” 2022 edition)
2025.03.28 Day after Opening Day MLB OT (“The Boys of Summer” – The Ataris)
2025.04.04 Asia Preview: NPB (Yakult Swallows highlight video)
2025.04.11 Wonka (Grunka Lunka Song from Futurama)
2025.04.18 Birdfeeder Squirrel Battles (Backyard Squirrel Maze video)
2025.04.25 Kids Books IV (“Thunder Road” – F-Zero GX)
2025.05.02 OUT
2025.05.09 Converting cassettes to digital (“Deuces are Wild” – Aerosmith)
2025.05.16 Year End Z-Rock 50: 1993 (“Big Gun” – AC/DC)
2025.05.23 OUT
2025.05.30 OUT
2025.06.06 Bad Traffic Everywhere (Paul Rudd SNES/Switch 2 commercials)
2025.06.13 Random Movie reviews (“Golden Reminiscence (Kechawacha)” – Monster Hunter)
2025.06.20 2025 First Half Recap
2025.06.27 OUT
2025.07.04 OUT
Mammoth is back. Wolfgang Van Halen is working on a 3rd album and going on tour this fall. The video for the first single, “The End”, is our song of the day. It’s directed by Robert Rodriguez; it stars Danny Trejo; it has cameos by Valerie Bertinelli (Wolfgang’s mother), Myles Kennedy, and Slash; and it has homages to “Hot for Teacher” (the table scene) and “Thriller” (most of the video).
If you want the whole “story” of the Wolfs in order, it starts with “Don’t Back Down” from the first album, then “Another Celebration at the End of the World” from the second album (which was featured in this 2023 Friday Rumblings), and continues with then “The End” (below).
Aside: I miss when rock and alternative were more popular. In late 90s Kansas City, I had 4 different radio stations to choose from when driving. That also meant there was more space for one-hit wonders and moderately successful bands to get wide release. Sure, I might only like a couple of songs from a band, but that’s two more than I’d hear now when those sort of bands wouldn’t even be given a chance.
(NSFW Warning: there’s lots of cheesy gore; there’s also some language in the intro, though not in the song)