This piece predicts the Royals will sign Rafael Furcal, Paul LoDuca and Bobby Abreu this off-season.

And trade Mark Teahen.

Those that suggested Seitzer got thier wish as he will take over as batting coach. Gibbons, former Toronto manager will be the bench coach, and appearently Rusty Kuntz decided that he couldn't stay away and will be back on the mic for 2009.

Kevin Seitzer has been named hitting coach and John Gibbons - the former Blue Jays manager - has been named bench coach for 2009. Former 3B coach Luis Silverio will serve in Player Development. Rusty Kuntz returns as 1B coach and Dave Owen becomes the new 3B coach.

Discuss!

Is it fair to raise ticket prices for us fans?

Glass has made a big profit the last couple seasons. Maybe he should eat a $1 per seat for most of the seats to keep the prices low. I know that tickets are already low compared to the rest of the league, but so is our talent level.

Rany has written another guest column at fivethirtyeight, which is run by BP's own Nate Silver. He muses on the possibility of Bin Laden acting as another October surprise (as he was, of sorts, in 2004).

Worth a read. You may have to scroll down a bit to get to the post with Rany's column.

At least half the people I've seen on ESPN this afternoon sound as if they want him dead.

A nation is shaken.

Joe Po interview at MLBinterviews.com...

We all know that hitting coaches and other assistant coaches can potentially add 10-15 wins a year to a team. Jamie Quirk, a former Royal and wingman to crab aficianado George Brett, has helped lead a team to the World Series as a bench coach with the Rockies. Alan Cockrell, a KCK native, helped the Rox lead the league in OBA in 2007 as hitting instructor.

Could we see one or both of these men hired in Kansas City to replace Mike Barnett and Luis Silverio? If hired, should we already begin printing "Royals: 2009 AL Central Division Champion" t-shirts?

Interesting post on Prince Fielder and where he may land. In the comments section there are several comments about a Greinke for Fielder swap. Initially I thought it sounded good but I think we could do much, much better.

I also saw that J.J. Hardy is a possible trade candidate. What does everyone think, would Greinke+Teahen+prospect land Fielder + Hardy? My feeling is that it might take more or depend on who the prospect is, but I don't think I'm great at judging trades. I don't know about Fielder - career 130 OPS+ and .370 OBP is pretty good, but I'm not sure about is defense (fielding pct. below ML avg, I couldn't find zone ratings).

Would someone like Hochevar or Davies bring back one of the two, if a prospect was thrown in? Thoughts?