Exhibit 13.7

The Royals have named Kevin Seitzer their new hitting coach. Hmm, let's see if I can find his business card somewhere. Ah, here we go:


Not only does that illuminate the startling lack of pertinent information found on my own business cards, but it pretty much says it all it needs to about Seitzer's qualifications for this or any other job. I'd hire Seitzer to reupholster my sofa and marry my sister if I could.

I've already written about Seitzer here, but I didn't come right out and admit the horrible truth: Kevin Seitzer is my favorite baseball player. I liked him better than George Brett as a child which is why I currently have a Kevin Seitzer Starting Lineup figure on my work desk while my brother has a presumably more valuable George Brett Starting Lineup figure in a closet somewhere.

(ed note: I looked into this. Neither is worth anything which is good because I'm not selling. Not unless the price goes over $1.75. Then I might sell. Sorry, Kev, but a guy has to raise money if his sister ever wants a husband).

Seitzer was never quite as good as his remarkable rookie season which just so happened to occur at the same time and in the same league as Mark McGwire's even more remarkable rookie season (49 home runs!). Benito Santiago, who won the Rookie of the Year in the NL that year, had an OPS+ 17 points lower than Seitzer's, and while Santiago was a catcher, it's still almost a certainty that Seitzer would have won it over him had they been in the same league. Seitzer also had far better all around numbers than 1986's AL winner, Jose Canseco, but Canseco hit a lot of HRs so it probably would have been a tossup. 1988's AL winner was the absolutely dreadful Walt Weiss. How that season (.633 OPS, 81 OPS+) managed to get anyone, even a shortstop, a Rookie of the Year award is beyond me (although all the rookies were dreadful that year. Reading the names of the other finalists is like reading names off of tombstones).

I wish Seitzer could have won the Rookie of the Year because I think his career might have gone quite a bit differently if he had. If nothing else, he probably wouldn't have been unceremoniously released by the Royals in the middle of spring training in 1992. At that point, everyone seemed to realize that he was never going to be George Brett, but as a kid who willingly traded George Brett cards straight up for Kevin Seitzer cards, it seemed like an insult to one of the cornerstone members of the team.

Rumors had it that Seitzer was a bit of a wild asshole during the first half of his Royals tenure (he drank too much) and then too much of a sanctimonious asshole during the second half (he stopped drinking and found [De]Jesus), but by all accounts he's a great guy, a class act now, and the Royals are lucky to have him back.

--Adam Peterson

Bats: Scare Him
Throws: Sort of Sissy Like
This Way To The Clubhouse: Adam went undrafted in baseball and every other sport.