Royals Sign Truby

True to his word Allard Baird signed a "stop gap third baseman" today in soon to be 31 year-old Chris Truby. Truby has bounced around a bit playing with Houston, Montreal, Detroit, and Tampa Bay since 2000. The discouraging thing is that in 884 career plate appearances he has walked a grand total of 38 times. His lack of patience makes Terrance Long look like a "plate discipline guy".

To his credit he did have a good season in AAA hitting .300 with 25 homeruns and 41 doubles in 130 games in Nashville and was the Sounds MVP. He walked 47 times and struck out 96 times in his 466 at bats. By all accounts he is a good defensive third baseman and even played some second and short for the Sounds in 2004.

To me this move is basically a lateral one. Jed Hansen looks to be the same player with a little more plate discipline. I'd still rather see some kind of radical experiment with Ken Harvey until Mark Teahan is ready. Oh well.