After breaking out of a dreaded 10-game skid with a sweep of Cleveland last weekend, manager Ned Yost declared that the Royals “are a better team than the 10-game-losing streak showed.”

Some statistics back up that statement. On April 11, following the last of the 10 losses, the Royals’ 4.5 runs per game was just below the American League average. They were also in the middle of the pack in slugging and in on-base-plus-slugging percentage (OPS). And on that date, their six quality starts from pitchers was in the upper half of the league.

So, if the offense and starting pitching was average to above, what was the problem during that stretch? One word: bullpen.

The Royals had blown four of six save opportunities, and seemed to have no answer for how to close out a game they should win.

While a myriad of problems led to the 58-104 disaster of 2018, the bullpen was the leading culprit. Losing with youngsters in the everyday lineup and in the starting rotation was bad enough. But when the team had a chance to win, blown opportunities by the bullpen were particularly galling.

The Royals thought they had purged the worst of last year’s relievers. They cut ties with Blaine Boyer, Justin Grimm, Brandon Maurer and Burch Smith – guys who combined to allow 181 hits and 141 runs over 143.2 innings.

They added two veterans in Brad Boxberger – a former closer in Arizona – and Jake Diekman, a tandem that couldn’t possibly be as bad as the quartet they’d just banished. Could they?

Turns out, in the early going, they could.

Boxberger, in particular, has been dreadful. He’s surrendered more than a run per inning, and his pitching has led directly to a loss three times already in this short season. After Boxberger blew a lead on Monday at Chicago, Yost essentially stopped using him, turning to other options.

With a few more wins under their belts, things in the bullpen don’t seem quite as dire as they did a week ago. Despite the rough start, Diekman and Boxberger will probably remain a factor. They continue to take the same attitude as they took to begin the season.

“The most important thing to being successful is seeing every day as a new day,” said Boxberger, who, with 77 career saves, has seen his share of success. “No matter what happened the day before, you might be called upon again the next day, so you have to be able to put that out of your mind and believe you can succeed the next day.”

Diekman said that, on top of trying to pitch effectively, he and Boxberger will try to provide a veteran presence as Yost relies more and more on youngsters like Richard Lovelady and Scott Barlow.

“We have a lot of pitchers with very, very good arms,” Diekman said. “They might not be the most experienced down there, but they have the ability to have success up here. So if (Brad or I) can give them any knowledge or ease the growing pains, then we’re happy to do it.”

Yost tends to believe in veterans to know how to turn things around. A week ago he seemed to be more frustrated with the poor showing by those young members of the pen.

“We have some very young pitchers who need to understand how good they are when they step on the mound, and get on the attack,” he said after the sweep of Cleveland last Sunday. “They’ve got to trust their stuff and attack.”

The Royals opened the season with high hopes that oft-injured Kyle Zimmer was ready to play a role in the pen. But having so little in-game experience, Zimmer might not have been ready for the jump to the majors. He struggled with his command and was sent to the minors to figure things out.

Another guy who dropped the ball was Tim Hill, a key lefty last year. He was also sent down, as was the more experienced Kevin McCarthy.

Next to disappoint was Lovelady, whose promotion had been much anticipated due to his success in the minors. Other youngsters like Jake Newberry and Glen Sparkman have had spotty results as well.

But the season is still young. With the emergence of converted started Ian Kennedy as a reliable option in late innings, and expected improvement from Wily Peralta, there is still time for the pen to go from a weakness to a strength. Those two veterans, plus Barlow and Lovelady, combined to hold the fort in recent wins.

“We’ve got a really special group of guys,” said Barlow, who saw limited action in 2018 and is starting to see his role expand. “Everybody gets along really well and with everybody helping each other, I think down the road, as the days and weeks go by, we can really feed off each other and do something special.

“It’s a lot of just building off each other. We’re starting to get into a better routine, taking care of our business. We’re definitely asking the older guys for help when we need it. And as each guy pitches well, we’re feeding off of each other.”

The Kansas City Royals’ ongoing rebuilding process may have recently turned up another building block in starting pitcher Heath Fillmyer.

A virtual unknown just a few weeks ago, Fillmyer is quickly proving what he can do when given an opportunity.

And that is after he made a name for himself before even setting foot on a big league field.

Fillmyer put together a new career best Wednesday by shutting out the National League’s best team for seven innings. A few more outings like that victory over the Chicago Cubs will endear him to Royals fans in the same way he handled his call to the major leagues back in June.

Fillmyer made news for the way he informed his parents of his promotion to the big leagues. In Reno for a game with the Omaha Storm Chasers, Fillmyer was informed he would be promoted to the Royals late in the evening. Calling from the Pacific Time Zone to his parents in the Eastern Time Zone, however, was a problem. When he couldn’t awaken them in New Jersey to give them the good news, and to tell them to start making travel arrangements to see his debut, he sought help.

He called his girlfriend and had her go to his parents’ home, in the middle of the night, to wake them up. Apparently it wasn’t easy. The story of the young woman pounding on the door in the middle of the night brought Fillmyer a degree of notoriety before he put on a Royals’ uniform.

“When I went home for the All-Star break I saw a lot friends and family, people I grew up with, and they all got a kick out of it,” Fillmyer said. “They just said it’s typical of my family not to pick up the phone. It was funny and made it memorable for sure. It was something I’ll never forget.”

Fillmyer is making some more memories he’ll cherish, the best being the win over the Cubs. Injuries opened the door for him to step into the Royals starting rotation, and he’s making the most of the opportunity.

His four previous starts consisted of: 3 earned runs over 4.1 innings, 3 earned runs versus Boston on July 8; 1 earned run over 6.2 innings against Detroit on July 23; 3 earned runs over 5 innings at Yankee Stadium on July 28; a rain-shortened start at Minnesota in which he gave up 3 earned runs in 3 innings.

Each resulted in losses for the Royals. Until Wednesday, that is, when he throttled the National League’s best offense and picked up his first big league victory.

Having logged 37.1 innings in the major leagues, Fillmyer boasts an ERA of 3.13, a 1-1 record, and an impressive 1.286 combination of walks plus hits per innings pitched (WHIP).

“I’m grateful to get the opportunity to make those starts, and I just want to make the most of them. This is obviously the point that you want to be. You want to get these opportunities and you work for them. And when they come, you want to capitalize on them.”

Royals General Manager Dayton Moore has made numerous moves this year to convert veterans into prospects. Much has been made of the in-season trades of Kelvin Herrera and Mike Moustakas. Less attention was paid in January when Moore swapped veterans Ryan Buchter and Brandon Moss for Fillmyer and fellow pitcher Jesse Hahn of the Oakland A’s. Hahn had some big league experience in Oakland, so Fillmyer was the least-regarded of the four.

So no one expected the A’s fifth round pick in 2014 out of Mercer County Community College to dent the Royals rotation this year. His 5.75 ERA in a half season at Omaha didn’t help.

Yet here he is, throwing his hat in the ring for the Royals rotation of 2019 and beyond. Fillmyer joins Brad Keller, Burch Smith and the injured Eric Skoglund as rookies to start at least five games for Kansas City this year.

“It’s been a dream come true to be able to play the game you grew up admiring and to be at this level,” Fillmyer said. “It’s been humbling, but it’s also been great. I’ve been able to play against a lot of great players, and visit a lot of great ballparks. And hopefully the ride keeps going.”

The pitching-hungry Royals are kicking the tires on not just Fillmyer, Keller, Smith and Skoglund. The list of rookies trying to establish themselves in Kansas City includes Tim Hill, Jason Adam, Scott Barlow, Trevor Oaks, Glenn Sparkman and Eric Stout. One would expect the competition to be tense. But Fillmyer said the culture inside the clubhouse is uplifting.

“There’s just a lot of encouragement among us. There are a lot of great guys in here, and everybody is just rooting for each other. Everybody wants to have a piece of the success when it happens. When you have bad days, we try to pick each other up as best you can. It’s nice to be around guys like that.”

With hardly any of the fanfare of the annual NFL and NBA drafts, the major league baseball draft, which will begin Monday, will have a long lasting affect on the fortunes of the Royals, a franchise desperate for an infusion of new talent.

Not only will a lot of young amateurs become rich men tomorrow, but the futures of franchises will be largely determined by the selections made. The baseball draft is much more of a crapshoot than are the drafts of the other major sports. A surprisingly small percentage of the young players drafted will ever reach the major leagues, much less make a significant impact on the franchises that invested millions of dollars in them.

With a farm system widely viewed as the worst in baseball, the Royals need to build upon the work they did in the draft a year ago. Fans have their hopes pinned on a crop of 2017 draftees who are currently honing their skills at the A-ball level. The Royals selected high school first baseman Nick Pratto in the first round, then added a couple of other highly thought-of prospects. Based on rankings from this spring, the Royals added their second, third and fourth best prospects in the most recent draft.

They have an excellent opportunity in 2018 to stockpile even more talent. Thanks to compensatory picks awarded for the loss of free agents, the Royals possess four of the top 40 picks in this draft.

It won’t be for several years, however, before we know if the Royals drafted well or not.

Even taking into account slow development, generally you expect a high round draft pick taken out of college to reach the majors in 2 to 3 years, and one from the high school ranks pick to reach within about 5 years. In each case, that puts the player arriving at the big league level at about 23 years of age.

Using this criteria, high school players drafted between 2008 and 2013, and college players drafted between 2010 and 2015 should make up at least a portion of the Royals roster. Some advance a little quicker, some develop a little slower.

With this in mind, the Royals current problems can be blamed in large part upon unproductive drafting in the first round the past several years.

Considering that baseball drafting is very hit and miss, the Royals were considerably effective with their top picks in the 2000s, which led directly to their success in 2014 and 2015. Zach Greinke (drafted in 2002 and flipped for key pieces in 2010), Billy Butler (2004), Alex Gordon (2005), Luke Hochevar (2006), Mike Moustakas (2007) and Eric Hosmer (2008) were all taken while the Royals drafted in enviably high positions each year, due to their dreadful performance at the big league level.

Sadly, time marches on, and the Royals needed to continue their run of success in the first round of the draft to backfill as those players aged and their big league contracts ran out. For a variety of reasons, that hasn’t happened.

Imagine if, in the five years following the drafting of Hosmer in 2008, the Royals had used first round draft picks on two front-line starting pitchers, a legitimate shortstop, third baseman and centerfielder. Those players would all be relatively new to the big leagues and under club control for the next several years. With pieces like that in place, the current rebuild would be more like a reload.

Unfortunately the players described above are not to be found in Kansas City.

In 2009, the Royals drafted Washburn Rural’s own Aaron Crow, a college pitcher who contributed to the Royals rebuild, but was derailed by injuries. In 2010, they took college shortstop Christian Colon, who was with the Royals during their World Series runs, but contributed little and is now unwanted by any team.

Then the really bad luck started. In 2011, the Royals felt compelled to draft Bubba Starling a local stud with limited baseball exposure. In 2012, they selected a coveted college pitcher named Kyle Zimmer. Injuries and poor performance have knocked these two completely off course, and it’s doubtful either will ever produce anything.

In 2013, the Royals drafted Hunter Dozier, who may still contribute something to the big league club, but certainly hasn’t set any worlds on fire.

If you want to make yourself ill, take a few minutes to look over the list of players drafted shortly AFTER the Royals made those selections. You’ll find names like Mike Trout, Chris Sale, Francisco Lindor and George Springer.

The Royals did do one thing for which they deserve credit: they drafted a couple of pitchers in 2013 and 2014 that they traded for key pieces in their World Series run. Pitchers being the commodity that they are, the Royals wisely dealt Sean Manaea and Brandon Finnegan to ensure a championship.

The bad luck continued in 2015 when the Royals used two first round picks on high school pitchers who have thus far been huge disappointments. In 2016, the Royals did not have a first round selection, having forfeited it to sign free agent Ian Kennedy.

So it’s easy to see why the top picks from 2017, and those who will be drafted this week, are so crucial to the Royals rebuild.

Now obviously, just as not all first round picks are sure-fire stars, first rounders aren’t the only ones who make it to the majors. Fortunately, the current Royals include some diamonds plucked from the rough, namely Danny Duffy and Eric Skoglund (3^rd round), Jason Adam (5^th round), Whit Merrifield (9^th round), Kevin McCarthy (16^th round), Jakob Junis (29^th round) and Tim Hill (32^nd round). The Royals need to continue to scour solid big leaguers from the lower rounds. But it’s in the first round they must turn the tide.

The Royals will make some young men very wealthy Monday. Will those draft picks restore the fortunes of the Royals in turn? Kansas City is the only team with four picks in the first round. Draft history shows that not all four of those picks will reach the major leagues, much less turn into stars. But the addition of several quality prospects, combined with the solid class taken in 2017, could go a long ways toward shaping a brighter future for the franchise.

Fans eager for a rebuild of the Kansas City Royals have questioned why management filled the lineup with veterans. With each signing of a stopgap – Alcides Escobar, Lucas Duda, Mike Moustakas and Jon Jay – observers wondered why the Royals would delay the anticipated youth movement. The team was expected to be bad anyway, so why not give the prospects on-the-job training.

Those fans may still wonder what’s going on, but a youth movement is taking place in an area they may not have noticed.

While the veterans take the field each night, take a peek into the bullpen and you’ll see plenty of fresh faces – guys cutting their teeth one inning at a time, without fanfare or even much notice by the casual fan.

A few years ago, the Royals employed a unique combination of average starting pitching and historically dominant relief pitching to reach two World Series, winning one. The tactic was revolutionary.

Aside from current closer Kelvin Herrera, that crew has since moved on. But perhaps the pieces are coming together to form another effective bullpen for the Royals to build upon.

Lefthander Tim Hill is leading the rebuild, slinging biting darts from a three-quarters angle that are nearly unhittable by left-handed hitters.

At 28, Hill is somewhat old by rookie standards. Three years ago, Hill’s path to the big leagues was slowed by a life-threatening bout with colon cancer. But having been drafted out of college at 24 years of age, he didn’t spend much time in the minors. Hill has been designated a reliever from day one and advanced quickly through the farm system.

Still, Hill didn’t have a lot of assurance he would break spring camp with the Royals in March. The Royals added veterans to the bullpen mix over the winter, and it looked like Hill would start the season in Triple A at Omaha. But Hill so impressed Yost during spring training, not only did he promote him to the big league roster, but called on him in pressure situations from the get-go.

“It was pretty special finding out that I was going to be on the opening day roster,” said the product of Bacone College in Muskogee, Okla. “It was something you’ve been working for years, basically your whole life, to get to have that moment.”

Hill started out red hot. He didn’t allow a hit in his first six appearances, and at that point his ERA was a dazzling 1.35. He has since cooled off, but remains one of Yost’s trusted assets.

The Royals broke camp with veterans Brandon Maurer, Justin Grimm and Blaine Boyer looking to set the table for Herrera. But quickly that formula was scrapped as Yost turned more and more to a collection of rookies in the bullpen, including Burch Smith and Brad Keller. Also making their debuts out of the bullpen have been Scott Barlow, Eric Stout and Overland Park native Jason Adam.

“Timing has a lot to do with it,” Hill said of the opportunity the rookies are being given. “You have to be pitching well, obviously, and then there has to be that opportunity. Those two things don’t always go hand in hand.

“There are lot of guys out there, in different organizations, who have the ability but just aren’t getting the opportunity. Or the opening is there, but they aren’t pitching well at the right time.”

Yost has yet to solidify a 7^th and 8^th inning tandem to set up Herrera, but Hill said time will sort out the roles in the bullpen.

“Everybody’s out there just cheering each other on,” Hill said “As the season goes on, roles kind of get established. But that kind of takes care of itself. I don’t think we (the relievers) should worry about what our role is. We should just focus on going out there when they give you a job to do, and just do that job that day. If everybody can just do their job well, we’ll be pretty good.”