From his time in the St. Louis Cardinals organization as a player and manager, Mike Matheny felt blessed to know Lou Brock not just as an iconic ballplayer but as a person.
“I consider Lou Brock a friend,” the Royals’ manager said Monday, a day after Brock passed away at the age of 81. “How amazing of a statement is that? He and his wife, Jackie, are special people. Lou navigated being a superstar and then kind of a folk hero and was always a bright light in the community and in that organization.”
The baseball world is mourning Brock’s passing. But his style of play -- the style that resulted in 12 consecutive seasons of more than 50 stolen bases and 938 steals overall -- departed long ago. The adoption of advanced analytics and understanding of the detriment of stolen-base success rates below 80% has contributed to a significant decline in attempts.
In 1974, Brock set a record (since broken by Rickey Henderson) with 118 steals in a single season.
Last year, the Royals, as a team, stole 117 bases -- and that was the second-highest total in the Majors (the Rangers led with 131).
“It’s a lost art,” Matheny said.
But while a hefty theft total the likes of which Brock and Henderson once brought to the game might never return, Matheny wants the Royals to be the type of team that combines speed and power and is opportunistic enough on the bases to distract opposing pitchers.
Such speed, after all, was a major component of what made the Royals’ teams of 2014-15 such an October threat.
“You have to be able to show you will take a base to make them think about you taking a base, which then becomes an advantage for the offense,” Matheny said. “You can’t imagine what it does opening up the field a little bit -- how it takes away from a pitcher’s stuff if he has to slide step, and he might not be very good at slide-stepping, and he takes away from his velocity or his location comes up a little bit because he’s trying to be quicker with his lower half.”
That’s the impact Brock had on many a pitcher in his day. But in the wake of his passing, those who had the privilege of interacting with him remember the impact he made as a person, too.
“Lou was battling [health issues] quite a bit for a while,” Matheny said. “But he would always show up with a smile on his face and was the exact same guy every time I saw him. I miss him. He was a good person.”
Perez getting close
Matheny said catcher Salvador Perez, on the injured list because of blurred vision in his left eye, took live at-bats Sunday at the team’s alternate training site. There is hope that Perez could be activated by the time the Royals return to Kansas City on Friday for a three-game series with the Pirates.
“I got some video, and he was taking some good at-bats,” Matheny said. “That’s what we’re looking for. See the ball, feel comfortable. The medical team gives us clearance that he’s in a good spot medically and everything’s pointing in the right direction. Now it’s about taking it to the baseball side and having him get those repetitions at the plate.”
Worth noting
• Jorge Soler was out of the starting lineup a second straight day Monday with an right oblique issue.
• The Royals’ taxi squad for the Cleveland series: left-hander Richard Lovelady, right-hander Scott Blewett, super-utility man Erick Mejia and catcher Oscar Hernández.