if the Kansas City Royals were to land Carlos Zambrano, Dayton Moore would be two for two on high-upside pitchers who certainly have their detractors. Compared to one another, however, Zambrano is in a class of his own.
Zambrano's competitive and sometimes petulant nature hasn't stopped Royals GM Dayton Moore from discussing him in a recent radio interview with 610Sports. In the conversation, the topic comes up on whether or not the Royals would be interested and the answer from Moore was quite positive for what should just be a random rumor.
"We would have to be interested," said Moore. "We would have to explore it because that's what you should do. You should explore every opportunity. Carlos Zambrano is a heckuva competitor," said Moore. "Carlos Zambrano has had a lot of success in the major leagues. Carlos Zambrano is actually a very pleasant, easy going, classy person off the field. Sometimes, as with all of us the competitiveness takes over and brings out qualities in us that we are not proud of. Obviously the Cubs grew tired of some of his outbursts but I believe in our coaching staff and we'll always take a chance and a risk on certain players. We'll see how that particular situation unfolds."
It sounds as if the idea of Zambrano coming over to the Royals isn't just a pipe dream but something the team has actually thought about. Perhaps not, but Moore's words seem like the Big Z is a subject the team has addressed internally. Granted, the contract and terms of a trade would have to be worked out, but it's rare to hear a general manager address a player so openly who's already under contract with another team.