Royals, Giants set World Series rosters

The Giants and Royals released their rosters for the World Series, and you can probably already guess who is on them for the most part. That’s because the Giants made no changes at all to the roster that has brought them to the Fall Classic to begin with, while the Royals made just one minor tweak. Kansas City swapped out infielder Christian Colon for another infielder in Jayson Nix.

Nix made it over Colon for defensive purposes, mostly because that has to be why. As the Royals will play at least some of the World Series in AT&T Park, and the pitcher will be used in place of the designated hitter there, it could maybe be for pinch-hitting. That being said, he’s still Jayson Nix, and pinch-hitting or NL experience or whatever doesn’t mean much when you’re a career .212/.282/.345 batter. Also, he has pinch-hit 37 times in his entire career. So, defense.

It probably doesn’t matter much either way since we’re talking about the 25th man on the Royals’ roster: Colon picked up two plate appearances in the AL Wild Card game, and hasn’t stepped to the plate since, but when nothing else has changed, that’s all there is to analyze.

Starting pitchers (4): Madison Bumgarner, Tim Hudson, Jake Peavy, Ryan Vogelsong

Relief pitchers (8): Jeremy Affeldt, Santiago Casilla, Tim Lincecum, Javier Lopez,Jean Machi, Yusmeiro Petit, Sergio Romo, Hunter Strickland

Catchers (2): Buster Posey, Andrew Susac

Infielders (6): Joaquin Arias, Brandon Belt, Brandon Crawford, Matt Duffy, Joe Panik, Pablo Sandoval

Outfielders (5): Gregor Blanco, Travis Ishikawa, Michael Morse, Hunter Pence, Juan Perez

Starting Pitchers (4): James Shields, Yordano Ventura, Jason Vargas, Jeremy Guthrie

Relief Pitchers (7): Greg Holland, Wade Davis, Kelvin Herrera, Danny Duffy, Brandon Finnegan, Jason Frasor, Tim Collins

Catchers (2): Salvador Perez, Erik Kratz

Infield (5): Eric Hosmer, Omar Infante, Jayson Nix, Alcides Escobar, Mike Moustakas

Outfield (6): Alex Gordon, Lorenzo Cain, Norichika Aoki, Jarrod Dyson, Josh Willingham, Terrance Gore

Designated Hitter (1): Billy Butler