Kansas City Royals

Royals gear gets more screen time on 'Better Call Saul'

Published Apr. 11, 2017 2:53 p.m. ET

Mike Nahrstedt

There's something about Better Call Saul and the Kansas City Royals. Just not sure what.

Season 3 of the hit AMC show, a prequel of sorts to Breaking Bad, debuted Monday night. The opening sequence took another leap forward in time, to when Jimmy McGill/Saul Goodman/Gene is working at a Cinnabon in Omaha (Saul's "best-case scenario" from the penultimate episode of Breaking Bad).

And there's Gene, played by Bob Odenkirk, grabbing his Royals lunchbox on his way to a lunch break in the mall.

Makes sense, in that the Royals are the closest big-league team to Omaha, not to mention the parent club of the Triple-A Omaha Storm Chasers.

It's the second time Royals gear has been depicted on screen on Better Call Saul. Last season, Kim Wexler (the Odenkirk character's girlfriend) is shown wearing a Royals T-shirt.

https://twitter.com/FSKansasCity/status/712679739807281152

In that episode we learn that Kim, played by Rhea Seehorn, grew up somewhere near the Kansas/Nebraska border.

So maybe Kim is a lifelong Royals fan. Maybe Jimmy/Saul/Gene is a Royals convert, post Walter White. And maybe the Better Call Saul producers just got excited about Royals baseball in 2015.

Maybe. Except Better Call Saul takes place in New Mexico in 2002, when the Royals went 62-100 -- hardly the stuff of bandwagons -- and Vince Gilligan and Co. are nothing if not sticklers for detail.

Which means this Royals theme must be going somewhere.