The Royals have announced they’ve declined Luke Hochevar‘s $7MM 2017 mutual option. That means they’ll owe him a $500K buyout. He is now a free agent.
The move was expected. Hochevar underwent surgery to relieve thoracic outlet syndrome in August, and it’s unclear when he’ll be ready to return to game action. There have, however, been indications that the Royals could attempt to sign Hochevar to a cheaper deal for 2017.
Hochevar generally pitched well in 2016 when healthy, posting a 3.86 ERA, 9.2 K/9 and 2.2 BB/9 over 37 1/3 innings. The 33-year-old former No. 1 overall pick struggled for years as a starter and missed the 2014 season after having Tommy John surgery, but he’s now had three relatively successful seasons as a hard-throwing reliever, including with the Royals’ 2015 World Series team.
Dbacks jump on this!
If healthy, he can provide a solid arm in our weak bullpen.
I hope Luke gets a good deal. He’s a family member of mine and is such a great guy
This is the guy they thought was better than Clayton Kershaw.
In college Hochevar was better than Kershaw, hence the higher draft position, it’s just he didn’t pan out, and he got TJ so everything is 20/20
Kershaw didn’t pitch in college.
Kerhsaw was drafted out of high school? I would expect Hochevar to pitch better in College than somebody who never pitched in college lol
Kershaw did not give up a single run in college. Look it up.
Very Jekyll and Hyde as a starting pitcher. There were nights when he’d have no-hit stuff. There were nights when he looked like he belonged in AAA. Found his niche as a reliever. A good comp would be a right-handed Andrew Miller, who was taken one pick behind Luke in the ’06 draft. If he can get healthy, he’d make for one of the better set-up/7th inning guys in the league.