Rich Hill Has June 15 Opt-Out In Royals Deal

Veteran left-hander Rich Hill signed a minor league deal last month. It appears the club will soon have to make a decision on whether or not to call him up. Robert Murray of FanSided reports that there’s a June 15th opt-out in that deal.

Since signing that pact, Hill has made four minor league starts, two in the Complex League and then two more for Triple-A Omaha. He went four scoreless in the first outing but allowed four earned runs in four frames in the next one. In his first Triple-A start, he allowed three earned runs in five innings. Most recently, he went six innings without allowing an earned run.

Put it together and Hill has a 3.32 earned run average in 19 innings. He struck out 31.5% of batters faced and only walked 4.1%, though those numbers were far better in the two Complex League outings, striking out 41.9% of batters faced with no walks there compared to a 23.8% strikeout rate and 7.1% walk rate in the Triple-A starts.

However you cut it up, it’s a small sample of work. Hill is 45 years old and it’s hard to guess how effective he can be against major league hitters at this point. He had a decent stretch as recently as the first half of 2023, posting a 4.23 ERA through his first 13 starts with the Pirates. However, he faded from there, with a 6.57 ERA in the remainder of the season. The Bucs flipped him to the Padres but San Diego ended up bumping him to the bullpen and he finished the year with a 5.41 ERA overall.

He tried to get creative last year, with a plan of not signing until midway through the season. The idea was to spend more time with his family and also save his bullets for a second-half playoff push. It didn’t play out as he imagined, however. He signed a minor league deal with the Red Sox in the middle of August and got called up for four relief outings before being released.

Hill has a lot of big league success under his belt, including solid seasons with ERAs near 4.00 in both 2021 and 2022. But given his age and the less consistent results of late, he’s more of a gamble now.

The Royals also don’t have a strong starting pitching need. In fact, they have one of the best rotations in baseball. Cole Ragans and Seth Lugo were on the injured list not too long ago but both are now active again. Noah Cameron got some starts to cover for those injuries and has been great, with a 0.85 ERA through five appearances now. He won’t be able to keep that up forever, especially with a subpar 16% strikeout rate. Still, even if he’s the club’s #6 behind Lugo, Ragans, Kris Bubic, Michael Wacha and Michael Lorenzen, that’s a great setup for the club.

The club is off today and also has off-days on the next two Mondays. Cameron is listed as tomorrow’s probable starter but it’s possible he’ll get optioned after that, now that Lugo and Ragans are back. He could then be recalled towards the end of the month if the club wants a sixth starter when they start a stretch of 16 games in a row. Kyle Wright is also on a rehab assignment and building up his workload at the moment.

There’s not an amazing path for Hill, unless the Royals want to add some long relief to the bullpen. It’s possible the situation changes in the coming days. Perhaps Lugo or Ragans will re-aggravate their respective injuries, or someone else could get hurt. Though other clubs around the league are already dealing with plenty of injury absences, so perhaps there are better opportunities for Hill elsewhere.

Hill should have a chance to make one more Triple-A start before his opt-out decision but it’s possible he’ll be a free agent again soon. If he makes it to the majors, with the Royals or any other club, he’ll be easily the oldest player in the league. Justin Verlander is currently the oldest at 42 years old, born in February of 1983. Hill was born in March of 1980, almost three years earlier.

Photo courtesy of Rick Osentoski, Imagn Images