Athletics Announce Several Roster Moves
1:15pm: Hernaiz has a “severe” left ankle sprain, per Martín Gallegos of MLB.com. He’s going to see a specialist today.
11:23am: The A’s on Wednesday announced announced that they’ve recalled catcher/first baseman Tyler Soderstrom from Triple-A Las Vegas and also recalled righty Osvaldo Bido to serve as the 27th man for today’s doubleheader. Oakland also selected the contract of lefty Easton Lucas. Meanwhile, infielder Darell Hernaiz was placed on the 10-day IL with a left ankle injury, lefty Hogan Harris was optioned to Las Vegas, and minor league righty Alex Speas was designated for assignment to open a 40-man spot for Lucas.
A slate of transactions on the heels of a 15-8 blowout loss yesterday and a doubleheader today seemed inevitable. Bido will start the second game of today’s twin bill against the Rangers. He’s in his first year with the A’s organization after becoming a minor league free agent but nevertheless signing a major league contract this offseason. He’s excelled through his first six appearances (five starts), pitching to a 2.59 ERA in 31 1/3 frames with a 30% strikeout rate and 10% walk rate. The 28-year-old made his MLB debut with the Pirates last season and pitched 50 2/3 innings with an unsightly 5.86 ERA.
Swapping out Harris for Lucas will give the A’s some length in the bullpen, as Lucas has tossed 15 2/3 innings in 11 appearances this season, pitching two or more innings on four occasions. He’s delivered solid results in that role, posting a 2.87 ERA — albeit with a less-inspiring 13-to-8 K/BB ratio (plus another hit batter).
Soderstrom’s call to the big leagues will give the A’s another look at the former first-rounder and top prospect. The 2020 No. 26 overall pick debuted as a 21-year-old last summer but looked overmatched, hitting just .160/.232/.240 with a 31.2% strikeout rate in 138 plate appearances. The lefty-swinging slugger has had a nice start to the season in Triple-A, hitting for a pedestrian .245 average but reaching base at a hearty .353 clip while slugging .529 in 119 plate appearances. Soderstrom, who is touted for his plus-plus raw power, has already drilled seven homers and collected eight doubles on the young season. He’s fanned at a 26.1% clip, but strikeouts are likely always going to be part of his game — and he’s at least helped offset some of those whiffs with a healthy 10.1% walk rate.
It’s not yet clear how the A’s will divide up playing time with Soderstrom now in the big leagues. Starting catcher Shea Langeliers has struggled mightily at the plate but continues to play strong defense. Backup Kyle McCann has raked at a .393/.485/.750 clip, but that’s come in a minuscule sample of 33 plate appearances.
Soderstrom has plenty of experience at first base as well, given that there are significant questions about his defensive skills behind the plate. Oakland recently optioned Opening Day first baseman Ryan Noda, but early-season pickup Tyler Nevin has hit well since Noda was sent down. Nevin has spent the bulk of his time at first base but has experience at all four corner positions. In all likelihood, there will be plenty of mixing and matching, which is to be expected from an A’s team that entered the season with few set-in-stone starting players and is actively evaluating potential long-term options at multiple spots. The majority of Oakland’s roster can and has played multiple positions — many with other clubs — while trying to carve out permanent MLB roles.
The A’s only acquired the 26-year-old Speas on April 6, sending cash to the White Sox for him following a DFA in Chicago. The flamethrowing righty sits in the 99-100mph range with his heater and can run it up to 102-103mph. Predictably, that’s led to both eye-popping strikeout totals and alarming walk rates in the minors. He pitched 10 1/3 innings for the Athletics’ Las Vegas affiliate but was tagged for 13 runs in that time, due in no small part to a 13.2% walk rate and three homers allowed.
Speas pitched two innings with the Rangers in the majors last summer but split the remainder of the season between Double-A and Triple-A, where he punched out a combined 34.7% of his opponents but also issued walks at a 15.5% clip. He walked six of his 26 opponents with the White Sox during spring training. There’s no doubting the electricity of Speas’ raw arsenal, but he’s walked more than 18% of his opponents in pro ball. He’s in the second of three minor league option years.
Now that he’s been designated, Speas will spend up to a week in limbo while awaiting his fate. The A’s can use that window to find a trade partner, attempt to pass him through outright waivers, or release him.
MLBTR Chat Transcript
Click here to read a transcript of Wednesday’s chat with MLBTR’s Steve Adams.
Rangers Acquire Robbie Grossman, Designate Kolton Ingram
The Rangers announced Wednesday that they’ve acquired outfielder Robbie Grossman from the White Sox in exchange for minor league right-hander Anthony Hoopii-Tuionetoa. To make room on the 40-man roster, Texas designated lefty Kolton Ingram for assignment.
Grossman, 34, returns to the team with which he won a World Series ring just last season. He signed a minor league deal with the White Sox, but his stint with the South Siders will ultimately last only 25 games and 85 plate appearances. The veteran switch-hitter turned in a .211/.329/.268 slash in that small sample but was a solid part-time player for manager Bruce Bochy last year when he batted .238/.340/.394 in 420 trips to the plate. He’ll be a cost-effective addition for the Rangers, as his deal with the ChiSox carried a $1.5MM base salary.
As has been the case throughout his career, Grossman was particularly effective from the right side of the dish last season. He hit .309/.416/.536 against southpaws, giving Texas a highly productive right-handed bat to mix in at left field and designated hitter. Things have played out similarly in his brief time with the ChiSox; Grossman is 6-for-16 with a pair of doubles, four walks and four strikeouts against lefties this year. In his career, he’s a .283/.383/.427 hitter against lefties — far superior to his .228/.331/.357 slash from the left side of the plate.
While Texas has a pair of big right-handed bats in Marcus Semien and Adolis Garcia — plus switch-hitting catcher Jonah Heim, who’s better right-handed — the lineup generally skews left-handed. That’s all the more true with third baseman Josh Jung on the injured list following wrist surgery. Promising young hitters Wyatt Langford (strained hamstring) and Justin Foscue (strained oblique) are both on the injured list as well, subtracting another pair of potentially impactful right-handed bats from the equation.
The Rangers, as a whole, have been flummoxed by left-handed pitching this season. The team is currently batting a collective .231/.288/.343 against southpaws. The resulting 80 wRC+ suggests that Rangers hitters have been 20% worse than average against lefties this year, ranking 25th among MLB teams.
Grossman can give the Rangers a platoon partner for young outfielder Evan Carter in left field. Carter has pummeled right-handed pitching but is just 2-for-33 against lefties in his young big league career and has fanned in 44.4% of his left-on-left matchups to date. And while Grossman doesn’t have the strongest career numbers from the left side of the dish, his keen plate discipline still allows him to post quality OBP marks from that side of the dish, making him a corner outfield or DH option against right-handed starters.
In exchange for Grossman, the Rangers will part with a bullpen prospect who’s approaching MLB readiness. While Hoopii-Tuionetoa hasn’t cracked the Rangers’ top-30 prospect lists at Baseball America or MLB.com, he’s breezed through Double-A opposition thus far, rattling off 12 1/3 shutout innings with a hefty 34% strikeout rate against a solid 8.5% walk rate. That strong start to his 2024 campaign comes on the heels of a 2023 season that saw the Hawaiian-born righty pitch 24 1/3 innings of 2.96 ERA ball with a 25% strikeout rate and 7% walk rate between Low-A and High-A.
Shoulder troubles limited Hoopii-Tuionetoa’s workload last year, but he finished the season healthy and also tacked on 9 2/3 innings of shutout ball in the Arizona Fall League. Hoopii-Tuionetoa went unselected in December’s Rule 5 Draft despite being eligible — Texas selected him in the 30th round of the 2019 draft — but he’s only further enhanced his stock with a terrific start to the 2024 campaign.
Grossman’s acquisition pushes the 27-year-old Ingram off the Rangers’ roster. He’d been claimed off waivers out of the Mets organization just under three weeks ago. The Rangers will have five days to trade him or else place him on outright waivers or release waivers, which could last another 48 hours. Whichever route the Rangers take, Ingram will know his next destination within a week’s time.
Ingram made his big league debut with the Angels in 2023 but totaled just 5 1/3 innings. He allowed five runs on eight hits and five walks in that tiny sample but did fan seven of his 30 opponents. He’s had far more success in the upper minors, logging 102 1/3 innings of 2.46 ERA ball in Double-A and 40 2/3 innings of 3.54 ERA ball in Triple-A — including a pair of scoreless frames with the Rangers’ affiliate in Round Rock.
Broadly speaking, Ingram has shown a knack for missing bats throughout his career — evidenced by a sharp 29.3% strikeout rate in the minors. However, he’s also battled command issues, walking 11.1% of his opponents in addition to another 14 plunked batters (1.5%). Primarily a fastball/slider pitcher, Ingram sits 92-93 mph with his heater and has proven to be a consistent headache for left-handed opponents. They mustered an awful .151/.245/.186 slash against him in 2023 and hit just .141/.243/.219 against him the year prior. Righties have had more success but primarily due to his sub-par command. Right-handed opponents still hit in the low .200s against Ingram, but they’ve walked at a 12.5% clip against him over the past several seasons.
Giants Notes: Murphy Timeline, Snell Update
The Giants placed backup catcher Tom Murphy on the injured list due to a knee sprain over the weekend but didn’t provide a timetable for his return, as the veteran was headed for an MRI to determine the severity of the injury. Skipper Bob Melvin announced to the Giants beat today that imaging revealed a Grade 1 to 2 sprain. Murphy won’t require surgery but is expected to be out of action for at least four to six weeks (X link via Andrew Baggarly of The Athletic).
The relatively lengthy absence for Murphy comes at a time when the Giants are also without starting catcher Patrick Bailey, who’s on the injured list due to ongoing concussion symptoms. San Francisco traded former No. 2 overall pick Joey Bart to the Pirates early this season because he was out of minor league options and the team didn’t want to carry three catchers in the long term. Since that swap, both catchers ahead of him on the depth chart have gone down with injuries. The result is a catching corps consisting of former Rule 5 pick Blake Sabol and recently promoted journeyman Jakson Reetz (who homered in his first game with the Giants yesterday).
Murphy, 33, has gotten out to a dismal .118/.211/.235 start after signing a two-year, $8.3MM deal over the winter. That’s come in a sample of just 38 plate appearances, however, far too small to glean meaningful conclusions. In 807 plate appearances with Seattle from 2019-23, Murphy batted .250/.324/.460 with 38 home runs. He was particularly dangerous against left-handed opponents, bashing them at a .287/.379/.539 clip.
With both Bailey and Murphy on the shelf and Bart now in Pittsburgh, the Giants’ catching depth has quickly dried up. Sabol is in line for the lion’s share of playing time, but he hit just .235/.301/.394 last season with a 34% strikeout rate. He was hitting .243/.378/.324 in Triple-A Sacramento this season, again showing worrying contact issues (30.8% strikeout rate). Reetz appeared in 15 games with Sacramento prior to his call-up and batted .217/.357/.435 in 57 plate appearances. Yesterday’s home run came in his first big league at-bat since 2021 — just the third MLB plate appearance of his career. Reetz is a career .234/.328/.478 hitter in parts of four Triple-A seasons.
It’s not a great update for the Giants, but Murphy avoided a worst-case scenario that’d have sidelined him for a much longer period. The Giants also provided a small update on reigning Cy Young winner Blake Snell on Monday, with Melvin telling the team’s beat that the lefty pitched a bullpen session without issue and is slated to pitch three innings in a simulated game against live hitters tomorrow (X link via Shayna Rubin of the San Francisco Chronicle). Snell, who was rocked for an 11.57 ERA through his first three starts, hit the 15-day IL due to an adductor strain last week.
Red Sox Outright Vladimir Gutierrez, Pablo Reyes
Red Sox righty Vladimir Gutierrez went unclaimed on outright waivers and has accepted an assignment to Triple-A Worcester, reports Francys Romero. Boston designated him for assignment last week. Also sticking with the organization following a DFA is utilityman Pablo Reyes, reports Chris Cotillo of MassLive.com. Like Gutierrez, he went unclaimed on waivers and has been assigned outright to Worcester. Either player could’ve rejected the assignment in favor of free agency, but they’ll stick with the organization and no longer require 40-man spots.
Now 28 years old, Gutierrez was a high-profile signing out of Cuba back in 2016, when the Reds gave him a $4.75MM bonus and paid a 100% tax on top of that sum. He was one of Cincinnati’s top pitching prospects for a few years but wound up giving them just 150 2/3 innings of 5.44 ERA ball while posting strikeout and walk rates of 17.3% and 10.4%, respectively — both worse than the league average.
Despite those struggles, Gutierrez would surely have received a longer look with the Reds if not for injuries. A torn ulnar collateral ligament in 2022 led to Tommy John surgery. Gutierrez returned to the mound to toss a handful of minor league innings last September but didn’t get back to the big leagues. He was removed from Cincinnati’s 40-man roster and became a free agent following the season. After a few showcases for big league scouts, he signed a minor league deal with the Marlins. He’s since bounced from Miami, to Milwaukee, to Boston via waivers and will now stay put in Worcester for the time being.
The 30-year-old Reyes has been with the Sox since 2023 but hasn’t been able to follow up on a solid .287/.339/.377 slash he posted in 185 plate appearances last season. He hit just .183/.234/.217 in his first 64 trips to the plate this season while fanning at a 29.7% clip that’s nearly triple his 11.4% mark from the prior season.
Reyes has appeared in six straight big league seasons, but last year’s 185 plate appearances were the most he’s accrued in a single season. Overall, he’s taken 572 turns at the plate in the majors and produced a .248/.309/.349 batting line between the Pirates, Brewers and BoSox. The versatile Reyes has appeared at every position on the diamond except for catcher. His career numbers at third base are particularly solid, though he made a few costly errors there earlier this season.
Mets Designate Max Kranick, Claim Yohan Ramirez
The Mets announced Monday that they’ve claimed right-hander Yohan Ramirez off waivers from the Orioles, who recently designated him for assignment. In a corresponding move, the Mets designated right-hander Max Kranick for assignment. The move to claim Ramirez comes less than a month after the Mets themselves designated Ramirez for assignment and traded him to Baltimore in exchange for cash. Ramirez is out of minor league options, so he’ll head right to the big league bullpen.
The revolving-door act with Ramirez isn’t entirely new for the 2024 Mets. He’s the second reliever to be designated for assignment and traded for cash, only to eventually return via waiver claim, joining Michael Tonkin in that regard. The Mets followed a similar course with Tonkin, trading him to Minnesota and quickly reclaiming him. That pattern could continue throughout the season. The Mets have very few bullpen pieces with minor league options remaining and will need to regularly cycle through different names in the last couple spots due to that lack of flexibility.
Ramirez, who turns 29 today, has pitched in eight games between the Mets and O’s this season. He’s logged 11 1/3 innings in that time and been rocked for 11 runs, though that’s obviously a tiny sample. The hard-throwing righty entered the season with a career 3.99 ERA in 124 big league frames between the Mariners, Guardians, Pirates and White Sox.
Ramirez has fanned a roughly average 23.1% of his career opponents in the big leagues, but his 12.4% walk rate is bloated well beyond league-average levels. He’ll give the Mets a fresh arm after using five relievers yesterday (the second straight day for Reed Garrett and Sean Reid-Foley). However, given the Mets’ handling of the final couple bullpen spots so far, it shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone if it’s a brief stay on the roster for Ramirez.
The Mets claimed Kranick, 26, off waivers from the Pirates back in January. He opened the season on the injured list due to a hamstring strain and was optioned to Triple-A Syracuse in late April upon being reinstated. Through his first seven innings in Triple-A this year, Kranick has allowed only two earned runs but has done so while issuing more walks (four) than strikeouts recorded (two). He’s also served up eight hits, including a pair of homers.
Coincidentally, both Kranick and Ramirez were with the Pirates last season — and at one point Ramirez was designated for assignment in order to make way for Kranick’s return to the roster after he’d recovered from 2022 Tommy John surgery. This time around, it’s Kranick giving way for Ramirez’s return to the pair’s current organization.
In 43 2/3 big league innings, Kranick has a 5.56 ERA. He’s fanned a below-average 17.9% of his opponents while issuing walks at a 10.9% clip that’s more than two percentage points north of the league average. A former 11th-round pick, Kranick has a solid track record in Triple-A, where he’s pitched in parts of four seasons and notched a 3.63 ERA through 24 appearances (23 of them starts). He’s fanned just 17.8% of opponents there as well but done so with much better command, evidenced by a 7.9% walk rate.
Kranick is in the last of his three minor league option seasons. He hasn’t had much big league success, but his optionability and Triple-A track record could earn him a look from a club in need of some rotation depth. In the next five days, Kranick will either be traded or placed on outright waivers or release waivers (both of which are a 48-hour process). He’s never been outrighted in the past, so if he clears waivers, the Mets will be able to assign him outright to Syracuse and retain his rights without needing to commit a 40-man roster spot to Kranick.
Giants Designate Daulton Jefferies For Assignment
The Giants announced Monday that they’ve designated right-hander Daulton Jefferies for assignment. His spot on the 40-man roster will go to right-handed pitching prospect Mason Black, whose previously reported promotion from Triple-A Sacramento is now official.
Jefferies, 28, went through two years of painstaking rehab to get back to the big leagues after undergoing both Tommy John surgery and thoracic outlet surgery. The former No. 37 overall draft pick’s Giants debut at the end of March was his first MLB appearance since May 2022 with the A’s.
Jefferies shined in spring training this year (2.57 ERA, 16-to-3 K/BB ratio in 14 innings) and has pitched quite well in four Triple-A appearances this season. In 18 1/3 frames with Sacramento, he’s notched a tidy 3.44 ERA while fanning 22.7% of his opponents against a sharp 6.7% walk rate.
However, in a pair of big league appearances, he’s lasted just 4 2/3 innings overall and been tagged for 13 runs (nine earned) on the strength of 14 hits (two homers) and a pair of walks. Jefferies has only fanned four of the 31 men he’s faced. He’s seen more than half the balls in play against him land for hits, which certainly hasn’t helped his cause, but he’s also paid the price for plenty of mistakes over the plate; in addition to the pair of homers, he’s surrendered six doubles and a triple.
Jefferies has had a fair bit of minor league success, but he’s yet to carry it over to the big leagues in a quartet of seasons where he’s seen mostly fleeting action. In 61 MLB frames, he carries an unsightly 6.64 earned run average, although his overall mark in six minor league seasons is nearly half that number, sitting at 3.88. Injuries have played no small part in his struggles; the previously mentioned Tommy John surgery in 2022 was actually the second of his career, and he battled nerve issues in his elbow for nearly a year before finally being diagnosed with thoracic outlet syndrome and undergoing that surgery.
The Giants will have a week to trade Jefferies, attempt to pass him through outright waivers, or release him. He’s in his final minor league option season, so any team that acquires him would be able to send him to Triple-A without needing to expose him to waivers. Jefferies has been outrighted once in the past, so even if he goes unclaimed on waivers, that prior outright assignment grants him the right to reject another outright assignment in favor of free agency.
Royals Showed Interest In Luis Arraez Prior To Trade To Padres
The Marlins got a surprisingly early jump on the trade market this offseason, hammering out a rare May trade of significance when they shipped infielder Luis Arraez to San Diego last Friday in exchange for a package of four players. It’s not entirely shocking given both the Marlins’ awful start to the season and that their trade partner was the hyper-aggressive Padres, whose president of baseball operations, A.J. Preller, leaves no stone unturned when a big-name player is even remotely available. However, it seems the Padres weren’t the only club sniffing around Arraez despite the early nature of his entry to the trade market; Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic reports this morning that the Royals also showed interest in Arraez before the Padres pulled off that swap.
Rosenthal emphasizes that talks with the Kansas City were preliminary and did not advance far. Still, the mere interest from Kansas City is telling. The Royals had an aggressive winter that saw them spend $109MM across several free agent signings, and now that they’re out to a 20-15 start to the season, it seems they’re interested in further bolstering the club.
Arraez is a limited defender who’s below-average at second base, solid enough at first base and of course has the bat to handle designated hitter duties. The Royals presumably wouldn’t have used Arraez at first base much, thanks to the presence of Vinnie Pasquantino. In all likelihood, Kansas City would’ve given Arraez the bulk of his playing time at second base and designated hitter.
Instead, the Royals will hope for 26-year-old second baseman Michael Massey to continue his recent hot streak and look to get DH/outfielder Nelson Velazquez back to his 2023 form. Velazquez bashed 14 homers in 147 plate appearances for the Royals last year after being acquired in a deadline swap with the Cubs, but he’s hitting just .215/.284/.344 with a 30.4% strikeout rate this season as the team’s primary designated hitter.
Even looking beyond Arraez specifically, the mere fact that Kansas City was poking around the market for one of the presumably few players genuinely available on the trade market at such an early stage in the season signals that the Royals won’t necessarily be content with their offseason additions and any in-house reinforcements that might surface. It also likely signals a willingness to deal from the top end of their farm system. The Royals’ system isn’t viewed as particularly strong, so they’d have had to expend some of their most notable prospects in order to pique Miami’s interest.
Ultimately, news of interest from a team that didn’t wind up trading for a player only carries so much weight. The Royals’ interest in Arraez will be little more than a footnote that’s perhaps worth keeping in mind when he reaches free agency. But it’s also a portent for how the Royals could operate in the weeks and months ahead, and it gives some credence to the idea that they’ll be in the mix when other high-profile bats become available this summer. Whether it was expressed to the Royals that the Marlins would be willing to pay down the remainder of Arraez’s contract isn’t clear. Kansas City opened the season with a roughly $116MM payroll, per RosterResource, and has previously run its payroll as high as $143MM (under the previous ownership regime).
The Royals’ offseason activity already pointed to a win-now mindset, and so long as they remain in or on the periphery of postseason contention, it seems they’ll continue to keep their foot on the gas.
Reds Release Mike Ford
1:35PM: The Reds officially announced Ford’s release.
TODAY, 8:18AM: The Reds will release Ford, Jon Heyman reports (via X).
MAY 1: First baseman Mike Ford has exercised an opt-out clause in his minor league deal with the Reds, reports Jon Heyman of the New York Post. The team will now have 48 hours to decide whether to select Ford to the big league roster or grant him his release.
The 31-year-old Ford had a massive spring training performance with Cincinnati and has carried that over into the regular season in Triple-A Louisville. The slugger mashed at a ridiculous .455/.486/.727 clip and belted three homers in 31 spring plate appearances. He’s now hitting .297/.381/.538 with six homers for the Bats and has drawn walks at a hearty 11.4% clip against a manageable 19.4% strikeout rate.
Ford’s strong spring and Triple-A production come on the heels of a nice performance with the 2023 Mariners. He hit just .228 but reached base at a .323 clip and slugged .475 in 251 trips to the plate. The longtime Yankees farmhand circled the bases on 16 home runs last year and also smacked six doubles. His 9.6% walk rate was better than league-average, but his 32.3% strikeout rate was well north of average and a notable red flag.
Ford has long had plus power and questionable contact rates. That makes this year’s small sample in Triple-A worthy of some skepticism but also intriguing for the Reds or any other team seeking a low-cost source of lefty power — be it off the bench or in a more prominent first base/designated hitter role. Ford hasn’t been allowed to face lefties much in his career but torched them in 24 plate appearances last year and has actually fared better against fellow southpaws in his career at large. It’s only 108 plate appearances, but he’s a .268/.343/.577 hitter versus lefties compared to .200/.303/.389 against righties (in a much larger sample of 611 plate appearances).
For the Reds, there could be some temptation to bring Ford to the big league roster. Christian Encarnacion-Strand has made 25 starts at first base but is batting only .196/.222/.314 with a 28.7% strikeout rate and just a 2.8% walk rate in 108 plate appearances. The former top prospect had a nice debut showing in 2023 (.270/.328/.477 in 241 plate appearances) but has been 57% worse than average at the plate in ’24, by measure of wRC+.
Designated hitter/outfielder Nick Martini has also cooled after a blistering start to the season; he homered twice in the season opener and slashed .290/.303/.677 through his first 33 plate appearances but has just five hits in 46 subsequent plate appearances. Martini has a minor league option remaining but could be a DFA candidate, given his journeyman status. Encarnacion-Strand has a full slate of three minor league option years remaining, if Cincinnati wants to give him a breather in Louisville to get back on track. Speculatively speaking, swapping out Ford for either of Martini or Encarnacion-Strand makes some sense in the short term.
The Royals’ Outfield Drought
The Royals’ 20-13 start to the season on the heels of an active offseason that saw Kansas City spend more than $100MM on nine free agents – to say nothing of trades acquiring relievers John Schreiber and Nick Anderson – has plenty of people buzzing.
The Royals are right in the thick of things in a largely improved AL Central that looks more like a four-horse race than the perennially weak division that’s been won in a romp in each of the past three seasons (Twins in 2023, Guardians in 2022, White Sox in 2021). Every team except the again-rebuilding White Sox has a legitimate chance at postseason play as of this writing.
A frequently maligned Royals pitching staff is at the heart of Kansas City’s early run. Lefty Cole Ragans hasn’t been quite as dominant as he was following the trade to acquire him from the Rangers last year but has nonetheless looked like a quality big league starter. Brady Singer looks more like the 2022 breakout version of himself than the 2023 version that struggled to a 5.52 ERA.
Free-agent signees Seth Lugo and Michael Wacha have been a needed boon. Lugo’s strikeout rate is down, and Wacha has been more steady than great, but they’ve provided needed, competitive veteran innings. Even fifth starter Alec Marsh has been sharp, though his K-BB profile is rather worrying and he’s on the shelf at the moment after being struck by a comeback liner.
The bullpen has been sound, though free-agent additions Chris Stratton and Will Smith have both struggled. Even still, K.C. relievers are eighth in the majors with a 3.28 ERA. Like some of the starters, their lowly 18.4% strikeout rate (second-lowest in MLB) and 10.2% walk rate call into question whether that ERA can be sustained. But the early results have still contributed to a nice start.
The Royals, to no one’s surprise, are getting strong offensive commitments from perennial slugger Salvador Perez, talented young first baseman Vinnie Pasquantino and emergent face-of-the-franchise shortstop Bobby Witt Jr.
Put more concisely: a lot is going right in Kansas City! It’s a good time to be a Royals fan – perhaps not relative to 2014-15 but certainly relative to the eight years since that consecutive pair of World Series appearances.
If there’s one area that has to remind Royals fans of that eight-year drought, however, it’s the team’s once-again middling outfield. Kansas City outfielders are hitting .190/.254/.323 on the season. The resulting 63 wRC+ indicates they’re 37% worse than league-average at the plate as a group. That ranks last in Major League Baseball. Let's get into the grisly details.
Unlock Subscriber-Exclusive Articles Like This One With a Trade Rumors Front Office Subscription
- Access weekly subscriber-only articles by Tim Dierkes, Steve Adams, and Anthony Franco.
- Join exclusive weekly live chats with Anthony.
- Remove ads and support our writers.
- Access GM-caliber tools like our MLB Contract Tracker