Royals Rumors

Questions Remaining

While some of the Royals’ offseason investments look a bit questionable, it’s still tough to find a glaring weakness on the team. The Royals have an offense that rarely strikes out, a strong bullpen and one of the game’s best defenses, which will help to offset the fact that the rotation is comprised mostly of mid-rotation arms. The likes of Salvador Perez, Eric Hosmer, Mike Moustakas, Lorenzo Cain, Alex Gordon and Alcides Escobar are all controlled beyond 2016, and the resurgent Kendrys Morales will reprise his role as the club’s DH this season (before likely testing the open market or having his mutual option bought out). All of that looks good on paper, but there are a few spots that could be questioned.

Kansas City’s investment in Omar Infante has been a bust to this point, with the second baseman hitting just .240/.269/.331 since signing a four-year deal worth a hair north of $30MM. He’s been a bit better this season, but with Infante and the light-hitting Christian Colon representing the club’s top options at second base, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see Kansas City seek a second-base upgrade for the second consecutive summer. Right field, too, could represent a potential area of upgrade. Jarrod Dyson is a stellar defender and adds plenty of value on the bases, but he’s dealt with an oblique issue already this season and owns a lifetime .256/.322/.343 batting line in 1214 plate appearances. At the very least, an upgrade over Paulo Orlando as a platoon partner could be worth exploring.

The other question for the Royals is whether they have enough in the rotation. Edinson Volquez, Yordano Ventura, Kennedy, Medlen and Young is a solid grouping, but Medlen and Young combined for just 181 2/3 innings last season. Ventura, meanwhile, has never topped 183 innings in a season. Kansas City made it work with a similar collection of arms that also lacked a track record of durability in 2015, but they had to trade for Cueto midseason and parted with one of their top near-MLB-ready arms (Sean Manaea) in the Zobrist deal. Dillon Gee and Minor provide some alternative options as the season wears on, but rotation depth could become an issue.

Deal of Note

For the better part of 18 months, there was talk of the Royals extending the contract of Salvador Perez — who infamously signed a five-year, $7MM contract that quickly became regarded as the most team-friendly deal in all of Major League Baseball. Perez’s new agents at the Beverly Hills Sports Council brokered a new deal with the club that effectively locked in the option years on Perez’s preexisting deal and extended the team’s control of Perez by two seasons for an additional $35MM.

While there’s every chance that the highly durable and excellent Perez will justify the value of that contract, from a pure business/risk standpoint, it’s difficult to believe that the Royals tore up a contract that carried so much surplus value. Perez was already controlled through the 2019 season, with club options of $3.75MM, $5MM and $6MM due to follow his 2016 salary of $2MM. That’s an incredible bargain for even a passable big league catcher, let alone one that has excelled to the levels that Perez has since establishing himself as the Royals’ regular catcher. The Royals not only forfeited the right to back out of those options in the event of a notable injury to Perez, they also signed themselves up for a considerable amount of risk beyond the previous scope of the contract.

In part due to Kansas City’s reliance on budget backups, Perez easily has the largest workload of any catcher in baseball, having logged 3635 innings behind the plate dating back to the 2013 season. In that time, only four other receivers have even topped 3,000 innings: Miguel Montero (3037), Russell Martin (3055), Jonathan Lucroy (3061) and Yadier Molina (3272). Perez’s workload tops his next-closest competitor by nearly 400 innings; he’s caught about 40 more games’ worth of innings than has Molina in that time span. That type of workload is taxing on any catcher’s body, but one has to imagine it’s particularly taxing on Perez, who at 6’3″ and 240 pounds is one of the largest catchers you’ll encounter. Indeed, Perez’s production at the plate has steadily declined over the past few seasons by virtually any measure. Per wRC+, Perez’s bat was 14 percent above the league average back in 2012 (114 wRC+). Since that time, he’s dropped to 106 in 2013 (six percent above average), 92 in 2014 (eight percent below) and 87 in 2015 (13 percent below). Kansas City had the choice of going year-to-year and seeing what type of impact that workload had on a backstop of Perez’s size, and instead chose to not only lock him in through age 29 but also extend him through age 31 at a fairly premium rate.

It’s understandable the the Royals would want to restructure Perez’s contract in an act of good will, and I’d be remiss not to note that the move was undoubtedly a popular decision in the clubhouse, where Perez is beloved by his teammates. And it’s not as if the two years added are without value. However, that’s a steep price to pay and an exceptional amount of risk to take on in negotiations where the Royals seemingly should have held all of the leverage. Extensions, almost by definition, are designed to lengthen a club’s control at a below-market rate or lock up a player that is nearing the open market, but this deal meets neither of those criteria. Perez’s extension strikes me as a clear win for the player, even if he lives up to his end of the bargain and proves capable of handling a historically large workload.

Overview

The Royals have been one of baseball’s best teams across the past two seasons thanks largely to an elite bullpen, a high-contact/low-strikeout approach and a significant emphasis on speed and defense. While Kansas City fans are assuredly dreading the days that Cain, Hosmer and Moustakas hit free agency, the good news is that the club has at least two more years of each. The Royals returned the vast majority of last season’s World Series roster, and they’re positioned as one of the top teams in a deep American League that features very few weak spots. While it’s fair to question the long-term wisdom of some of this offseason’s dealings, it’s hard to criticize the organization for continuing to invest after its historic breakthrough, and the simple fact is that the 2016 Royals look as formidable as any club in the AL. This type of sustained run is exactly what the front office had in mind when building the club’s young core of Hosmer, Moustakas, Cain, Escobar, Gordon, Perez, Ventura, etc. The Royals are not sneaking up on anyone; they’re a postseason favorite and a force to be reckoned with.

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Photos courtesy of USA Today Sports Images