It was a road trip the Kansas City Royals would like to forget, as Joel Goldberg of Bally Sports Kansas City highlighted on Twitter today after the Royals’ 4-0 loss to the Rangers on Sunday.
Starting off the road slate in Los Angeles with the Dodgers would be challenging to overcome. However, losing five of six to the Athletics and Rangers, both teams below .500 is more difficult to swallow.
After Sunday’s loss, the Royals are 42-37 and are now a half-game behind the Boston Red Sox for the last Wild Card spot. However, the Royals still have a +42 run differential and an expected W-L record of 44-35. That hints that the Royals may be better than their record indicates. This isn’t a situation like the one in 2003 when the Royals were massively overperforming (the Royals had a -31 run differential that season).
Nonetheless, things aren’t going well for the Royals in any category. BrooksGate posted team ERA numbers in June, and unfortunately, Kansas City ranked near the bottom of the league (27th specifically).
That is the entire pitching ERA, not just the bullpen. While the Royals’ starting pitching has been stellar this season, they have also seen some regression in June, contributing to their 7-13 record this month.
If that wasn’t bad enough, the Royals hitters have been on a frigid streak at the plate since the Oakland series. 643 Royals on Twitter highlighted the batting average of the hitters who played over the last six games, and the numbers are ugly, to say the least.
For the last two weeks, the Royals haven’t been good on the hitting or pitching ends. They haven’t gotten on base enough for the baserunning to be judged. On a positive note, the defense hasn’t been bad, with MJ Melendez showing that he’s taken a significant step forward with his glove in the outfield after a horrendous 2023.
Royals fans are panicking a lot, especially on social media. Many Royals fans are saying that this team is “fraudulent” and that this is “2003 all over again”. I get it. This has been an ugly stretch of baseball, and it’s hard to stay optimistic when nothing is going right.
It would be one thing if the hitting was doing okay like they were before the road trip. It would be one thing if Bobby, Salvy, and Vinnie were still producing at the plate. It would be one thing if one or two of the relievers could still be dependable.
Unfortunately, none of that is happening, and it’s hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel for this Royals squad, especially with a Twins team that is surging and a Guardians team that just can’t seem to lose.
The Royals are experiencing a “June Swoon.” Hopefully, it won’t become a July or Summer Swoon that carries into September. Even the best teams have a bad month. However, having two to three bad months is an entirely different story and can change the narrative from a “breakout” season to a “disappointing” one.
I wonder if this stretch will change JJ Picollo’s mindset regarding approaching the Trade Deadline. So far, Picollo has indicated that he plans for the Royals to be aggressive buyers in the coming months leading up to the August Deadline.
On the other hand, this team may need more than one reliever or outfielder to significantly improve and make the postseason.
Granted, I think the Royals are still a team that can hover between 79 and 81 wins as they are currently built. However, how many wins is Michael Kopech going to bring? Or Tommy Pham? Will that make them an 83-win team? Is that enough for a postseason berth? And is it worth any prospect capital from a system that doesn’t rate too highly, according to most experts?
When I made my bold predictions at the beginning of the year, I predicted that the Royals would finish third, ahead of the Tigers or Guardians. Right now, I think the Royals can, at the very least, comfortably finish third in this division, especially with the Tigers looking like a mess on the hitting end.
(Yes, I know they scored 11 runs against the White Sox today.)
Thus, the Royals are surprising fans and should surpass Baseball Prospectus’s 71-win projection back in Spring Training. They still have a lot of pitching and hitting depth in Omaha, as the Storm Chasers are one of the top teams in Triple-A and already have qualified for the Triple-A postseason by winning the first half of the International League season.
This is not to say that the Royals shouldn’t explore improving the roster in the next two months. Picollo should continue to call GMs around the league to see who will be available and if it is within the Royals’ price range.
The Royals do not need to panic and sacrifice the future because of a rough month.
They are on track to build something special and have a few pieces in Omaha that could solve their problems if given the opportunity (both on the pitching and hitting end). Even if they aren’t, the Royals have two months before the Trade Deadline. There is time to test things out and still look outside the organization if necessary.
This has been one of the most fun Royals seasons in a while. This is the first time the Royals have played meaningful baseball this deep into the season since 2017. That shouldn’t be lost, especially since many around the league didn’t expect this back in February.
It would be a shame that, as Royals fans, we missed it or didn’t enjoy it enough because we were focused on a “mediocre” (not even poor) month of play.
Maikel Garcia and His Launch Angle Problem
It’s been rough for Maikel Garcia in June.
In 86 plate appearances, he is slashing .152/.221/.177 with a .398 OPS. That has dropped his overall slash to .239/.291/.349 and OPS to .640 over 346 plate appearances this season. Things have gotten so bad that Garcia has been bumped from the leadoff spot in the batting order, hitting 7th on Saturday and 8th on Sunday.
Even though it’s been tough sledding recently, there still are some encouraging signs that Garcia can turn it around at the plate.
His K% is 16.6%, 5.7% down from a season ago. His walk rate is 7%, only a 0.4 difference from 2023. He also ranks in the 90th percentile in whiff rate and 82nd percentile in chase rate. Lastly, he still is hitting the ball hard, as his average exit velocity ranks in the 79th percentile, and his hard-hit rate ranks in the 70th percentile.
Nonetheless, Garcia’s overall hitter performance has drastically slid, as can be seen in this rolling PLV chart.
Garcia’s most significant issue is not making contact or chasing too much. Instead, it is the launch angle on batted balls this season (and over his career).
Garcia’s current launch angle is 7.4 degrees. That is an improvement on his 6.1-degree mark from a season ago. However, he has a 33.2% LA Sweet Spot%, a 3.7% decline from 2023. LA-Sweet Spot% can better indicate power success since that metric accounts for batted balls with a launch angle between 8 and 32 degrees, where productive contact often occurs.
I had a great Twitter conversation with Brennan Knabe, and he made this point about Garcia struggling with fastballs in the shadow zone, which could explain his lackluster launch angle numbers this year.
Knabe shared some Statcast data he found on Garcia, and here’s an expansion of what he mentioned in the Tweet.
Royals fans should focus on the right two images to understand Garcia’s struggles.
On his spray chart, notice how all his batted balls against fastball-type pitches in the shadow zone are either up the middle or to the right side of the field. He does pull the ball a lot, but it’s all grounders, and they are all batted balls that typically result in easy outs. That explains why his batting average and xwOBA (.206) are so low against these pitches.
On the radial chart, notice how little he elevates those pitches when he does make contact. That red zone on the radial chart indicates that the ball was barreled or at least hit solidly. He only had three batted balls against fastballs that have fallen in that area this season.
How does Garcia improve this issue?
Either he needs to increase his bat speed or speed up his ability to pick up pitches.
Regarding bat speed, Garcia tends to be slower than his peers. His 70.6 MPH average bat speed ranks in the 31st percentile of the league. Furthermore, it ranks him 11th of Royals hitters with 5 or more plate appearances this season.
Hitters with slower bat speeds typically don’t square up or blast balls. And yet, despite ranking on the lower end of Royals hitters in average bat speed and fast-swing rate, he had the best squared-up percentage and the fourth-best blast percentage by contact.
Garcia can uniquely generate hard contact, especially considering his diminutive size. That could explain some of his struggles this season.
He probably knows he needs to elevate the ball more if he wants to indeed take the “next step” as a hitter. It may require him to adjust his swing mechanics to generate a better launch. That could slow his bat speed even more and, thus, affect his ability to produce hard contact as well as he currently does.
Another way Garcia could improve his launch angle is by picking up pitches better and earlier. He could begin his swing earlier by picking up pitches and getting the bat through the zone sooner in the process.
Cubs Inside published a great article about improving a hitter’s launch angle in 2020. The author, Evan Altman, shared a peculiar quote from former Rockies slugger Dante Bichette about what he preaches to hitters about improving their launch angle.
“It ain’t all about exit speed, man, it’s about line drives and solid contact,” Bichette said. “It ain’t about loft. Everybody’s talking about loft. You know what loft is? I’ll tell you what loft is.
“Here’s what loft is [takes small steps back from tee]…Catching it out front. That’s all loft is, is catching the ball a little further out front.”
“Let’s Set Record Straight on Launch Angle (Again) While Maybe Fixing MLB’s Contact Issues” by Evan Altman; Cubs Insider
Based on Bichette’s advice, it could benefit Garcia to catch the ball more in front of the zone to improve the loft. To do that, though, he will have to pick up pitches and make swing decisions sooner, especially since Garcia doesn’t have elite (or even average) bat speed.
One of Garcia’s strongest traits is his ability to make solid decisions on pitches inside the zone. His In-the-Zone Decision Value PLV chart indicates that.
However, focusing on “catching the ball in front” to improve loft can have a counterintuitive effect. Trying to make those adjustments on the fly at the Major League level is probably not natural to how Garcia developed as a hitter, especially in the Royals farm system.
Garcia seemed to be selling out early in the year for power, especially after his initial solid series on Opening Weekend. However, poor contact and strikeouts spiked when pitchers began to adjust. That trend is happening again in June, as evidenced by his rolling K% chart via Savant.
Even on this road trip, Royals fans have seen Garcia try to be a bit too aggressive, trying to “guess” the pitch in the zone rather than “read and react,” which has been his strong suit as a hitter. Part of it may be him trying to catch pitchers off guard and snap out of his slump (he’s seen an increase in first-pitch strikes this year, as shown in the table below).
He’s also probably aiming to improve loft so that his hard-hit balls have a better chance of falling for hits instead of in the opposing defender’s mitts. His xwOBA is 25 points higher than his actual wOBA, and that has to be frustrating on his psyche, especially for a player who is only 24 years old.
It’s been a disappointing month for Garcia, especially after he seemed to be turning a corner in May when he put up a slash of .305/.349/.424 with an OPS of .773 in 128 plate appearances.
Garcia has the potential to become that hitter again. It could happen as soon as July or by the end of June, especially if he can tap into a groove at home at Kauffman Stadium for this upcoming homestand.
He does need to simplify things a bit at the plate and get back to that approach that produced success a month ago.
That may result in him continuing to post pedestrian launch angle numbers on batted balls for the remainder of the season. The launch angle “adjustment” may need to wait until next offseason.
At this point, Garcia and Royals fans can live with that launch angle shortfall as long as he can be a productive hitter again, wherever it may be in the batting order.
Photo Credit: Jay Biggerstaff-USA TODAY Sports
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