The Royals have lost seven straight games, including all six in their last homestand of the season.
After getting swept by the Tigers and the Giants this week, the Royals sit tied with the Tigers in the AL Wild Card race. Detroit and Kansas City are also ahead of the Twins, who are one game behind in the Wild Card race after losing both games on Sunday to the Boston Red Sox.
The Royals’ struggles can be credited to their hitting, which nosedived in September after Vinnie Pasquantino’s injury in late August.
Since September 1st, the Royals have ranked 29th in the league in wRC+ and ISO and 30th in SLG and HRs hit. On an individual end, below is a look at how Royals hitters have fared this month (not including Sunday’s game).
It’s been a brutal month of September overall, as the Royals are 7-12 this month with six games left in the 2024 season. As expected, many Royals fans (including myself) are searching for answers amid this recent collapse. The Royals can’t afford more losses, especially with the Royals not having the tiebreaker advantage against Minnesota (though Kansas City has the advantage against Detroit).
The recent offensive struggles have coincided with the acquisitions of hitters Tommy Pham, Robbie Grossman, and Yuli Gurriel, who were added to the Royals roster shortly before the August 31st deadline. While the three haven’t exactly been the catalysts for the Royals’ hitting problems, the vibes in Kansas City since their acquisitions have been off, and this subpar September has correlated with their arrival.
Thus, one has to wonder if GM JJ Picollo is wondering if he should’ve employed a different strategy to replace Vinnie’s production and presence in the lineup.
The Struggles of the Veterans in September
As Royals fans can see in the Fangraphs table above, the Royals lineup has struggled beyond Bobby Witt, Jr. Therefore, it’s not fair to put all the blame on the three new faces that joined the club after the Vinnie injury.
Nonetheless, the Royals acquired them for their veteran presence and history of production on playoff clubs.
Furthermore, the trio also joined other veterans like Adam Frazier, Hunter Renfroe, and Garrett Hampson, who also had postseason experience. With Kansas City clearly in playoff position during Vinnie’s injury, it seemed like Picollo would “lean in” on the vets supporting Bobby and Salvy in the lineup in the race to the postseason.
Here’s how those “veterans” have fared this month regarding offensive metrics (via Fangraphs).
Gurriel has fared the best with a 129 wRC+ and .355 wOBA in 41 plate appearances. However, he hasn’t displayed much power (.061 ISO), and he did go 0-for-4 today, which likely lowered his numbers from the table above (these numbers don’t include Sunday). Pham has gotten the most plate appearances but has a K% of 26.9%, a paltry walk rate of 3.8%, and a 75 wRC+.
Frazier’s wRC+ looks solid at 103, but he only has 24 plate appearances, the second-fewest of this group (and his .158 average isn’t anything to shout home about). Lastly, Grossman, Renfroe, and Hampson have been lousy since September 1st, as they all have K rates over 22% and wRC+ marks under 50.
In terms of Statcast metrics, much of the data seems to correlate with the results from this group of six veteran Royals hitters.
The Royals veterans are hitting the ball hard for the most part.
Pham has a 59.3% hard-hit rate this month, and Frazier ranks second with a 53.8% mark. Unfortunately, the wOBA numbers just haven’t been there. Every hitter in this group, except Gurriel, has underperformed their xwOBA significantly. Additionally, the whiff numbers have been high, with Frazier, Grossman, and Hampson all having whiff rates over 25% (Pham is close at 23.9%).
One can say that this group of Royals hitters has been unlucky, and the wOBA-xwOBA gap suggests that batted-ball luck may be a partial factor.
Conversely, this group was acquired before September or this past offseason to perform in the most significant spots of the season. Even though the Statcast metrics aren’t awful, the performance from this group hasn’t been what the Royals expected or wanted, especially with a postseason berth in striking distance.
What About the Other Guys in Omaha?
Picollo mentioned at the Trade Deadline that the Royals couldn’t afford to have “tryouts” at the Major League level with a playoff spot on the line. That said, the Royals organization has seen some success at the Triple-A level in Omaha.
This year, the Storm Chasers set a new record for wins in a single season in Omaha Triple-A franchise history.
Six hitters (including five on the 40-man roster) have been vital to the Storm Chasers’ recent success. They could have some future at the Major League level if given an extended opportunity: Drew Waters, Tyler Gentry, Nick Pratto, Nick Loftin, Nelson Velazquez, and Devin Mann.
Here’s how those six hitters have performed at the plate this year via Fangraphs’ advanced metrics.
Only Pratto is below league average on a wRC+ end with a 91 mark. Furthermore, all hitters have BB/K ratios over 0.35 and showcase reasonable power numbers in Omaha. That kind of offensive production is precisely what the Royals need, especially since they aren’t getting it from their veteran role/bench players now.
On a Statcast end, here’s how those six Storm Chasers hitters fare in September alone.
Waters, Gentry, and Velazquez have been barreling the ball at tremendous rates (above 10%) in September. Granted, their whiff rates have been high, but they have been hitting the ball hard consistently, especially Waters and Velazquez, who have hard-hit rates over 40%.
Mann is the most surprising contributor for the Storm Chasers this month. Acquired in the Ryan Yarbrough deal at the Trade Deadline last year, Mann has a .331 wOBA this month and a hard-hit rate of 40.7%, just behind Waters and Velazquez. He also has the lowest whiff rate of the group at 20.5% and launches the ball the best at 27 degrees.
The former Dodgers prospect hasn’t barreled the ball much this month, but he has been able to launch line drives for productive hits in September, like this one below.
Waters has been sensational this month, evidenced by his .457 wOBA, 50% hard-hit rate, and 16.7% barrel rate. As highlighted by Storm Chasers broadcaster Nick Badders, the former Braves prospect was on an absolute tear in this most recent series against the Louisville Bats (the Reds Triple-A affiliate).
Granted, this group’s career numbers at the Major League level haven’t been precisely glowing.
Gentry just made his MLB debut this year and looked overwhelmed in the few at-bats he received. Mann has yet to make his MLB debut. And the other four? Royals fans can look at their career MLB numbers and make their own decisions.
Waters is the only one with a career fWAR over 1.0. Pratto has a negative fWAR, and Loftin is barely above zero. Velazques possesses the most power (31 career home runs in 194 games), but his defense has been so poor, as evidenced by his Def of 16.5 career runs below average.
All six Omaha hitters, including Mann and Gentry, are far from perfect or “sure things.” Thus, it’s understandable why Picollo and manager Matt Quatraro have hesitated to utilize them with the Royals in a playoff race.
That said, guys like Renfroe, Hampson, and Grossman are barely producing at the plate, and they don’t carry the long-term upside that the six above have.
Which feels like a missed opportunity by Picollo and the Royals front office. Even if they decided they wouldn’t hold onto the six hitters in Omaha beyond 2024, playing them in September and seeing them get hot and productive could make them more tradeable assets in the offseason.
The Tigers Doing the Opposite of the Royals
The Tigers are one of the hottest teams in baseball. They went from being under .500 at one point in the season to now being tied with the Royals for a postseason berth (the Royals have the edge due to Kansas City owning the tie breaker).
However, their roster approach after the Trade Deadline has been the opposite of what the Royals have done this season.
Detroit didn’t put any claims on any players on waivers. They didn’t “rely” on veterans because they had “playoff” experience. Instead, they benched or lessened the roles of their veterans and gave younger players who underperformed at the beginning of the year a second chance.
Now, they’re reaping the dividends of this young group playing confidently.
Parker Meadows and Spencer Torkelson were demoted to Toledo at various points in the year and have come back up and become productive hitters. Trey Sweeney was an under-the-radar shortstop prospect who has replaced Javy Baez and has boosted the Tigers not by being super productive but by just NOT being Baez.
After his struggles in the rotation, they demoted Kenta Maeda to the bullpen and opted to fill his spot with younger, albeit flawed, options (Keider Montero and Casey Mize). It’s had its hits and misses, but it’s been enough to carry the rotation for now (it also helps to have an elite bullpen).
GM Scott Harris and manager AJ Hinch took risks on the younger guys. They opted to trust the guys on the roster and in the clubhouse, which has paid off.
The Royals opted to go with veterans to “put” them over the top instead of giving chances to the younger guys on the club who played in the Majors either earlier this season or last year.
Unfortunately, the approach has backfired thus far for Kansas City in September.
The Royals aren’t producing offensively and are lifeless and flat while doing it. Bobby and Salvy look like guys trying to carry a team and pressing because of it.
That isn’t what we saw when “The Boys Were Playing Some Ball” in April and May.
It’s too bad the Picollo couldn’t trust the “process” and hit the panic button roster-wise after Vinnie went down.
Let’s hope that Picollo learns from this mistake and makes changes for 2025.
He should not just “preach” about building the farm system and their player development but bury them behind underwhelming, underperforming veterans who get chance after chance. Instead, he needs to back those departments up and let those young and talented prospects get playing time at the Major League level, especially on the hitting end and in crucial spots of the season.
Baltimore has done it and found success. Cleveland has done it. Tampa Bay has done it.
Now, it’s the Royals’ turn.
Photo Credit: Charlie Riedel/AP
[…] In my post over the weekend, I lamented the Royals’ strategy of relying more on newly acquired veteran bats after Vinnie Pasquantino’s injury. I felt that the Royals’ acquisitions of Yuli Gurriel, Tommy Pham, and Robbie Grossman and the continued at-bats given to Adam Frazier, Hunter Renfroe, and Garrett Hampson were counter-intuitive. […]
[…] Yuli Gurriel on a Minor League contract (he was on the Braves’ Triple-A roster). Granted, the moves have had mixed results, but it showed that Picollo and the Royals weren’t just going to “settle” during […]