Crown Jewels: Overall Draft Thoughts, Second Half Goals and a Series Preview

The Royals get things started tonight against the AL's best after drafting 21 players earlier this week.

On the fourth pitch of an at bat, Salvador Perez hit a line drive single to right field in the sixth inning of the All-Star Game. That’s not the best moment of the Royals 2023 season, but it’s far too close to the top. The team started the year 1-6 at home, then they were 4-16 and have finished just seven days with a winning percentage of .300 or higher. Forget .500, that’s apparently the goal now. The Royals are on pace to win 46 games, which is better than just two teams since the schedule moved to 162 games. That’s not great!

In a lot of ways, I tend to believe they’ll get to something a little bit less historic. They somehow have managed to not even win three in a row yet this season. I know they’re bad, but even the A’s have won seven in a row this year (which sort of makes their 44-win pace even crazier. I’ve said this before, so maybe it’ll just never happen, but let’s say they go on a fine, but unremarkable 11-9 stretch to start the second half. They do that and they’re on pace for 52 to 53 wins. So it doesn’t take a lot to go from historically bad to merely horrific. But, again, they also haven’t done it yet, so maybe it just won’t happen. As I wrote yesterday, there’s still a lot to watch for if you’re looking for it. I’ll just get to the notes though.

Initial Final Draft Thoughts

Opinions will absolutely change as we learn more about the Royals draft over the next weeks, months and years. What we know today will be different than what we know in September and in the coming years, but we can only evaluate what we know today, so these are my first thoughts on the draft as a whole. I will say that I wasn’t a fan in general of the strategy, but I also think there’s a bit of an overreaction going on based on what we know today.

I wrote a bit on Monday about the high school catcher thing. What seems to be happening is the messaging is getting a little bit jumbled. I’ve included international catchers as well in this exercise because they’re as inexperienced or more than their high school brethren. That demographic makes up 65 percent of the top-20 in fWAR for catchers since the start of the 2020 season. Of the 13 in the top-20, seven were drafted and six were signed internationally. Of the seven college catchers, two were drafted in the first round (Adley Rutschman and Will Smith). The rest were later on.

I just want to make sure that we’re making proper arguments here. The issue I have with picking Blake Mitchell is not about picking Mitchell or a high school catcher in general. It’s about picking him where he did and why they did. I actually think Mitchell is an interesting and legitimate prospect. The bat plays and if he can’t catch and they figure it out quickly, I think he actually moves through the system pretty fast. Though I’ve seen a lot of people believe he can catch, so that’s a plus.

I just don’t love playing slot games when you have 36 picks between your first and second pick and other teams have multiple picks to take away players you can play those games with. I also thought there were players I liked more at that pick and seeing Kyle Teel sign for below slot at 14 frustrates me quite a bit because you can at least draft a higher floor in a system that just needs players. But there is a lot more upside in Mitchell than Teel and the Royals need stars, so I see both sides. I like Blake Wolters too. I think he’s a solid pick. It’s just the two in tandem are a little concerning.

And, it’s also true that if you ignore where the players were picked, the Royals did pretty well for themselves. They got three players in their first five picks within the MLB.com top-60 and six in the top-130. Baseball America didn’t like Carson Roccaforte quite as much (they had him at 160), so it was just three in the top-60 and five in the top-130 from BA, but that’s a pretty nice haul given that they had two picks in the top-60 and five in the top-130. I’d say they fared fine on the whole as far as the industry rankings.

I did keep looking for the big pick in rounds 11-20 that just never seemed to come. Jared Dickey will require something more than the $150,000 allotment for that spot, but not significantly more and I think they probably saved close to $1 million from their draft pool in the first 10 rounds. I had heard there were a few guys they were talking to who might be this year’s Austin Charles in terms of going way over, but nothing seemed to materialize. That said, I spoke with a scout who said that Donovan LaSalle could turn heads as soon as this time next year with what he brings to the table. In all, the last three picks were big upside picks and if they can get even two of LaSalle, Stone Russell and Blake Wilson signed, that will be a nice haul for them.

My favorite pick of the entire draft for them had to be Hunter Owen in the fourth round. He’s a big, beefy lefty who throws strikes and has gotten to the upper-90s before. I don’t think he’s going to move particularly fast early in his professional career, but if and when everything clicks with him, it could be very fast for him. I sort of feel like he’s got some traits they drafted for this year - the good fastball with carry and a slider that can get whiffs - that we didn’t see from this organization in the past.

Overall, they came away with talent, as all teams did, but my first assessment is that they did so by assuming more risk than I’d have liked in an already incredibly risky proposition like the draft. If the risk comes through, it’ll be really fun, but it’s hard to win when you’re dealing with ifs as often as they’re forcing themselves to.

Second Half Goals

I suppose something like a 24-game winning streak to start the second half would change some things in a bad division, but short of that, the Royals aren’t angling for a playoff spot. Even if they did win 24 in a row, they’d still be a long way from .500, which is quite sad, but maybe sadder that it would likely put them in a good spot in the division for the last seven weeks of the season. So no, the goals aren’t about wins and losses, which really stinks when that’s the case for the sixth straight year, but the reality is what the reality is.

I wrote a little about this yesterday, but everything this team does needs to be about the future. Okay, everything is a little bit strong because there are circumstances that make it sort of tough. But still, most of the pitches thrown need to be thrown by players who will either be with the team in the future or are thrown by players the team is showcasing to try to move them for a player who will be with the team in the future. The same is true with the bats. This season is long lost, but future seasons are not.

I’ve said before that you can have success in a season even without a single win. Note that I didn’t say it would be a successful season, but you can find success. Now, I wish that the Royals hadn’t taken that quite so literally, but even if they determine that this player or that player isn’t part of the future, that’s a successful outcome. Knowing what you don’t have, while less satisfying, is as important as knowing what you do have.

The Royals have 11 players who they could potentially lose in the Rule 5 draft this upcoming winter - Christian Chamberlain, Steven Cruz, Jonah DiPoto, Tyler Gentry, Will Klein, Nick Loftin, John McMillon, Logan Porter, John Rave, Evan Sisk, and Anthony Veneziano. I don’t know if they can realistically check out all of them, but they need to try. I’d prioritize Chamberlain, Cruz, DiPoto, Klein, Loftin, McMillon, Rave and Veneziano. I’m still a big fan of Gentry, but I think he’s probably safe given the year he’s had. I don’t think Porter is a likely long-term answer and neither is Sisk, so that’s why I think if they can’t get to them, oh well.

I think Chamberlain, Cruz, Klein and McMillon are near locks to be added to the 40-man in the winter. I think the other four who I’d like them to prioritize are on the bubble. And they always make a weird move on this front, so maybe I’m missing someone, but they need to get some of these guys up. The four relievers should be pitching important innings with Carlos Hernandez, Jonathan Heasley and Dylan Coleman. What do you do with the rest? I don’t care. Taylor Clarke, Nick Wittgren, Collin Snider and Jose Cuas aren’t part of the future. I feel comfortable having made that evaluation.

They also need to evaluate Jonathan Bowlan, Austin Cox and Cole Ragans. Does that mean a six-man rotation and you just throw Jordan Lyles to the curb if they can’t trade him? Sure, why not? They don’t all have to be up and pitching in the same rotation. They have 71 games left. I’m fine with just seeing any or all of them for 25-30 innings. That’s four or five starts each. Get an idea of what you have there.

On the offensive side, Loftin was trending toward a callup before his injury and now he’s sort of the odd man out since Maikel Garcia has taken over third base. Michael Massey hasn’t been good overall, but he’s been fine at second base. I’m not entirely sure that you do something with him to give Loftin time unless he falls back into a rut like the one he was in during April. Rave is hitting the cover off the ball in AAA. There’s no reason to not let MJ Melendez work on his issues in AAA for a bit to give Rave a shot. Worst case scenario, you determine he’s a AAAA player and you move on. Best case, you have an outfield glut.

You get the idea. The goal of the second half is to see as many players as possible. If that means moving on from some guys unceremoniously, then that’s what it means. When we hit that date after the World Series that free agents can sign anywhere, the Royals better know exactly what they need to compete in 2024. I’m not saying they need to bridge the whole gap from terrible to contender in one offseason, but they better know what they need to do to get there.

The Weekend with the Rays

I mentioned this on Monday, but the Rays ended the second half with a whimper. They started the season 13-0 and, don’t get me wrong, they’re very good, but they’re 45-35 since. The Braves, who took two out of three from them last weekend have surged to become the best team by record. The Orioles find themselves even in the loss column with Tampa and just two games back overall. This is a race I didn’t expect to see, but they’re 10-15 now in their last 25 games, including splitting at home with your Kansas City Royals.

The Royals have set their rotation to start with Alec Marsh in the first game out of the break. He’ll be followed by Brady Singer tomorrow and Jordan Lyles on Sunday. I have to say that I’m slightly concerned about Daniel Lynch not being in that group, but only because his velocity was down in his last start and he had a visit from the trainer. If we find out he’s scheduled to go on Monday or Tuesday, I’ll lose that concern. I had thought for a bit that Marsh might get optioned following his last start just to massage the roster a bit, but he’s set for an honest look in the rotation and, at least as the current rotation stands, will continue his AL Central tour with a start against Detroit and Cleveland after this one.

The Rays will counter with Tyler Glasnow tonight and Shane McClanahan tomorrow, so there’ll be some good pitching they’ll see. Glasnow shut down the Royals in Tampa with one of his best fastballs of the season. He was outstanding. He was really good against Seattle in his next start and very good against the Braves in the start after that. McClanahan got hit around a bit by the Royals and left with a back injury before things could get worse.

Then he came back eight days later and was even worse and then found himself on the IL. He should come off for this one, but even as good as he’s been this year, he hasn’t pitched since June 30 and hasn’t pitched healthy for at least two weeks before that, so I don’t think we have much of an idea of what he has in the tank for this start. He could be amazing or he could struggle. It’s hard to say.

In their last 20 games, the Rays have won just seven and I think the offense shoulders a lot of the blame. They’ve averaged 4.8 runs per game, but they’ve been very inconsistent, scoring three or fewer runs eight times in that stretch and six or more seven times. It’s always hard to know how a team is going to come out of the break, but it does appear that the Royals are catching them at a better time than it could have been earlier in the year. When you add in that the Rays are “just” 23-20 on the road and the Royals seemed to play them well just a few weeks ago, it’s a recipe for at least a potentially solid showing for a bad team.