The specter of a failed call-up shouldn’t prevent the Royals from attempting to improve their roster
A week and a half into the season is still too early to panic. You know it, I know it, we all know it. But, the thing is, this is more like 53 weeks into the season – at least when it comes to extremely subpar outfield play. We all know the numbers the Royals outfielders are putting out, so we don’t need to go over those. I, along with a lot of other Royals fans and analysts, have written and spoken extensively about the failure of the team to add any other reasonable options to the franchise during the offseason. But, well, maybe none of that would have helped.
Jurickson Profar, tops on many lists, got popped for popping pills. Or, ya know, however you ingest hCG. He’ll miss 80 games and the postseason (should Atlanta make it after a truly terrible start to their season). Anthony Santander, owner of a fresh five-year deal in Toronto, has a measly 70 wRC+ at the season’s start. Yes, that would be a drastic improvement over what the Royals are currently putting out there, but at those prices? I know I criticized the Royals for perhaps playing it too safe but even I have to admit that might have been a bad investment.
Starling Marte has started “hot” with a 126 wRC+ of his own in New York, but he has only played in half of the games, he’s struck out one-third of the time and a big part of his offensive production comes from being hit three times in 15 plate appearances. How much do you want to bet that will hold up? Taylor Ward hasn’t been good. Heston Kjerstad hasn’t been good. My favorite off-season target, Michael Conforto, has been fantastic, but not every fact can confirm every bias, I guess.
Still, that doesn’t mean the Royals are without options for at least trying to fix their biggest problem. There are no remaining obvious answers – and the obvious answers didn’t end up necessarily working out – but the Royals have four different guys in their minor leagues they could let sink or swim at the big league level. They don’t even have to cut anyone to make it work – MJ Melendez and Kyle Isbel both have options remaining!
Drew Waters
Drew is probably the least sexy choice, but also the most obvious. Waters has played major league baseball before, and for the Kansas City Royals. In 2023, unfortunately, he was something less than good in extended action. Still, while MJ Melendez gets chance after chance, Drew Waters languished in the minors for almost all of 2024, and he’s down there again. The worst part? He’s had success there! He had a 127 wRC+ in Omaha last season, and he’s already hit for the cycle, including a stand-up, inside-the-park home run this year.
Is he likely to be good for KC? History tells us not to hold our breath. But he’s at least a better defender than either Melendez or Renfroe, and he can hardly hit any worse. Did you realize he’s still only 26? That’s still the edge of prospect range and just entering his physical prime! Might as well give him a shot.
John Rave
Rave has a lot in common with Waters – he’s not a top prospect and while not old, he’s certainly not young for a baseball prospect. Rave didn’t hit quite as well as Waters last year, only a 111 wRC+, but he offers a bit more power and similar speed. Also like Waters, he has the ability to play centerfield which helps if the Royals want to give Kyle Isbel a more limited role alongside Melendez and Renfroe.
The biggest difference between Rave and Waters is that Waters had a chance and didn’t do enough with it. Rave has never even been given a chance. Again, like Waters, there’s no guarantee he can be good, but he can hardly be worse than what they’ve got out there.
Gavin Cross
I predicted/wish-cast Cross as the starting right fielder in my final preseason roster projection for the Royals. A lot of people told me the team had no business calling him up, fretting about how they ruined Adalberto Mondesi. So this is where I go on a bit of a tangent.
Adalberto Mondesi didn’t fail as a player because he was called up too early. He failed as a player because he wasn’t very good. The ability never matched the hype. Sure, he had raw tools in power and speed, but he had never, ever learned to harness them before the Royals called him up. Who knows if he ever would have?
Even if you think Mondesi could have been good had the Royals been more patient with him, his situation was very different from the one Cross is in, now. Mondesi was called up at age 20 with a history of subpar hitting throughout his short minor league career and asked to save the franchise. If the Royals were to call up Cross before tomorrow’s game, he’d be 24 years old with a history of hitting above league averages in the minors every season except the one impacted by his bizarre bout with Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever. He also wouldn’t be asked to save the franchise, just to be at least slightly below average instead of an abject disaster.
Jac Caglianone
Now, if you wanted to make a Mondesi comparison, Jac would be closer to the guy to do it with. That said, even his situation isn’t comparable. Jac doesn’t have a history of minor league success, but he does have a history of high-level college success that Mondesi didn’t have. It’s important to realize that nothing about Mondesi’s production ever suggested he’d be successful outside of 2020. All of the players I’ve listed today have shown that success to some degree.
Anyway, let’s talk about Jac. Jac is good. Jac is strong. Jac will almost certainly be with the big league club before the end of the year. Don’t just ask me. Ask Anne Rogers. Ask Jonathan Mayo of MLB Pipeline. Sam Dykstra of MLB Pipeline agrees. So does Jeff Passan of ESPN. The Jac Wagon is real, it’s big, and it’s got a lot of people on it even outside of KC.
Jac isn’t an immediate answer to the Royals’ problems. Even if he could be. But he’s definitely an answer that’s coming. The biggest question is how long we’ll have to wait, and if the Royals would just please consider one or more of the first three options until then.
Bonus: Mark Canha
Listen, I know Canha is past his prime. But he was a competent hitter last year. The Royals traded for him at the end of Spring Training. One presumes they did that for a reason. And yet, he has received a mere one start in the outfield during the first week and a half of the season. And when he’s played, he’s gotten on base a bunch! He has a .533 OBP to start the year! Meanwhile, Cavan Biggio, cut last year by basically every MLB team and a couple minor league teams, has been in there almost every day along with Melendez and Renfroe. Make it make sense!
It’s great to have baseball back, but now I’d like to have winning baseball back. That’s going to continue to be difficult until they make some adjustments to the outfield picture.