Leading Off: Kansas City Royals
The 2020 home run king returns on Tuesday evening (Jamie Squire / Getty Images)
The Teams
The Royals are 32-38 and sit in third place in the AL Central. They lost 6 games in a row before Adalberto Mondesi returned from the IL to ruin the Red Sox, and come into the series after taking 2 of 3 from Boston in Kansas City. While we appreciate their work over the weekend, we hope that the Royals will revert to their losing form in this upcoming series.
The book on the Royals is reasonably similar to the book on the Yankees at the plate. They don’t produce much. Both teams are below average in runs per game, but the Royals do not quite have the encouraging underlying stats that the Yankees do. They rank 19th in OBP and 21st in OPS (the Yankees are 13th and 12th respectively). Where it gets especially tough for the Royals is that they aren’t great in the run suppression department. The staff is 23rd in ERA, with the starters ranking 27th in ERA and IP, and the bullpen slotting in a slightly more respectable 16th in ERA.
Of the starters, only Danny Duffy was having a particularly interesting season (his ERA was under 2.00 in 7 starts), but he’s on the IL. Certain relievers, like Josh Staumont and Jake Brentz, are having good seasons, but it would be a lot cooler if Wade Davis and Greg Holland were, for old time’s sake. It’s at least a little exciting that Ervin Santana is pitching well (although his FIP indicates his days of being above average are numbered), but he won’t be pitching in this series.
The Yankees are riding a two-game winning streak, and have comeback wins in 5 of their last 6 games. Their fearless leader is Gary Sanchez, who has fully embraced #HotGarySummer to the tune of a .344/.408/.719 (202 wRC+) slash line since May 27. He was the entire offense on Sunday as the Yankees won a 2-1 nailbiter against Oakland, and has been phenomenal since Memorial Day Weekend (but also all year), placing himself firmly in the All Star conversation. Vote here!
Starting pitching is still a concern. Aside from the gem that Montgomery threw on Sunday to keep the Yankees in it against Sean Manaea, the Yankees’ starters have not provided great performances lately (with the obvious exception of Gerrit Cole). Kansas City’s offense is not the most impressive unit every assembled (though they handled Boston’s pitching deftly this weekend), so it would be nice for Taillon and King to use this series as an opportunity to get on track.
The big, Missourian elephant in the room is that Chris Gittens was sent down after Sunday’s game, which can only mean one thing.
Luke Voit 🔜 https://t.co/wFYPPTjbY6
— Yankees Files (@YankeesFiles) June 20, 2021
Thank you to Chris Gittens for your exit velocity and insurance runs, but it is time for the reigning home run king to return to his throne. The Yankees have desperately missed Luke Voit, with their first basemen posting a .548 OPS this year (29th of 30 teams). Even 75% of Luke Voit would be better than that, and his return feels much less rushed this time. Enjoy this video of Luke Voit hitting a ball 11 miles in Kansas City in 2019 in front of his family and friends and John Flaherty not caring nearly as much as it feels like he should.
Watch Out For…
Hunter Dozier. This is not a joke. Look, has he been worth -2 bWAR this year and is his OPS+ 45? Yes and yes. Is his OBP lower than Kyle Higashioka’s batting average? No. But you probably would have believed me if I said it was (it’s .217… gross). Even so, Dozier has been a true Yankee Killer in his career. Now, most of the damage he did to build his 1.120 career OPS against the Yankees was in his breakout 2019 campaign when he had a 124 OPS+ and led the league in triples, but a Yankee Killer is a Yankee Killer, and Dozier is one.
Watch out for Adalberto Mondesi as well. The son of a former Yankee (Raul Mondesi came to the Yankees in a trade in 02 and was traded away in 03) only has a .737 career OPS against the Yankees, but he’s really good. He started the season hurt, played for about a week at the end of May, got hurt again, and returned a few days ago, but he’s slashing .344/.364/.813 for a 208 OPS+, and hit an absolute nuke the other day against Boston.
The shortstop is still only 25 years old despite this being his sixth year seeing Major League action, and he’s never played more than 102 games in a season. Still, when he’s right he’s something between a 3 and 5 tool player. His defense is solid, his speed is elite, and he’s hit for power and average in short bursts over his career. I hope he puts it together, because it would be all kinds of exciting. I do not hope he puts it together this series (though it appears he already has).
Note: Mondesi was moved to the IL on Monday for the third time this year. I’m not taking him off the list, though, because this was fun to write and he’s really good.
Bonus: Watch out for Carlos Santana, after gracing us all with the hit song “Smooth” with Rob Thomas from Matchbox Twenty, Santana has gone on to have a very productive MLB career, and is playing well this year.
Pitching Matchups
Game 1: Gerrit Cole vs Brady Singer
With or without Spider Tack, Gerrit Cole is one of the best starting pitchers in baseball, and acting like that’s not true would be insane. Gerrit Cole is phenomenal, the Royals are not an imposing lineup (look, I wouldn’t want to face Carlos Santana and Adalberto Mondesi either, but most of the guys are not them), and he has been very impressive in his last two starts. Expect him to keep it going on Tuesday.
Brady Singer was a first round pick out of the University of Florida in 2018, and made his debut for the Royals last year. He exceeded rookie limits last year, but was the second best prospect in the organization, and 59th in all of baseball prior to that graduation. The kid can pitch! Look, are the Royals 4-10 when he starts? Yes. Is his ERA 4.76? Sure. Does he average fewer than 5 innings per start? Yeah. Does a lot of this sound like Jameson Taillon? Unfortunately.
But really, there’s a lot to like about this kid. He’s great at limiting hard contact (especially at preventing barrels), he throws his fastball pretty hard, his xERA is more than a full run lower than his actual ERA, and he throws a slider that moves well. He doesn’t strike a lot of guys out and is only average at avoiding the walk, but I think that his peripherals make a strong case that he can be a very effective sinkerballer as he moves forward. Also, you have to give credit to the Royals for running him out there every fifth day. They made moves to be competitive in the offseason (Carlos Santana, Andrew Benintendi, Mike Minor, Wade Davis, Greg Holland), and are investing in their young prospects. I’m excited to see Singer pitch, even though I hope the Yankees knock him around, because I think he’s a guy who could be a solid Major Leaguer for a long time.
Game 2: Mike King vs Jackson Kowar
Mike King’s spot in the rotation seems very secure. The Yankees have made it clear that they’re not going to give it to Deivi Garcia, who is currently struggling in AAA, and the even bigger vote of confidence is that they didn’t panic buy a starter when Kluber, Severino, and Clarke Schmidt all ended up injured. Realistically, King is supposed to be the seventh or eighth starter, and for that role, he’s been fine… or maybe that’s my selective memory talking.
King doesn’t pitch deep into games, so maybe his 6.32 ERA in starts is a bit inflated, but guys are hitting .295/.380/.410 off him in those games. It’s tough to find this high BA / low SLG stat line for a player, but 2019 Avisail Garcia is a reasonably good comparison. Anyway, Mike King should consider being more effective.
For whatever it’s worth, Baseball Savant is not impressed with him (lots of blue on his page), so we don’t have much of a reason to believe things are on track to improve. However, he did pitch to a 2.29 ERA in 19.2 innings before they made him a starter, so maybe he should just go back to doing whatever it is he was doing then.
Jackson Kowar is one of the Royals’ top-10 prospects, and another guy who we should credit them for having on the squad. It seems like he’ll be used as an opener (that’s been the case in each of his other 2 starts, and he does not have an appearance longer than 3 innings), which is something the Royals like to do a lot. Who will he open for? Tough to say. Roster Resource and ESPN even disagree on who is starting this game (MLB has TBDs for the Royals for each game of the series), but if it’s Kowar, that’s pretty cool. He throws a fastball, curveball, and changeup, changes speeds well, and has good movement. Like Brady Singer, he was a first round pick out of the University of Florida in 2018 (I guess the Royals loved that rotation), and unlike Brady Singer, he worked his way onto the staff this year by pitching to a 0.85 ERA in 6 starts in AAA before getting the call up to the Majors. He’s definitely a guy the Yankees should smack around for an inning or two, as his 18.00 ERA suggests, but don’t expect him to be in there for 100 pitches (or even like, 40 pitches).
Game 3: Jameson Taillon vs Kris Bubic
Jameson Taillon looked like a guy who had almost found it on Friday against Oakland. He tossed 4.2 IP of 2-run ball, and kept the Yankees in the game. Would it have been nice to leave him in to see if they could line him up for the win? Yes. Would it have been wise? No.
We’ve talked about it on the podcast, we’ve talked about it on here, we’ve mentioned it on Twitter: Jameson Taillon’s high velocity, spin rate, whiff rate, and chase rate all seem to indicate that he should be pitching better than he has. His xERA, which is nearly a run and a half lower than his actual ERA, agrees. His ERA is still over a run above his FIP. The guy has definitely gotten unlucky. At some point, as Gary Sanchez has shown, though, your luck must turn. I don’t know if Jamo needs to do something to change his luck, or if it will just happen, but the Yankees don’t win when Jamo starts. They are 4-9 when they run him out there, and his 5.59 ERA is unbecoming of a member of this rotation. Things need to change, and maybe a home start against Kansas City is exactly the way that starts to happen.
Kris Bubic is another recently-promoted arm for the Royals, who debuted with Singer last year and has become a full-time member of the staff here in 2021. He’s only 23, younger than Kowar or Singer, and is another 2018 first round pick (though this time from Stanford), so he’s another guy who it’s nice to see the Royals using at the Major League level early on. Due to the pandemic, he’s never played a game above high-A that was not in the Majors. He was called up from the alternate site last year and has not looked back. Pretty cool.
What’s not pretty cool are the young lefty’s stats. His Baseball Savant page is basically all blue (in an homage to the Royals’ colors, or to Mike King), and his 4.17 ERA balloons to 5.10 in games he has started (also an homage to Mike King). I’ve said that the Yankees should dominate soft-throwing lefties who don’t strike guys out and fail to limit hard contact in the past and been wrong (I’m looking at you, Ryan Yarbrough [ok he’s good with the exit velo stuff] and Rich Hill), but I should not be wrong this time.
Really Though
I think the Royals deserve to be commended for the way they have managed their organization since the World Series. Might they like to have Eric Hosmer and Wil Myers right about now? Probably, but still, they’re doing things that a lot of teams are not doing. Wouldn’t it have been cool if the Marlins, Pirates, Mariners, Tigers, Diamondbacks, etc. had been aggressive in building their roster this offseason? The Royals have shown that you can construct a roster seriously while still giving your young players a shot at the highest level (look at who’s pitching in this series!!). This is the kind of rebuild that more teams need to do. A mix of established guys (Carlos Santana, Mike Minor), homegrown favorites (Salvy, Mondesi), young guys who might pan out (Benintendi, Dozier), and a host of prospects ensures that the product on the field is either performing well, or a look into the franchise’s future. Not enough teams do this, and I am glad the Royals have. They made their roster fun, and the series should be fun as a result.
Get a sweep though. Let’s go Yankees.
