With Michael Wacha retained on a three-year deal worth at least $51MM, “we don’t expect to be in the market for a starter moving forward. We’re going to focus on some other things,” Royals general manager J.J. Picollo told MLB.com’s Maria Guardado and other reporters during the GM Meetings. Picollo cited the projected top five of Wacha, Seth Lugo, Cole Ragans, Brady Singer, and Alec Marsh, and said that the Royals continue to view Kris Bubic and Daniel Lynch as starters even though both pitched primarily as relievers in 2024. All in all, the GM is “very comfortable with our starting pitching right now,” and added that “we feel very good about the depth of our bullpen right now” as well.
As noted by MLB.com’s Anne Rogers, it is possible the Royals could still add a veteran arm as depth, so the door probably isn’t closed entirely on Kansas City’s starting pitching plans even if re-signing Wacha checked a major box on the to-do list. There were some reports earlier this week suggesting that the Royals could consider moving Marsh or Bubic in order to land lineup help, and such a trade would in all likelihood lead to K.C. pursuing some extra pitching to shore up the depth chart. Some level of relief additions are also probably likely, even if these might take the form of minor league signings if Picollo is really as set as he claims about the bullpen mix.
More from around the AL Central…
- Twins outfield prospect Emmanuel Rodriguez underwent a “cleanup procedure” of a right thumb operation after the season, president of baseball operations Derek Falvey told the Minneapolis Star Tribune’s Bobby Nightengale and other reporters. Rodriguez is expected to be recovered and ready for the start of Spring Training in February. Even with thumb problems limiting him to 47 games and 209 plate appearances across four minor league levels in 2024, Rodriguez was still a force at the plate, hitting .280/.459/567 with nine homers. This has essentially been the story of Rodriguez’s young pro career, as his potential has stood out despite playing in only 230 games over parts of four seasons due to multiple injuries. Baseball America ranks Rodriguez as the 14th-best prospect in the sport, and assuming he can stay healthy, the outfielder should be making his Major League debut at some point in 2025.
- Speaking of careers hampered by injuries, Matt Manning has yet to really take off as a big leaguer since being drafted ninth overall in 2016. Manning has a respectable 4.43 ERA in 254 innings with the Tigers since making his MLB debut in 2021, but with only a 16.4% career strikeout rate. Despite the lack of a breakout to date, Tigers president of baseball ops Scott Harris told Evan Petzold of the Detroit Free Press that the team still views Manning as a starting pitcher, and expects him to compete for a rotation job in camp. Harris feels Manning’s splitter can become a quality secondary pitch for the right-hander, as Petzold observes that Manning has had trouble developing a true second offering beyond his solid four-seamer. Detroit has been rumored to be looking for pitching additions this winter, but for now, Manning will be vying for one of the two open rotation spots behind the top three of Tarik Skubal, Reese Olson, and Casey Mize.
How do the twins have so many lefty power corner outfielders??? On top of walker Jenkins and Rodriguez??? And that’s not even counting the one who retired (who was it? larnach kiriloff or wallner I forget)
There’s a lot of swing and miss in those bats though.
Kiriloff is the recently retired player
Singer, Kowar, Lynch, Bubic. Royals really drafted terribly in the first round that year.
Never draft pitchers from UF. They are always terrible. Desclafani has been the best to come out of that program, which is sad.
You just listed 3 guys that contributed to the major league roster this season.
Not as much as the Royals hoped as first rounders 6 years ago.
They actually did not do all that bad considering for pitchers out of that draft. The next 2 pitchers drafted who have done anything at MLB level were Bradish and Taj Bradley in the 4th and 5th I believe. Later coming in rds 8 and 9 Joe Ryan and Skubal were taken. The only reason I’m familiar with this particular draft was looking at those who went ahead of Skubal recently.
Getz has a real opportunity here to make up some ground. He needs to overhaul the line up because the pitching is coming.He’s not going to get any money from Reinsorf, Or hardly any anyway, But he has some options. He could take Crochet and trade him for 3 or 4 prospects. Then take the best prospect he gets in that trade and get a couple more. Robert hopefully gets better by the deadline and he gets a couple more. I’m sure somebody thinks they can fix Vaughn and he could get something there. He’s going to have to be really creative this year, But if he’s smart and he and Venable can get together on prospects, The future doesn’t look as bleak as it did. We’ll see what he’s made of. This is one of those times that the Cubs and Sox match up perfectly. The Cubs have hitters that will never see Wrigley and the Sox have better pitching doming than the Cubs. At the worst Crochet fails as a starter and turns into a LH Closer. They need to talk.
Yes, but you’d certainly draft Bradish ahead of any of those 4 Royals.
Obviously in hindsight would take Bradish, Ryan, or Skubal over any of those Royals selected. Point I was getting at though is every team passed for multiple rounds on those guys.
Of those selected the 4 taken by the Royals have seen more time in MLB than any pitchers taken from that point down to the 4th rd where Bradish was taken.
Bradish is a very interesting situation. Elias (and Sig Meidel) have said that they have kept their draft boards from the Astros days and have look to trade for players they wanted to draft, but missed out on.
In between the 2018 and 2019 drafts they move to the Orioles. They certainly scouted Bradish, because they drafted his teammate (Joey Ortiz) im 2019. In 2018, their last pick before Bradish went was Jeremy Pena. They trade for him after one OK season in the minors.
The Royals actually picked a fifth pitcher before Bradish and 3 additional college pitchers before Skubal and Ryan. So it’s a good bit harder to defend than you thought.
Every single team passed on Bradish at least 3 times, some 4. So I find it hard ti fault the Royals there. And the point still stands that after the 4 pitchers they took, not til Bradish in the 4th Rd is there a pitcher who has had success at the MLB level.
Now I’m not going to try and spin this as though it was an elite draft for KC. I was just responding to the initial criticism about the pitchers selected.
Ultimately it goes to show how many prospects never come to fruition at MLB level.
Really generous calling Mize a “top 3”…
As a fan I still believe in him but I would prefer they take a few mph off the fastball and exchange it for some cut/2 seam movement, preferably both. It was the strategy that they undertook with Porcello and it helped his career immensely, albeit mostly post Detroit.
Exactly. Mize, by no means, is a lock for the rotation. The team favored Montero over Mize toward the end of the season, and Montero isn’t a lock for the rotation either.
Agreed. They need at least two starting pitchers via free agency or trade.
Would you put Maeda ahead of him? If not, its a fact Mize is their number 3. Keep in mind he was just returning from TJ, and is likely to show more improvement in ’25, as he will be farther from the injury.
No, I wouldn’t, but that still doesn’t make it a fact. Skubal is our #1. That’s a fact and that’s the only fact. Olsen as our #2 is likely, but it isn’t a fact. Spots #2-5 will all be decided closer to April and I don’t think Mize really has an edge over Montero or even Jobe based on the way he pitched last season. His velocity was there, so I don’t really see returning from TJ as an excuse. His pitches were just lackluster and for the most part, ineffective.
TJ rehabbers typically find their velocity first, with movement and command returning as rust is shaken off. mize has hope for another step forward, but i also read him being their #3 starter with a grain of salt. i believe they will be looking for someone to throw right after skubal in their rotation, knocking everyone down a peg, and i think mize, montero and jobe will be fighting between two or, ideally just one spot if the tigers can bring in two mid-level or higher starters
This is correct. Everyone I’ve followed that had the procedure said the velo comes back first, but it takes almost a year in order to really get their feel for the movement and control of their pitches.
I’d say Skubal, free agent (Flaherty, Buehler, Verlander?), Olson, Mize and Montero or even Hurter to start the year with Jobe coming up later. I could see Manning shipped out and it wouldn’t surprise me if they moved on from Mize either.
I really think the Tigers need to add three starters. Flaherty for one. Maybe a reclamation project like Bieber. Then another lefty at number 3 like Nester Cortes. He is their 6th starter and the Yankees talked about dealing him last year. It would save them about 6 mil (which is 10 mil with luxury tax) and they could add some inexpensive players to fill holes. A couple bullpen arms, maybe a bench player?
Im guessing if we traded Flaherty to the Yankees, Nestor would have been part of the deal. I really thought we were gonna make that trade with the Yanks and get him as a throw-in. I knew the Yanks were looking to trade him and he made sense for us, as we were giving up our only other solid starter and needed innings. I’m all in on Nestor. I think we could turn him into a great pitcher.
They say Will Warren was part of the package for Flaherty…not a fan of him as a pitcher but I guess Fetter saw something. I wonder if Jorbit Vivas was part of the deal as well since that is o e of the pkayers they tried to get in the Erod fiasco.
Nestor wouldn’t be a bad add, but Flaherty would be better if they are only looking for one guy to fill the #2 spot (Verlander and Buehler are coming off poor years). Olson has to be a lock and Jobe will be up at some point. I guess it depends how they view guys like Mize, Montero, Manning, Maeda and Hurter internally…fits for the 3-5 spots or trade fodder/depth. I’m interested to see who they settle on.
Nester doesn’t have a great reputation. I have a mutual friend of someone that works inside their clubhouse. Probably why they want to trade him
I’m glad they pivoted to the Dodgers. I’m not fond of anyone in the Yankees farm system. They wouldn’t have included Jasson Dominguez or Spencer Jones, so there isn’t much beyond that.
The Dodgers seem to have a steady supply of decent prospects even though they usually draft very late. I really like their SS prospect Alex Freeman. Switch hitter with some power and speed. Solid defender. I doubt they entrust SS to a rookie on a championship club. He may be available.
And, of course, Hunter Feduccia is a favorite of mine.
The Dodgers will have an age problem this year… 6 position players over 32 years old. A bench that makes over $22 mil this next year. And a pitching staff that spends more time on the IL than on the field.
Mize was getting warmed up before he got injured. Calm cool and collected on the mound with that slider moving like Maddux. To me that movement was key.
The pitch that Maddux threw w/the movement he was famous for was his 2 seamer. Threw it inside to lh hitters and it moved back over into the inside of the plate.
He didn’t play for the Tigers but Greg Maddux was my favorite pitcher.
I recently saw an interview with Greg Maddox, where he explained that he called his own pitches to the catcher, by touching different parts of his body and hat, moving the glove in certain ways… Genius! I have never heard of that before.
Royals definitely need one more starter. They were lucky injury wise with their starters. I dont seeing that happening again this year.
Wonder if Greinke is on speed dial to Picollo … or vice versa. I never thought he left the game because of aches/pains and but because the manufactured structure of pitching by pitch clock sucked all the fun out of it for him. Maybe he would reconsider and come back as a 5?
He never has officially retired, so you have to wonder if he would be willing to come back for a small one year contract
The Tigers’ Chris Fetter has been fantastic at grooming young pitchers and resurrecting older ones. I look for improvement from Mize, Manning and Montero in ’25.
Name a more iconic duo than Twins player with immense potential and injury problems
The Tigers will have to go outside the organization, to find a starter or two…..Manning, I don’t believe, is the answer.
“we don’t expect to be in the market for a starter moving forward…”
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Moving forward is forever.
They probably said that last year, before they signed Flaherty…..
He’s the type that they’ll sign again this year.
I was under the impression that Bubic was in the bullpen due to returning from a major surgery. I view him as better starting option than both Singer and Marsh. Royals also potentially have Kyle Wright coming in and competing for a role in spring training. In my mind, Singer would be the easiest to move along with Melendez for hitting help. They need some OBP in front of Witt Jr…. there are guys out there that would help fill that hole as well as some corner OF possibilities.
That’s correct. I believe he was coming back from Tommy John surgery and because you always want to be careful with those coming off of Tommy John they decided to move him to the bullpen.
Spring Training is as important as ever to determine the Tigers’ rotation. Tarik Skubal has the only sure spot while the remaining 4 spots must be won.
Personally, I favor an eight-man rotation. There are many reasons for it. As well as keeping a couple on minor league contracts. More good reasons for that…..
This would be a lot more fun if only…
they would hire the Superfife!