Five questions about the Royals and their start to the 2022 season
The last three games haven't been great, but hang in there. This is no time to start banging the panic button.
Do you have feelings of panic? Despair? Or is it the all too familiar feeling of “there we go again” after watching the first five games of the Royals 2022 season?
Don’t fret! Even though the Royals are under .500 and have lost three in a row, it’s still extremely early days. So while things haven’t been necessarily great, especially of late, this is no time to be looking for the panic button. There will be plenty of time for that later.
Now that’s some kind of setup, isn’t it?
Still, you have questions after the first five games. I’ll try to provide some answers to avert any kind of potential panic. It’s a long season. We will navigate these games together. Onward!
The offense has been brutal, hasn’t it?
This feels like a rhetorical question. But the answer is yes. The offense has been brutal.
Their collective .209 batting average ranks 25th in the majors. Their .275 OBP ranks 26th. And their .313 slugging percentage is 26th. Add the misery together and you have a 70 OPS+, meaning the Royals offense has been producing at 30 percent less than league average.
Although the offense has taken up residence in what is all-too-familiar territory, it’s still far too early to draw any conclusions. You know this. We’re talking about 21 plate appearances for most of these guys.
Still, we can look to see where the deficiencies reside. The one-two combination of Whit Merrifield and Bobby Witt Jr. at the top of the order aren’t setting the table. That means the Royals haven’t been able to take advantage of Andrew Benintendi’s scorching hot start. Think back to Salvador Perez’s two home runs on Tuesday in St. Louis. Both solo shots.
Perhaps obscured by the collective struggles has been the performance from Nicky Lopez, who has picked up where he left off from 2021. Again, while I stress it’s far too early to make any kind of conclusions from what we’ve seen so far, I still wonder about if the Royals would ever be inclined to shift the lineup around if Lopez and Merrifield continue their respective trends. I like the idea of Lopez as the “second leadoff man” in theory, but that only works if you have a quality “first leadoff man.”
The heart of the order featuring Carlos Santana and Hunter Dozier and Adalberto Mondesi has been a black hole, which while it was a worst-case scenario when looking at the start of the 2022 season, also felt like the most likely outcome.
Nick Pratto looks good, doesn’t he?
Eh. Pratto has hit three bombs, but has 15 strikeouts and just one walk in 34 plate appearances and is hitting .152/.177/.424. It’s not a great start by any stretch, but…
I understand why you may be asking the question.
Santana has looked particularly poor in the season’s first week.
His average exit velocity is up a couple of mph and ranks in the 69th percentile. That’s good. He’s struck out just once thus far and his contact rate is about 87 percent. That’s also good. And his Hard-Hit Rate is up almost five percent from 2021. That’s…still good.
So why has Santana been so bad? Ahhh…a question within a question.
Let’s start with his batted ball profile. He’s hitting 40 percent of the balls he’s put in play on the ground. He has a 40 percent fly ball rate and—more alarming—a 13.3 percent pop up rate.
That leaves just a 6.7 percent line drive rate. Santana is hitting the ball hard and catching the barrel, but he’s still not squaring it up the way you’d like. Frankly, the bat looks a little slow through the zone. So while he’s still making what Baseball Savant considers to be good contact, it’s not of a particular quality.
Again, it’s early. Again, the trends that pop up (get it?) early in the season should be monitored. Pratto will need to continue to develop as a hitter in his Triple-A time. (His glove is already exceptional and will play in the majors.) Santana and the Royals should be feeling the pressure around the season’s 40th game, the checkpoint in the season Dayton Moore often points to as the first time to truly begin to make adjustments.
Should you be worried about Bobby Witt Jr.?
No.
Really?
Yes. Witt (and all of us) need to focus on process rather than results. If he’s striking out, did he at least have a decent at bat? Is he impacting games in a positive manner like we saw in the first two games of the year? We hear raves about his makeup, and it’s absolutely justified. That’s supposed to help him get through any lean times. As long as you see him keep his focus, he’ll be fine.
Prospects struggle. The jump from Triple-A to the majors is massive. The Royals need to—and can afford to–be patient.
The pitching has been brutal, hasn’t it?
Through five games, Royals pitchers own a 6.80 ERA. It’s the worst mark in the majors. That’s a full run (and more) than the next-worst team. And that’s after they allowed just one run through the first two games of the year. Hey, it happens when you cough up double-digit run totals twice in the season’s first week.
Obviously, the numbers are skewed by the train wreck game against the Guardians on Sunday. And the follow-up on Monday. But the Royals bullpen hasn’t been exactly helpful.
Sure, a lot of that comes from Jackson Kowar and Brady Singer from Sunday’s destruction. But we’re looking for reasons the Royals have struggled getting out of the gate (more specifically the last three games), and that’s a major reason.
Repeat the mantra…It’s just five games. It’s just five games.
Central Issues
Dodgers 7, Twins 0
Clayton Kershaw threw 41 sliders, got the Twins batters to offer at 27 of them and they completely missed 17. That’s 17 whiffs on the slider!
Of course, you are aware that the lefty was pitching a perfect game before he was pulled after 80 pitches and seven innings. Yes, it sucks for baseball and for the fans to have a pitcher who was so dominant in a start get pulled so early, but we can’t forget that because of the lockout spring training was shortened by a few weeks. Also, this was Kershaw’s first regular season start in ‘22 and then there’s his rather lengthy injury history.
I get it. It’s no fun to watch a guy dominate and then get pulled for Alex Vesia. This isn’t a baseball nerd with their spreadsheet problem. This is a lack of regular preparation problem. Along with some general awareness and common sense.
Anyway, the Twins dropped both their games against the Dodgers by a combined score of 17-2.
Guardians 7, Reds 3
The Reds are not a good baseball team. I’m less certain about the status of the Guardians, but damn, did they just tear through Cincinnati. Seven of their nine regulars have an early-season OPS+ greater than 100. Wednesday, Miles Straw did the damage from the leadoff spot, reaching base five times in six plate appearances and José Ramírez drove in three runs on three hits. Then Owen Miller got into the action with a pair of dingers.
They’ve now won four in a row where they’ve outscored their opponents by a tally of 44-18.
Red Sox 9, Tigers 7
Super Prospect Spencer Torkelson hit his first major league home run, but it wasn’t enough as the Red Sox held on to a victory. At points Boston led 7-1 and 9-2. Austin Davis, Kutter Crawford and Jake Diekman came in from the bullpen for the Sox to make it close. This is why you steal bases and bunt for hits when leading big. You never know how much that bullpen is going to bend. Or break.
Mariners 4, White Sox 6
The South Siders have now won four in a row, their lone loss this year coming when Liam Hendriks couldn’t hold a one-run ninth inning lead against the Tigers on Opening Day.
Eloy Jimenez, Tim Anderson and Luis Robert all went deep against Mariners starter Robbie Ray and Dallas Keuchel went five innings with five strikeouts.
Beware the South Siders.
Up next
The Royals return after their abbreviated series against the Cardinals to host seven at The K against the Tigers and Twins. Because of the rainout on Wednesday, the Royals haven’t set their rotation for the four-game set with Detroit. I’ll just go ahead and assume Zack Greinke gets the ball on Thursday evening. The Tigers have Casey Mize slated to make the start. He went five innings in his first start of the season which was against the White Sox, allowing four runs on seven hits. First pitch is scheduled for 7:10.