Kansas City Royals: Every First Round Pick Since 2000
Every Royals first-round draft pick since 2000: Zack Greinke (2002)
In 2002, the Kansas City Royals finally landed a true ace in the first round of the MLB Draft. That ace’s name was Zack Greinke, who was unbelievably good while pitching for the Royals.
Greinke was the Royals’ sixth overall pick in the 2002 draft and two years later saw his first action in the majors. He started 24 games that year and ended the season with a 3.97 ERA in 145 innings thrown. Greinke struck out 100 batters in his rookie season and went 8-11 on the year.
Greinke struggled in his second season, posting an ERA over five and things started to go downhill from there. The first-round pick began struggling with depression and contemplated quitting baseball altogether. As a result, he only pitched in three games in 2006.
The next season was when Greinke started to come into his own. He had the best ERA of his career up until that point at 3.69 and 106 strikeouts. He continued to improve each and every year and by 2009, he was on his way to becoming a superstar.
That 2009 season saw Greinke win the Cy Young Award after he threw 229.1 innings in 33 starts with an ERA of 2.16 and a record of 16-8. Greinke made it to his first All-Star Game that year, but that was the beginning of the end for his time in Kansas City.
Greinke never wanted to be apart of a rebuilding process and that’s what the Royals were at that time. Dayton Moore finally agreed to trade him, shipping him and Yuniesky Betancourt off to Milwaukee for several prospects (two of which were Lorenzo Cain and Alcides Escobar).
Greinke ended his KC Royals career with a 60-67 record, 3.82 career ERA, 12 complete games, three shutouts, and 931 strikeouts. He started a total of 169 games and threw 1,108 innings while in Kansas City.
Since being traded, Greinke has pitched for the Brewers, Angels, Dodgers, Diamondbacks and is currently with the Astros. It’s ironic that all Greinke wanted back then was to pitch for a World Series contender and the team that drafted him went to two World Series and won one without him. Not only that, but they won it due to two guys they acquired through trading him. Crazy stuff.
Zack Greinke was an odd duck and still is. He was a very awkward individual and kept to himself, but he was a damn good pitcher. He’s still chasing that first World Series appearance, but perhaps he’ll lead Houston back to the promise land in the next few years.