Kansas City Royals: 2019-2020 offseason schedule

With the news breaking on Halloween that the Kansas City Royals have hired Mike Matheny as their 17th manager in franchise history, what other major tasks are the Royals set to accomplish this offseason?

According to mlbtradrumors.com, the following offseason schedule will apply to upcoming major transaction dates for the MLB. The Kansas City Royals have plenty of moves to make this offseason with new ownership taking over, a new manager, and roster acquisitions.

Here is an outline of when major events will likely take place and what the Royals should do for improving their roster.

October 31st – Eligible players officially file for major or minor-league free agency

The Kansas City Royals have already made a splash announcing the hiring of Mike Matheny as their 17th manager in franchise history. This hire has stirred up some controversy, but I’m on the side that finds this to be a good hire for the Royals moving forward.

This hire appeared predestined after Matheny was hired as a special assistant prior to the 2019 season, as I haven’t heard and rumors about outside candidates being interviewed for the manager position.

The MLB will ratify and approve the sale of the Kansas City Royals to John Sherman and his buyer group in the upcoming days. It appears there has been a good communication between General Manager Dayton Moore and the new ownership group as the Royals have made a decision on their next manager.

Moore appears to have complete control of baseball operations at this point and hopefully in the next couple of weeks, we will get an idea as to what kind of budget he will be working with this offseason. I detailed what we can expect from new owner John Sherman in the next few years here.

The Royals will be using the next few days to make roster decisions and decide whether to exercise Alex Gordon’s final contract year ($23 million) or decline and pursue his buyout option ($4 million). Between October 31st and November 4th will be a very active time for all of the teams in the MLB. This is an excellent period to pay attention to mlbtraderumors.com to keep track of all of the players released into free agency, contract options declined, and/or traded to clear up roster space.

Several of the more talented rosters such as the New York Yankees, Houston Astros, Los Angeles Dodgers, San Diego Padres, and Texas Rangers will be busy releasing and trading players to make room on their 40-man rosters for prospects who need to be shielded from the Rule 5 draft and free agents.