Kansas City Royals: Asa Lacy has ace potential
The Kansas City Royals took Asa Lacy fourth overall with the hopes that he could be their next ace.
It’s been awhile since the Kansas City Royals have had a true ace in their rotation, but hopefully 2020 first round pick Asa Lacy can provide just that for the boys in blue.
Lacy didn’t have a chance to end his collegiate career that most players would like to due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but before the season was shut down, he was having an incredible campaign. He had a 0.75 ERA in four starts and 24 innings thrown while striking out 178 batters. This production came against the SEC, which has some of the best teams in all of college baseball.
The Royals had to be elated when Lacy was still on the board with the fourth overall pick (as was Austin Martin, which was shocking to say the least) and didn’t hesitate to make him their first round selection. Had there been a traditional season in 2020, it’s very possible that Lacy could have been a September call-up and pitched in the majors a bit this year.
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With the shortened season, however, that won’t happen. Lacy should be up in the big leagues and contributing by 2022.
Lacy’s size (6’4″ and 215 pounds) along with his off-speed pitches give the Royals hope that he can bring that true ace the team has been coveting for so long now. Manzanares De la Rosa of FanSided agreed that Lacy could be the team’s ace of the future and had this to say,
"Even more remarkable are his off-speed pitches, which include a pronounced curve, a rarely-used but definitely above-average changeup, and one of the deadliest, nastiest sliders college baseball has seen in a while. His slider oscillates in the low to mid 80s, but considering Lacy’s size and the length of his stride (listed at 6’9), it is a nightmare for any batter."
Lacy went up against the best of the best when it comes to college baseball competition and pairing that with the fact that he has time to fine tune his pitches in the minors for a year (at the very least) is very exciting for the Royals.
Dayton Moore has definitely been making pitching a priority these past few years and with how well the 2018 draft class has looked paired with Lacy’s potential, the Kansas City Royals could actually have too many options for their rotation and have to relegate a few to the bullpen instead. What a good problem to have, right?
If he pans out, Asa Lacy could be just what the Kansas City Royals need to get back to contending for a World Series title.