Kansas City Royals: Why moving Brad Keller to bullpen could make sense

By Leigh Oleszczak | Jun 16, 2020

MINNEAPOLIS, MN - AUGUST 04: Brad Keller #56 of the Kansas City Royals delivers a pitch against the Minnesota Twins during the game on August 4, 2019 at Target Field in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The Twins defeated the Royals 3-0. (Photo by Hannah Foslien/Getty Images) /

The Kansas City Royals could fall into a nice problem to have, which is having too many quality pitchers to fill out a rotation. As a result, Brad Keller might be an easy choice to move back to the bullpen.

At the beginning of Brad Keller‘s MLB career in 2018, the Kansas City Royals were using him as a reliever and he was doing a very good job in that role.

During his stint as a bullpen arm, Keller appeared in 21 games (22.1 innings) and held opponents to a .207 batting average while posting a 2.01 ERA. He struck out 13 batters, walked seven, and only gave up five runs.

That was the first year of the Royals’ rebuilding process, so naturally the rest of the team wasn’t very good. That especially applied to the bullpen, who was awful. Keller was one of the few bright spots not only out of the bullpen, but on the team as well, so it only made sense that he get promoted when the time came.

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Due to several injuries to the starters, Keller was indeed promoted to the rotation and that’s where he’s been ever since. During the rest of his rookie season, Keller started 20 games (118 innings) and finished the year with an ERA of 3.28 while striking out 83 batters.

In 2019, Keller wasn’t as impressive as his flashy rookie season, but that was to be expected. He finished the season with an ERA of 4.19 in 28 starts (165.1 innings). Keller definitely still had his moments, but it was going to be a little trickier for him, as there was more video on him now for hitters to study.

Keller has been a nice starting option for the Royals, but once all of these young arms start to find their way to the major leagues, is it possible that he could be relegated back to the bullpen? He did well there and would immediately become the best arm in the pen for the Royals, which is a plus.

Looking at the Royals’ top ten prospects (Asa Lacy not included yet), six of the ten are pitchers and all six are projected to make it to the majors no later than 2021. Of course that’s subject to change due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but right now it looks like the Royals could have Lacy, Brady Singer, Jackson Kowar, Daniel Lynch, and either Kris Bubic or Jonathan Bowlan in the rotation.

That’s what the minor league play is for, as it helps the organization determine what role will better suit each player or if they’ll even pan out at the major league level. It’s very possible that not all of those players pan out either, but this isn’t something that will happen for a few years obviously.

It will take time for the prospects to develop in the minors and even then they might not be thrown into the rotation right away, but once they’re ready to be starters, it could make a lot of sense to move Brad Keller back to his original role as a reliever.

What do you think Royals fans? Assuming the other pitchers do make it to the big leagues and look solid, would moving Brad Keller to the bullpen be something you’d be okay with or do you think he should remain in the rotation?

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