Kansas City Royals are further away from contending than we thought
By John McCarty
The Royals’ remaining production is not getting any younger.
The biggest issue and why this team is much further away from competing than others is that the bats likely remaining in the lineup are getting older.
Whit Merrifield is already 31 and will be 32 by spring training in 2021. Hunter Dozier is already 29, so while he’s in his prime now, in a few years when the Royals hope to be good again, well, he’ll be well into his 30’s and we hope his decline isn’t drastic.
The younger players on the roster have shown to simply be not good enough. Nicky Lopez isn’t a major leaguer and Adalberto Mondesi has been mismanaged from the start by this organization. He’s nothing special or anything more than a bottom of the lineup speed bunter with good defense. I can go on and on about the lack of anything else from anyone else, but I simply don’t have the space and you don’t have the time to hear me rant about it.
What the Royals do have in Merrifield and Dozier, however, appears to be solid trade chips with cost control at good prices on both players, meaning they likely could really jump start and accelerate a rebuild with their returns. I don’t think the organization has the forward thinking to make the move, but hey, I’m just looking at the past six years of decision making.