KC Royals: First impressions of newcomers in 2021

The KC Royals won Opening Day in a 14-10 slugfest against the Rangers. How did the newly added players look in their Royals debuts? 

Baseball is back and it sure feels good, doesn’t it? The Kansas City Royals opened their 2021 season at Kauffman Stadium in front of fans for the first time since 2019 and what a game it was, lasting well over four hours, actually setting a record for the longest Royals Opening Day and the most runs scored by the boys in blue in the first game of the season.

One big reason as to why Royals fans were so optimistic about this year is that Dayton Moore added premier talent to this roster. He went out and signed names like Mike Minor (who is on his second stint with the team and didn’t pitch on Thursday), Carlos Santana, and Michael A. Taylor while trading for Andrew Benintendi.

With the first game in the books, what were our first impressions of the new Royals? Let’s take a look, starting with the most surprising.

Michael A. Taylor

Let’s not all sit here and act like we thought Michael A. Taylor was going to be the biggest bright spot from the team’s first game of the year. Most considered this signing to be a “typical Royals move” in bringing in a good defensive player who can’t hit.

Taylor did both on Thursday and did so quite well.

For starters, his catch in the first inning was critical, as Brad Keller — who we’ll obviously get to in a bit — was struggling to get outs. Taylor had two terrific throws to get key outs and this gave fans flashbacks to what Alex Gordon was able to do in the outfield, even though Taylor mans center field.

Defensive gems isn’t shocking for Taylor, but the guy hit the ball well too on Thursday, going 3-for-5 with one home run and three RBI. He’s batting .600 after his first game with the Royals and while he’s obviously not going to keep up that kind of pace, no one thought he’d have this kind of day with his new team, especially not in the first game.