Soler's Success Crucial To KC In 2019

Spring training always brings up intriguing questions for die-hards of any club. This year is no different for our Kansas City Royals; I mean, is this KC pitching staff going to actually not suck? Because, so far, on paper, it looks like it might not suck. We'll return to that in a different article, but hey, why did they just now bring back Lucas Duda? Which guys were unjustifiably sent back down to the minors, and which guys don't deserve their spot on the Opening Day roster? Also, how much ass will Kyle Zimmer kick before he gets injured and hurts my soul yet again?

We have many questions that the ensuing months of baseball's blissful return will answer, and I'll try to bring more and more Royals content as the year goes on, but let's start with who showed up big in Arizona this year. One of KC's biggest run-producers, and one of their most important offensive assets, is the rehabilitated Jorge Soler. Soler had six more at-bats than any other Royal in spring training this season, and he still maintained a .973 OPS while leading the team in home runs and runs batted in. That could be crucial for KC this year.

Jorge could be the only starting outfielder capable of producing runs at a higher-than-average level for the Royals in 2019. Newly acquired center fielder Billy Hamilton steals more bases than he brings in runs in every season of his career. He somehow manages an oWAR of exactly 0 or higher every year, but he's never had a season with more than 48 RBI. He'll score around 70 runs if he stays healthy, but the new Billy in town won't be bringing in many runs. His 29 RBI in '18 was bested by 27 center fielders and 98 outfielders in total.

The less said about Gordo's recent run-making potential the better. We have no reason to believe he'll improve on his 54 RBI last year, since this is actually six RBI more than he's produced in any other season since 2014. But Alex has a spring training OPS .001 points higher than Soler's this year! And he didn't suck during the second half last season! That's something, right? We'll see.

Point is, Jorge means a lot to this team, which is already full of intriguing question marks. It's truly difficult to gauge the shift from Alcides Escobar's offensive production to that of our new full-time sensation at shortstop, Adalberto Mondesi. It's equally tough to know what we'll get from KC's new staples at the corner infield spots or from the notoriously big-league-worthy Frank Schwindel.

We have lots of intriguing questions. Regardless of the resulting win-loss record for 2019, I'm excited to get started. If the Royals of the future regain legitimacy within the Nicky Pratto/Brady Singer window, then many of the pieces of that puzzle are already in place this season. Each and every Royals fan should be excited to see what they can do right now.

Doug LaCerte writes about the Royals here and the Chiefs here. He also has a badly neglected Twitter @DLaC67 and a deservedly neglected Facebook page.

Unheralded Prospect Brewer Hicklen Enjoying All-Time Great Season (In Lexington)

The Lexington Legends are arguably the most exciting club among all affiliates of Kansas City Royals baseball. Lexington isn't rich with Royals baseball history, but it may be the current home of the new wave of talent that will make KC competitive again. Nick Pratto, MJ Melendez, Seuly Matias and others represent a significant portion of the next core of highly-touted prospects, but today we're focusing on somebody who avoided most fans' radar entirely.

Largely unheralded 7th-round draft pick Brewer Hicklen leads the Legends in OPS with an impressive .304/.366/.537 slash line through 72 games at this level. That translates  into a .903 OPS this season, and Hicklen's doing this in a league that's notoriously tough on hitters. 14 dingers and a 0.71 ground-out to fly-out ratio indicates that this 6'2" left fielder gets plenty of lift on the ball. His strikeout and walk percentages could use some work, but the same could be said for every important batter on the Legends roster (more on that later this week.)  When I looked through the stats for previous Lexington rosters, this number really stood out.

Nobody has ever maintained an OPS that high through as many games as a member of the Royals-affiliated Lexington Legends. The Legends were actually affiliated with the Houston Astros prior to 2013, so the last Legend to have a better year with the bat was actually an Astro in-the-making. The guy I'm talking about posted an obscene 1.03 OPS in 2010, then went on to garner MVP votes and All Star accolades throughout a still-impressive MLB career. The last guy to be better at the Single-A level than our guy Brewer Hicklen is currently anchoring the best lineup in the big leagues with his league-leading .655 slugging percentage and the big league's third-best OPS of 1.057. Yeah, we're talking about J.D Martinez.

The devil's advocate in me needs to point out Hicklen's struggles this year before I get all giddy thinking about the future. When he was promoted to the Advanced-A Wilmington Blue Rocks, Hicklen posted a .573 OPS while striking out in more than 36% of his 71 at-bats. There's a reason he spent so much of his year in Lexington, but some of his peripheral stats are encouraging, and he was only drafted last season. There's plenty of improvement that needs to happen before we can call Brewer the next Frank Schwindel (just kidding, maybe), but that's what cheering for prospects is all about.

Let's keep an eye on Nicky Pratto and M.J, of course, and let's hope Seuly gets healthy and gets back to crushing the ball next year. But, let's also keep this Hicklen guy on our radar; he's about to conclude the kind of season that's only typical for a future MLB star.

Doug LaCerte plugs his sports blog articles and gives his opinions on Kanye albums on Twitter @DLaC67. He also still has a Facebook page, I guess.