Failure to Launch: Failed Hitting Development Continues for the Royals
Larger change is needed to truly make change in the organization.
The calendar has flipped to June. By now in the minor leagues, that means hot stretches to open the season have more or less leveled out into what can be expected. Small samples are beginning to dissipate, and we have a clearer picture of how players are truly performing for the long haul this season. Of 48 qualified minor league hitters, the Royals currently have 22 with a wRC+ of 100 or better. By OPS, 13 are at .850 or better. Keep in mind, however, that many of these numbers from the Dominican Summer League and Complex are still plagued by small sample sizes — their season schedule started much later than the full-season affiliates.
Outside of the box score stats, by and large, Royals minor league hitters simply haven’t done well this season. It’s a continuation of last year’s trend, when only a few Royals minor league hitters truly shone.
This tweet today couldn’t have come at a better time to prove the point. Royals minor league hitters are worse than average in both chase rate and whiff rate this season. For exit velocity, hard hit rate, and zone contact rate, they’re all around average. There simply isn’t a lot that they’re doing extremely well right now. I attribute some of that to the turnover from last offseason. Director of Hitting Performance, Drew Saylor, left the org this winter. Saylor was with the organization for six seasons and was replaced by Abraham Nuñez and Nic Jackson. Although you could point to a change in leadership as a cause for a “burn-in” period, it doesn’t appear that’s the case.
Nuñez has been in the organization for some time, but Jackson joined the Royals in 2022. Before that, he was in the Mets and Cubs organizations. In the linked article above from Anne Rogers, she includes a tidbit related to a quote from General Manager J.J. Picollo.
While Royals officials were adding voices to the Major League hitting staff, they began to realize they might have the player development answer already in place: Three coaches who know the system already, who have existing relationships with players and who work well with senior director of hitting performance and Major League hitting coach Alec Zumwalt.
“We just came to the conclusion: Why are we trying to [complicate] things?” general manager J.J. Picollo said. “We have three very capable guys in the Minor Leagues that have done really good jobs from a coaching perspective, that have different backgrounds, which we value, and they have great relationships with Alec Zumwalt. That’s important, because we want to emphasize the continuity from the Major Leagues to the Minor Leagues.”
The Royals are in a weird place. The farm system has supplemented the big league roster consistently in recent years. Bobby Witt Jr. was a can’t-miss prospect, but others, including Michael Massey, Vinnie Pasquantino, and Maikel Garcia, have all been homegrown, key contributors. Although the farm has developed big-leaguers, it hasn’t developed a winning big league roster. The offense continues to be an area of need and has been since Vinnie Pasquantino injured his wrist in Houston back in 2024.
The Royals are 28th in runs scored this season. They were 26th last season. Since the firing of former Hitting Coach Terry Bradshaw on May 16, 2022, the Royals are 22nd in runs scored, 24th in on-base percentage, and 24th in wRC+ (93). It simply isn’t working. There were improvements for a time immediately after Zumwalt took charge. The Royals excelled in zone contact and hard hit rate. This season, that’s changed to some degree. The Royals are down to sixth in zone contact rate. They’re seventh in overall contact rate but still third in hard-hit rate.
The Mets — 27th in runs scored this season — are fourth in hard-hit rate. It’s beyond time to consider if the overall philosophy of high-contact and hitting the ball hard is truly a long-term plan for success. The Royals are dead last in groundball rate. That alone isn’t extremely alarming, but they are too low altogether when you consider roster construction. Outside of Jac Caglianone and Bobby Witt Jr., who are the reliable power hitters in the current lineup? Salvador Perez is well past his prime, and Vinnie Pasquantino is hardly himself this season. Carter Jensen has power over contact but has struggled too much with the latter this season to make an impact.
The Royals talk about small-ball baseball. They often preach about speed and keeping the line moving. Despite that, they develop hitters as if they’re a Yankees lineup. You simply can’t put out a lineup full of small-ball hitters, making contact at a high rate, and teach them to hit as if they’re power-hitting sluggers. The Royals need a higher groundball rate to be successful based on the lineup they have. With the self-proclaimed offensive strategy, the Royals need to hit the ball where they aren’t more than they hit the ball in the air. The result is a lineup stocked full of mediocre power hitters hitting the ball hard, in the air, to the deepest parts of the park. They don’t have the raw power to get it out of the park consistently.
Kansas City has the third-fewest home runs in the American League despite the high hard-hit rate. The offense has improved in walks this season, but is actually worse in chase rate than a season ago. The roster doesn’t seem to match the hitting philosophy, and the stated focus doesn’t appear to match the hitting philosophy either.
Back to the original point, the hitters in the Royals farm system aren’t performing especially well. As an organization, they’re below average in many key categories such as whiff rate, chase rate, and overall contact. The change in hitting development leadership before this season only seems to have compounded the issues plaguing the system’s development. The Royals have essentially doubled down on Alec Zumwalt. This, despite Zumwalt treading hot water to varying degrees over the last calendar year. If the Royals truly needed to change course in the farm system, promoting those who will bring “continuity from the Major Leagues to the Minor Leagues” isn’t the way to do it.
What’s happening in the Major Leagues isn’t working. Translating that to the Minor Leagues is also bound not to work. It’s difficult to find a hitting prospect in the system right now that has plate discipline without the high whiff rate. Spencer Nivens is the best example right now, but he’s now 24 years old in Double-A. In 2026, he sports a 0.95 BB/K with an .898 OPS. Josh Hammond has been good so far in his pro debut, but he doesn’t walk at a high rate. His strikeout rate isn’t abysmal, but it’s far too high to overcome his lack of walks to this point. The on-base percentage is heavily dependent on his high average so far.
Fellow 2026 draftee Sean Gamble has been among the worst hitters in the entire farm system this season. Both he and Gavin Cross rank in the bottom five in wRC+ among all Royals farmhands this season. Another first-round pick, Blake Mitchell, has nearly his entire offensive value propped up by an unsustainable 27% BB%. Then there’s Carson Roccaforte — another 2025 standout who also started strong in 2026 — who has seen his strikeout rate balloon to 34.9% in the last month. The Royals have a hitting performance problem in the Major Leagues. It has led to a hitting development problem in the Minor Leagues, and recent moves in leadership only look to have compounded those struggles. Instead, the Royals desperately needed them to improve development.
Next month, the Royals are once again at risk of picking top ten in the draft and failing to see impact talent join the system. It’s an odd thing to say, considering the success of Bobby Witt Jr. and Jac Caglianone. However, the Royals picked in the top ten six consecutive years from 2019 to 2024. Out of those six, they’ve hardly seen the impact needed to build a great farm system. Other teams that saw similar stretches of early picks?
Houston Astros: Delino DeShields Jr., George Springer (11th), Carlos Correa, Mark Appel, Brady Aiken, Alex Bregman, Kyle Tucker
Detroit Tigers: Casey Mize, Riley Greene, Spencer Torkelson, Jackson Jobe, Jace Jung
Pittsburgh Pirates: Henry Davis, Termarr Johnson, Paul Skenes, Konnor Griffin, Seth Hernandez
Kansas City Royals: Bobby Witt Jr., Asa Lacy, Frank Mozzicato, Gavin Cross, Blake Mitchell, Jac Caglianone
Each of these clubs had its share of misses but not nearly to the level that we’ve seen the Royals fall flat in the early first round. With the consistent level of draft capital the Royals have had, the farm system should be stocked full of talent. Hitting development has prevented that at least as much as scouting. We will never know the true culprit, but with the shortcomings listed above, it’s worth arguing that development is the largest root cause behind these draft failures. The book is still out on Mitchell, but he’s hardly a consensus top prospect. Cross is a full-blown bust of a pick at this point.
The Royals aren’t going to compete in 2026 without a complete 180. They’re last in the American League Central and have a -46 run differential. That differential is the worst in the American League. They’re only 4.5 games out of a Wild Card spot, but that’s hardly worth hoping for. Sure, a run can happen at any time, but so much of the team’s performance points to that simply not happening in 2026. Without true change in the organization’s hitting development leadership, the Royals will not build a consistent winner because they simply won’t score enough runs, no matter how good the pitching staff is.
I don't think it's fair to call Mitchell a bust - he is having a weird season, but not a bad one. I also don't think it's fair to call Jac a bust, he might be in the middle of his breakout right now!