Royals Rumblings - News for July 15, 2024

Enjoy a break.

J.J. Picollo talks to Anne Rogers about adding Hunter Harvey.

“He adds great depth,” Picollo said. “It’s not something where we’re going to say, ‘He’s our closer,’ starting tomorrow. That’s not the case. Our goal all along was to have a deeper bullpen. [James McArthur] has done a great job in the ninth inning here over the last few weeks, and we’re happy with what he’s doing. … The depth was the focus for us and having more options at the back end of the game.”

Pete Grathoff has player reactions and more from the front office.

“The thing that we heard about him — you don’t want to overstate it — is how competitive he is and he wants to take the ball,” said Scott Sharp, the Royals’ senior vice president, major league operations/assistant general manager. “The good thing is we have a lot of other capable relievers in our bullpen so that helps manage the workload to give everybody a proper rest.”

Picollo discussed how giving up a draft pick affected their bonus pool.

“I don’t want to comment exactly what our strategy will be right now, but there’s significant money that’s not in our Draft pool right now,” general manager J.J. Picollo said Saturday. “[Scouting director] Brian Bridges was aware, the entire staff was aware, that this was a possibility. They build out that board, the best available player on down, and then the flexibility that you may or may not have will affect who you can actually select. It’ll have an effect on who we’re able to draft tomorrow, but Brian would have been prepared going into [Sunday] night either way, whether we had the money or not.

“It’s a little less than $2.4 million that we lose out of our pool, but thinking about both ends, our Major League club and our future, we still thought this was the best avenue for us to secure prospects and not go crazy trying to give up too much. The Draft pick was one thing we were willing to give up.”

David Lesky writes about what the Royals gave up.

This is a system with depth but without star power, as I’ve written so much, and I just don’t think Wallace is an impact player. I think he has a shot to be a big leaguer, but I don’t think it’s that big of a deal to give him up in this trade.

The pick is different. There’s an argument for why the Royals were so comfortable giving this up along with Wallace. It’s that this is not a deep draft at all and they already have another pick two picks after the 39th overall pick. It could be that they don’t have two players ranked in a spot to be happy picking there. I get that to some extent. They feel that pick is better served to help the 2024 and 2025 Royals than it is to help the 2028 and beyond Royals (or whatever year you pick). I think they also felt more comfortable giving up the unknown rather than someone in their system. The enemy you know and whatnot.

Seth Lugo talked his start on Saturday.

“It wasn’t a good one; I made a few mistakes out there, and I didn’t give the guys a chance to win,” said Lugo on his outing. “[The Red Sox] put up good approaches, and I couldn’t locate glove side, and I wasn’t getting inside well into the fourth or fifth inning. I think that’s when I started to find a little groove for myself. The first three innings, I couldn’t really locate breaking balls or fastballs glove side.”

Grathoff talks to Royals players about how they spend an off-day.

The Red Sox nearly landed Seth Lugo last off-season, but the Royals outbid them.

The A’s slam eight home runs and put up 18 runs on the Phillies.

The Guardians make Australian Travis Bazzana the first overall pick in the draft.

Dodgers pitcher Dustin May is out for the season after esophageal surgery.

Jazz Chisholm will begin playing some second base for the Marlins.

The Brewers designate pitcher Dallas Keuchel for assignment.

The Cubs are interested in Blue Jays catcher Danny Jansen.

Karl Ravech talks up the new format at the Home Run Derby.

There are a lot of sons of former big leaguers that could get drafted.

Could some of the top college pitchers in this year’s draft make their MLB debut this season?

In 2021, the Angels took pitchers with every single draft selection - and it didn’t work.

The Copa América final in Miami is delayed after fans rush gates.

Ravens Super Bowl hero Jacoby Jones dies at the age of 40.

“Timeless” weddings aren’t really timeless.

Astronauts may be able to drink their urine with a filtration suit.

Kevin Costner’s sequel to Horizon has already been postponed after the first one flops at the box office.

Your song of the day is Ezra Vine with Celeste.