Nathan Lukes was 28 years old and in his ninth professional season when he made his MLB debut with the Toronto Blue Jays in 2023. He almost didn’t make it that far. Life down on the farm isn’t exactly a bed of roses, and that was especially true prior to conditions — financial and otherwise — improving via a collective bargaining agreement that essentially coincided with his reaching the bigs. A few years earlier, Lukes almost walked away.

“It’s been a journey,” Lukes said of his path, which began when Cleveland selected him in the seventh round of the 2015 draft out of Cal State Sacramento. “Five games into my career — this was in short-season ball — I broke my hamate and was out for the rest of the year. The next year, I started in Low-A, and halfway through I got traded to Tampa Bay at the deadline. I stayed with the Rays until my minor-league contract was up, then signed here [in November 2021].

“It was getting to the point where it was almost time to think about hanging it up,” continued Lukes, whom the Blue Jays placed on the IL with a hamstring strain prior to yesterday’s game. “But then, in 2023, they put me on the 40-man roster. Pretty much as long I had that 40-man ticket, I was going to keep running with it.”

The now-31-year-old outfielder didn’t feel that he had stalled out developmentally when he pondered calling it a career — “I always felt that I could play in the big leagues” — but he did recognize that there is more to life than baseball. Lukes and his wife had a child in 2021, and as he explained. “Family changes things.” While his financial situation had improved somewhat thanks to minor-league free agency, he was “going to play the 2022 season, and after that, probably just be a dad.”

“You weren’t getting rich,” I said to Lukes in our spring training conversation. “No,” he replied. “I was getting poor. My wife was working at the time, which helped… actually, it didn’t just help, it kept us running. At the lower levels, I was bringing home six thousand dollars a year after taxes, so I was making a thousand dollars a month. The most I ever made on a minor-league contract was $15,000. You can’t really do too much with that.” Read the rest of this entry »

Below is an analysis of the prospects in the farm system of the Kansas City Royals. Scouting reports were compiled with information provided by industry sources as well as my own observations. This is the sixth year we’re delineating between two anticipated relief roles, the abbreviations for which you’ll see in the “position” column below: MIRP for multi-inning relief pitchers, and SIRP for single-inning relief pitchers. The ETAs listed generally correspond to the year a player has to be added to the 40-man roster to avoid being made eligible for the Rule 5 draft. Manual adjustments are made where they seem appropriate, but we use that as a rule of thumb.

A quick overview of what FV (Future Value) means can be found here. A much deeper overview can be found here.

All of the ranked prospects below also appear on The Board, a resource the site offers featuring sortable scouting information for every organization. It has more details (and updated TrackMan data from various sources) than this article and integrates every team’s list so readers can compare prospects across farm systems. It can be found here. Read the rest of this entry »

On Wednesday, the Detroit Tigers signed rookie shortstop Kevin McGonigle to an eight-year, $150 million contract extension, keeping him under team control through 2034. When McGonigle was going through the draft process, quite a few observers — including me — saw a heady, left-handed-hitting second baseman with average size but a polished, punchy bat, noted that he is from Delaware County, Pennsylvania, and thought, “Maybe he’ll be the next Chase Utley.”

As big as the hype around McGonigle has become, that’s still a lofty comp. Utley played 16 years in the majors, made six All-Star teams, produced 61.5 WAR (including five straight seven-win seasons), and appeared in three World Series, winning one. If McGonigle ends up doing all that, I think everyone walks away happy. But after just 17 major league games, McGonigle guaranteed that he would out-earn his childhood hero, who pocketed a mere $125.6 million across his decorated career. Read the rest of this entry »

First things first, I need you to divorce yourself from the notion of marrying strictly for love. Because that’s not how it worked for Evelyn Hugo.

Oh wait. That’s right, some of you probably don’t know who Evelyn Hugo is. Imagine Elizabeth Taylor, Rita Hayworth, and Ava Gardener all rolled into one, and now, in her twilight years, she’s sitting for a longform, tell-all interview spanning her entire career — every marriage, every movie, every divorce. That’s the premise of The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, a novel by Taylor Jenkins Reid.

None of Hugo’s marriages are fairytale romances. For her, they entail more practical considerations. Sometimes love is a factor, but it’s never the sole focus, and rarely the primary concern. Nevertheless, each marriage plays a distinct role in Hugo’s story, in the creation of her final, self-actualized form. Read the rest of this entry »

Welcome to a new season of Five Things I Liked (Or Didn’t Like) In Baseball This Week. After a slow, veteran-who-signed-late-this-spring style warmup to the year, it’s time for another dive into the little details that catch my eye each week. It’s the perfect time of year for it. Beautiful weather, early-season optimism, overheard conversations about who should bat third and who’s a bum – it all fuses together to make this one of my favorite parts of the baseball calendar. And even though the WBC whetted my appetite for the spectacular somewhat, there’s really no replacing major league games for the sheer variety of entertainment. I’m sure that Zach Lowe of The Ringer, whose old NBA column format I’ve borrowed, would say the same thing about the basketball regular season. Let’s talk baseball.

1. Ricochets
If you share my baseball consumption habits, it might seem like every weekday offers a Royals game, a Guardians game, or a Royals-Guardians game. And I love it! I’ll take any excuse to watch Maikel Garcia continue his ascent from contact hitter to do-it-all superstar, a kind of modern-day José Ramírez. And I get to watch the actual José Ramírez too? And Bobby Witt Jr.? And Steven Kwan, Vinnie Pasquantino, Bo Naylor, and old favorite Michael Wacha? Both of these teams are sneaky fun, and their series this week didn’t disappoint. Witt might be having a slow start on offense, but he’s still a defensive genius:

Lots of shortstops – pretty much every other shortstop, even – would get only one out, somewhere, on that play. But two?! Ludicrous. When Garcia’s lunging attempt caromed toward Witt, he turned from interested observer to protagonist so smoothly that it looked like he was planning on doing it the whole time. It started with his feet. Instead of charging the ricochet, Witt timed his steps to hop to a stop and get his body in as good a throwing position as he could:

Read the rest of this entry »

A pitcher goes to the mound hoping to record outs without allowing runs. Unfortunately, a lot goes on between the ball leaving the pitcher’s hand and the scoreboard changing. You can’t just toe the rubber, chuck the ball, and say, “God’s will be done,” as you stare glassy-eyed into the distance like Martin Sheen as Robert E. Lee in Gettysburg.

I mean, you could, but you wouldn’t like the results.

A modern pitcher goes to the mound with a plan to influence events much further up the causal chain. Every pitcher is special in his own way, but every plan boils down to this: By changing speed, movement, or location, trick the hitter into swinging somewhere other than where the ball will be. Read the rest of this entry »

Collin Snider is with Chicago looking to recapture what he had two seasons ago with Seattle. Currently in camp with the Cubs, the 30-year-old right-hander was a pleasant surprise for the Mariners in 2024, logging a 1.94 with a 27.8% strikeout rate over 42 relief outings comprising 41-and-two-thirds innings. Last year was a different story. Hampered by a flexor strain and unable to get back on track, Snider struggled to the tune of a 5.47 ERA across 24 appearances in the majors, then posted an even uglier 8.06 ERA across 25 games with Triple-A Tacoma. Cut loose by Seattle in November, he subsequently inked a deal with the Cubs in December.

Despite the dismal results, Snider wasn’t without suitors. He had options — every team can use more pitching — and in the case of the Cubs, he also had connections. Tyler Zombro, the NL Central club’s Vice President of Pitching Strategy, previously worked at Tread Athletics, where Snider trained in previous offseasons. As the erstwhile Vanderbilt Commodore put it, “That really steered my decision. I like the way the pitching development is here.”

Asked about his poor 2025 performance, Snider pointed to how his injury contributed to bad mechanical habits that resulted in a drop in velocity, as well as “pitch shapes that weren’t the same.” He knew what was happening, but correcting it was another matter.

“I was very rotational, throwing too side-to-side, whereas I need to be north-south,” Snider said. “Side-to-side made the velo go down, because I couldn’t get behind the baseball. I was aware of what was going on, but I didn’t know why I was doing it, or how to make the adjustment quickly. It ended up being one of those things where I needed the offseason to straighten it out.”

Snider averaged 92.5 mph with his four-seamer last season, whereas in the prior two years that number was 94.2 and 95.3. His sweeper was also impacted by his delivery being out of sync. Read the rest of this entry »

After 14 seasons in the majors, Starling Marte has signed with the Royals on a one-year contract for $2 million. The 37-year-old Marte brings a proven bat to an outfield that should look at least a little bit different than it has in recent years. Between one-year deals for Marte and Lane Thomas and trades for Isaac Collins and Kameron Misner, Kansas City has now added more than an entire outfield to its roster, even though the team has two returning incumbents in Kyle Isbel and Jac Caglianone.

Marte’s career is maybe too easy to overlook; after being a core member of three Pirates playoff teams during his first three full seasons, both he and his team faded into obscurity until he was traded three times between the start of 2020 and the end of July 2021. Then, for the past four years, he was a role player on a star-studded Mets roster. For that reason, let’s make sure we appreciate just how great he’s been. He has a career wRC+ of 115, 361 stolen bases, and 35.9 WAR to his name. He’s had eight different seasons of at least 3.0 WAR and earned a couple of Gold Gloves, a couple of All-Star nods, and even an MVP vote. You might be surprised to learn that JAWS ranks him 46th among left fielders. He’s not in Hall of Fame territory, but he’s a lot closer than you might think. Read the rest of this entry »

Somewhere in my list of article ideas, I have a theoretical question tucked away. What’s the longest distance you could hit a baseball? Not what’s the longest distance a really strong player could hit a ball, but what’s the longest distance that it’s possible to hit a baseball? I haven’t gotten around to it because I’d need to interview a physicist or a materials scientist or both, but I’m excited about this question. Say you’re an infinitely strong batter with an infinitely fast swing. The distance you can hit the ball isn’t infinite. At some point, you’ll hit the ball hard enough that your bat will shatter, reducing the efficiency of the energy transfer. Or maybe the ball will be the weak link, and you’ll hit it so hard that it will deform into a less aerodynamic shape or explode into a thousand pieces. There’s a limit somewhere.

I will write this article one day (so please don’t steal it), and it will be fun to discover the answer through math and logic, but theory isn’t the only way to solve a problem. Last Thursday, Jac Caglianone tried to find the answer through pure experimentation, which is to say that in the top of the fifth inning against the Diamondbacks, the Royals right fielder turned on a Yilber Díaz fastball and ripped it into the right-center gap at 120.2 mph. The missile made Caglianone just the eighth player to gain entry into the 120 MPH Club in the 11-year history of Statcast.

It’s the hardest-hit ball of Caglianone’s career (officially, anyway; we’ll return to that later). It’s also the hardest-hit ball of spring training, and it’s far from the only fireworks display he’s put on in the past week. With a 116.5-mph double on Saturday and a 115.2-mph homer on Tuesday, Caglianone now owns three of the 10 hardest-hit balls of spring training. More importantly, it’s the 30th-hardest ball ever recorded by Statcast at any level. Thankfully, Statcast is now in every spring training ballpark, or we never would have grasped just how special Caglianone has been this spring. Read the rest of this entry »

Analyst-Research and Development

Job Summary:
The Kansas City Royals Baseball Club is seeking a highly motivated and creative analyst to join the Research & Development department. Under the direction of the Director of Research & Development, the analyst will be involved in several stages of the data lifecycle process to meet the needs of the organization. The successful applicant will leverage baseball data to provide a competitive edge and innovative solutions for the Kansas City Royals. Ideally, this role will be location in our Kansas City, MO office.

Responsibilities and Duties:

• Perform advanced statistical analysis on baseball data to aid in the organization’s decision making
• Collaborate with other analysts and Baseball Operations personnel to provide support at all levels of the organization
• Design and create reports, charts, tables, graphics, and other tools to deliver information to coaches, scouts, and players
• Work to create, advance, and or maintain machine learning models
• Provide data driven insights on player rankings, player development plans, and player acquisitions as needed

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience building predictive models to generate actionable insights from large data sets
• Understanding of player and ball tracking data (Hawkeye, Trackman, Statcast, etc.)
• Record of published baseball research and/or portfolio of technical projects in any domain
• Familiarity with the landscape of Major League Baseball and its teams, players, and affiliates
• Post-graduate degree in computer science, mathematics, statistics, or related quantitative field

Education and Experience Required:

• 4-year degree or equivalent experience in computer science, mathematics, statistics, or related quantitative field
• Ability to manipulate and analyze large data sets to extract significant insights • High proficiency with R and/or Python (SQL and HTML are a plus)
• Interpersonal and communication skills to seamlessly interact with front office, analysts, coaches, scouts, players, and other Baseball Operations personnel
• Ability to work evening, weekend, and holiday hours during the baseball season

Physical Requirements:

• Ability to lift items weighing as much as 15 pounds
• Must be able to work in a seated position for majority of workday
• Must be able to be productive utilizing a computer keyboard and telephone
• Must be able to be productive in a work environment where the noise level can be high at times
• Must be comfortable walking to navigate the facility to access the office, concourse, etc.
• Must be able to work extended hours and/or weekends as required by deadlines and event scheduling

The physical demands described here are representative of those that may be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job.

This role is a Full-Time, Exempt opportunity that is eligible for Company Benefits, 401K, and PTO. This role is expected to have a standard 40-hour work week.

We also afford equal employment opportunities to qualified individuals with a disability. For this reason, the Kansas City Royals will make reasonable accommodations for the known physical or mental limitations of an otherwise qualified individual with a disability who is an applicant consistent with its legal obligations to do so, including reasonable accommodations applicable local, state and / or federal law. As part of its commitment to make reasonable accommodations, the Club also wishes to participate in a timely, good faith, interactive process with a disabled applicant to determine effective reasonable accommodations, if any, which can be made in response to a request for accommodations. Applicants are invited to identify reasonable accommodations that can be made to assist them to perform the essential functions of the position they seek. Any applicant who requires an accommodation in order to perform the essential functions please inquire with Human Resources by email at humanresources@royals.com.

We are an equal opportunity employer, and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law.

To Apply
To apply, please follow this link.

The content in this posting was created and provided solely by the Kansas City Royals.