Royals’ pitcher Brad Keller back from the IL and optimistic about being able to contribute soon
Kansas City Royals right-hander Brad Keller, who tested positive for the COVID-19 coronavirus earlier this month, returned to the team’s spring training 2.0 camp at Kauffman Stadium on Friday.
The 6-foot-5, 250-pound Keller, who took on the mantle of staff ace last season in his first full year in a major-league rotation, said he got the phone call informing him he’d been cleared at 8:30 a.m. He threw a bullpen session of approximately 30 pitches on Friday.
He expressed optimism he’d be able to build up quickly with a week before the season starts next Friday night.
“I think I can get up to 50-60 pitches, maybe even more,” Keller said. “I have faith in myself.”
Keller said he thought he could be ready for the second series of the season against the Detroit Tigers, but added “that’s out of my control.”
While in isolation, Keller said he threw a baseball with his hand and the ball inside of a sock. He used athletic tape to fasten the sock around his forearm so that he could release the ball without it flying around the room and causing damage.
“Mentally, it’s tough because I’ve never experienced that before,” Keller said. “We’re usually pretty active all the time. So just to kind of sit down and not really do anything was really hard to do.”
Keller, 24, said his symptoms, which he likened to an allergy attack, subsided after about four days. He said he felt a little “down” for two days, but he wasn’t sure if that was due to the virus or because his physical activity was limited.
Last season, Keller started the season opener at Kauffman Stadium against the Chicago White Sox. He went 7-14 with a 4.19 ERA in 28 starts. He struck out 122 in 165 1/3 innings and posted a 1.35 WHIP.
Keller, who had been a candidate to start this year’s season opener, said he and Danny Duffy texted every day he was in isolation. Royals manager Mike Matheny announced Duffy as the club’s opening day starter on Tuesday.
Duffy will pitch in Saturday’s intrasquad scrimmage.
Scrimmage highlights
Former first-round draft pick and highly-regarded pitching prospect Brady Singer started and pitched four scoreless innings against a lineup that featured mostly younger players and minor-leaguers. Singer had at least one runner on base in each of the first three innings. He allowed three hits and struck out three.
Salvador Perez looks to be rounding back into form. He smoked a three-run home run to left field off of right-hander Jorge Lopez in his first at-bat. Behind the plate, Perez also picked off Brett Phillips taking too big a secondary lead off third base and threw out Oscar Hernandez stealing second.
Maikel Franco also blasted a solo home run to left field off Lopez in his first at-bat of the game. Franco, whom the Royals signed this winter, also homered against Glenn Sparkman in Wednesday’s intrasquad scrimmage.
Bubba Starling smashed a grand slam against right-hander Stephen Woods Jr. in the sixth and final inning. Woods struggled with command and walked six in less than two innings.
“Our hitters weren’t letting guys get away with many mistakes,” Matheny said.
Matching up
The Royals traded away one of their most experienced left-handed relievers on Thursday night in the deal that sent Timmy Hill to the San Diego Padres.
That leaves Richard Lovelady, Randy Rosario and Gabe Speier as left-handed relievers on the current 40-man roster. Lovelady pitched in 25 MLB games last season, while Speier pitched in nine. Each made their MLB debut last season.
Rosario debuted in the majors with the Minnesota Twins in 2017. He made 15 appearances for the Chicago Cubs before the Royals claimed him off waivers in September. He made six appearances for the Royals in September.
“We have some other lefties that are options, but I do believe that it’s going to have a different look for guys that struggled with getting the opposite side out — left-handed or right-handed,” Matheny said. “I just think with the new rules, you’re going to see less specialists, especially high-leverage specialists.”
Matheny also included left-hander Foster Griffin among the left-handed bullpen candidates. Griffin had been a starting pitcher in the minors.
This will be the first season with the new rule that a pitcher who enters the game must face at least three batters unless he pitches to the end of the inning.
Testing update
The Royals announced on Friday that catcher Nick Dini and pitcher Daniel Tillo have tested positive for the COVID-19 coronavirus.
Major League Baseball and the MLB Players Association released the latest COVID-19 testing results under MLB’s COVID-19 Health Monitoring & Testing Plan through the end of Thursday, July 16.
Testing has now moved into the “monitoring” stage of testing, in which players, coaches, staff members and individuals classified as Tier 1 are being tested every other day. Tier 2 individuals will be tested multiple times per week.
Six of 10,548 samples or 0.05 percent were new positives. Five of the six positives were players and one was a staff member.
The total number of monitoring tests conducted have been 17,949. Twenty-three of these 17,949 samples or 0.1 percent were new positives. Eighteen of the 23 positives have been players and five have been staff members.
Thirteen clubs have had a positive test result during the monitoring phrase.
Combined between the intake screening phase and monitoring phase of testing, the total number of new positive tests has been 93 or 0.4 percent of the 21,701 samples since June 27.
Among the 93 positives, 80 have been players and 13 have been staff members. Twenty-eight clubs have had a positive test result.
This story was originally published July 17, 2020 at 7:43 PM with the headline "Royals’ pitcher Brad Keller back from the IL and optimistic about being able to contribute soon."
