Why the Kansas City Royals think Zack Greinke is a good fit for its young pitching staff
After seemingly holding their ground, content to play the cards in their hand, the Kansas City Royals did some significant reshuffling in a few hours Wednesday.
Around 10:30 a.m. in Arizona, it looked like the Royals had made a move that signaled they were going all in on the youth movement and rolling the dice on a young pitching staff that has shown flashes of both inexperience and enticing potential.
By 2 in the afternoon, veteran pitcher Zack Greinke was set to rejoin the Royals for the first time in 12 years and simultaneously provide a measure of stability and nostalgia for fans in Kansas City. He signed a one-year contract worth $13 million.
A big part of his value figures to come as an innings eater and consistent presence for a rotation that still features a bevy of pitchers who’ve demonstrated more potential than production thus far in their brief careers.
“[He was] one of the guys on the market that we felt would be able to continue to provide us quality innings, work well with our defense, work well in our ballpark and really set the tone for our young pitching staff going forward,” Royals president of baseball operations Dayton Moore said. “I think it’s really important and crucial to have examples of greatness on your team.”
Greinke will enter his 19th major-league season having already won a Cy Young Award, two ERA titles and six Gold Gloves. He’s been selected to six All-Star Games.
The right-hander has logged 3,110 innings and won more than 200 games (219-132 career record). He has reached the 200-inning plateau in a season nine times during his career, most recently in 2019.
“Somebody like Zack certainly points the way for many of our young pitchers. I mean what he has accomplished, how he goes about it, he is somebody that understands the importance of executing pitches and will be a huge example to our young pitchers,” Moore said. “That being said, we believe Zack Greinke is going to perform very well and win a lot of baseball games for us here in Kansas City.”
Last season, Greinke made 29 starts (30 games) for the Houston Astros and went 11-6 with a 4.16 ERA, 120 strikeouts and 36 walks and a 1.17 WHIP in 171 innings.
The MLB lockout forced more than three months of radio silence between big-league players and the executives like Moore who are charged with putting together rosters.
When the players and owners ratified the new CBA, Moore said the first call the Royals made was to Greinke and his agent, Casey Close, to reiterate the strong desire to sign him that they’d expressed prior to lockout.
On Wednesday, the Royals made the reunion official 20 years after they’d selected Greinke in the MLB Draft.
Greinke returns to the organization where his career started as a 38-year-old right-hander with a distinguished track record and 18 seasons in the majors under his belt with six different clubs.
Minor leaves, Greinke returns
The Royals traded veteran left-hander Mike Minor in the morning, leaving 26-year-old Brad Keller, who is entering his fifth season, as the senior member of the starting rotation.
Keller enters this season with 494 innings pitched in the majors and 104 appearances (83 starts). Meanwhile, pitchers Brady Singer, Kris Bubic, Carlos Hernandez, Daniel Lynch, Jackson Kowar and Keller combined haven’t logged as many innings as Greinke did during his first stint in a Royals uniform.
Ultimately, the Minor deal acquired left-handed reliever Amir Garrrett and cleared some salary off the books for the Royals to sign Greinke, whose $13 million deal also includes $2 million in incentives if he pitches 160 innings this season, according to a source with knowledge of the contract.
Moore said the Royals were one of several suitors in pursuit of Greinke, and he said the previous relationship played a big role in him choosing Kansas City.
“Our goal coming into this season was to do everything we can to build a championship-caliber pitching staff with some of the moves we were able to make,” Moore said. “Obviously, bringing Zack Greinke back is a big part of that as our young pitchers continue to mature and develop.”
Moore said bringing Greinke back has been something the front office had “targeted” for the past three or four years.
Even though Greinke’s fastball velocity, once averaging better than 94 mph, dipped below 90 mph last season, Moore asserted that Greinke hasn’t drastically changed the way he pitches, and Moore said Greinke makes “pitching a true artform” with his ability to dissect hitters, read swings and be creative on the mound.
“He doesn’t really do it much differently,” Moore said. “He’s always been somebody that has a great feel to pitch and command of his pitches and somebody that really has a feel for what a hitter is trying to do and how to change speeds and disrupt timing and do all those things you have to do to be successful as a pitcher.
“The power of his pitches is not what it perhaps once was, but I think if Zack wanted to throw with more power, he probably can and is capable of doing that. But at the end of the day, he realizes it’s about executing pitches.”
This story was originally published March 16, 2022 at 8:50 PM with the headline "Why the Kansas City Royals think Zack Greinke is a good fit for its young pitching staff."
