After the team’s first full week, plus a little, the Royals are 5-5. That’s not where they want to be, but there are some positive takeaways from that first week. The losses still count, but they were never going to go 162-0. Even the most optimistic Royals fan can’t look at this team and expect them to even win 100. So the important thing is that, when they take a loss, they get something from it to help them win more games later.
The Royals haven’t been swept yet
Like the header says, the Royals have yet to lose every game in a series.
More than that, they have yet to even lose three in a row, while they do have a modest three-game winning streak.
Sure, it’s a low bar to clear, but here’s a list of teams that haven’t managed to clear it:
- Toronto Blue Jays
- Arizona Diamondbacks
- Detroit Tigers
- Baltimore Orioles
- Athletics
- Boston Red Sox
- Chicago White Sox
- Texas Rangers
- Washington Nationals
- San Francisco Giants
- Colorado Rockies
Do you think the Tigers have given up on their season over a sweep? Have the Red Sox? Of course not. The Blue Jays got swept by the WHITE SOX.* But they’re not going to give in, either. And the Royals have, by at least one metric, played better than all of them.
*Yes, I am aware that the White Sox aren’t as bad this year as the last couple, but they’re still not good.
The Royals have played stiff competition
There may have been reason to think the Royals had a soft-ish schedule to start the season to begin the year, but two weeks into the season, it looks like that may not have been the case.
While the team has lost two of their series, the Brewers are tied for the best record in baseball. Atlanta is a couple of losses behind them, but has been unlucky by two losses, according to run differentials. The Royals are 2-4 against two of the best teams currently going in the sport. They took out the division-leading Guardians in their opener, too.
They could have won the Atlanta series if Carlos Estévez had looked like himself. They scored the same number of runs against the Brewers as they allowed. They could have easily won on Sunday if any of Kris Bubic, Matt Strahm, or Lucas Erceg had pitched as well as we know they are capable of. Or even if they had managed to get a timely hit from Bobby Witt Jr. instead of a strikeout. They took out the division-leading Guardians in their opener. Speaking of the offense…
The outfield is hitting
Royals outfielders are collectively hitting .277/.354/.406, for a wRC+ of 122, eighth-best in baseball. Remember, that was our biggest question for the offense coming in. We all said if they were hitting, the sky was the limit. Well, they are.
Jac Caglianone looked like one of the best hitters in the sport for the first few games, and he’s still not even elevating yet. He had a “bad weekend” against the Brewers that still saw him reach base four times. Isaac Collins appears to have picked up almost exactly where he left off last season – minus the cold stretch to close out the year. And we all know what Kyle Isbel has been doing; he looks like an MVP. Maybe none of them will play quite that well for the entire season, but if we can even see them do it in stretches, the offense should ultimately be fine. Assuming we aren’t ready to give up on the stars.
Maikel Garcia seems to have found another gear. To begin the season, Bobby Witt Jr. and Vinnie Pasquantino have been the biggest problems in the Royals’ lineup. It just so happens they’re batting second and third, so they’re failing in the biggest spots. But is anyone REALLY concerned about them? They are now nearly famous for their slow starts; March and April are by far their worst career monthly splits. It would be nice if they could hit earlier, but if they’re the only problem in April, you’ve got to feel good about where the season is going to end up.
Salvador Perez is perhaps the biggest concern, but not in any way that hasn’t been true since last year. He’s miscast as the cleanup hitter but could be a stud in the six-spot. If Collins and Caglianone keep hitting, that could become a reality sooner rather than later.
The bullpen has flashed
The relief corps has been scary for KC this year; they have a 6.17 ERA, fifth-worst in baseball. But they also have the 15th-best xERA at 3.99, and pretty much every other advanced metric says they’re pitching better than their numbers to some degree or another.
I think it’s reasonable to argue that the bullpen is probably the weakest position group the Royals have this year, but every single reliever who has appeared for KC has at least one really impressive appearance. And you can also throw out a lot of their work as irrelevant to the team’s future. The six runs given up by Estévez aren’t representative, nor are the final three innings of relief in last Wednesday’s mud bowl. That pretty much leaves Erceg and Strahm from Sunday and Cruz’s appearance on Thursday as the problem points.
Unfortunately, that means that there is no one in the “circle of trust” right now that will nearly guarantee a clean inning. But, because every single reliever – minus the IL-bound Estévez – has had at least one really solid relief appearance, it’s easy to see how any or maybe even all of them could be in the circle of trust as the season exits some of this early-year weirdness.
And if any of them stop showing flashes, Mason Black, Mitch Spence, Eric Cerantola, and Dennis Colleran Jr. all look like guys who could pitch some innings out of the bullpen and help the team out. To say nothing of Luinder Avila who looked great in the bullpen last year, something less than great in his first career MLB start, and was not immediately demoted following that start – meaning he’s likely now in the bullpen, too, with Bailey Falter joining Estévez on the IL over the weekend.
The 2026 Royals are far from a perfect club. Everything has not yet completely come together. But more than a week into the season, you can already see the team beginning to become the shape we had all hoped they might. The season could yet be derailed in any number of ways, but for now some of the hope is paying off and there’s as much reason to believe in this squad as ever.
