When the Kansas City Royals hit the 2025/2026 offseason, they had a few items on their wish list. Generally, they were looking to shore up their outfield, which was a significant weakness for them. Specifically, they were on the hunt for three things: a right-handed bat to play against lefties, a starting left fielder, and a middle-of-the-order type bat to lengthen the lineup.
To fill the right-handed platoon bat, the Royals signed Lane Thomas on a one-year, $5 million deal. Kansas City traded for
Isaac Collins to fill the left field spot. And the middle-of-the-order bat never materialized, as the Royals didn’t find a player in free agency or a trading partner that they were comfortable with.
Should the Royals have done more? That was one of the questions us Royals Review staff discussed in the very first roundtable of the year. Fortunately, though, we can take a look at what some of the players with whom the Royals were linked in the offseason and see what they have been up to. And the results are…mostly underwhelming.
This list of players includes a variety of free agents in the Royals’ price range as well as the players the Royals were rumored to be targeting in a trade:
There is one clear winner in this list: Ward, who has been both very good and healthy for the Baltimore Orioles. Two more players are also clear success stories: Garcia, who has been perfectly serviceable on his one-year deal, and Frazier, who is darn near playing at the league minimum but hitting well and generally doing his thing.
Outside those three players, though, there’s a lot to cringe at. Donovan has been good when healthy, but he’s already missed three weeks with an injury this year. Kim hasn’t played at all yet after a freak injury in Korea. Bader and Hays have also been hurt, and they’ve been bad when they’ve played. Yastrzemski and Mullins have simply been bad.
The year isn’t yet done, and it’s only May. There’s plenty of time for this group of players to succeed. Still, you acquire free agents or make trades to impact your club quickly—if teams didn’t need that, they could simply wait until the trade deadline. And the group of players in the Royals’ price range have been largely disappointing.
Kansas City’s offseason wasn’t perfect. Giving $8 million to Jonathan India was eyebrow-raising at the time, and his season-ending shoulder injury makes that more frustrating. And was Lane Thomas worth $5 million? He hasn’t been as bad as many others who got more years and dollars, so that’s a win at least.
But the Royals don’t do their offseason in a vacuum; they have to acquire real players with real money or talent, and have to do so with what’s available. And for the second consecutive offseason, it looks like Kansas City’s reluctance to make splurge on a big free agent or trade acquisition has been smart.
