Safe at home but bored, Starling anxious to resume his fight for a Royals roster spot
The local phenom who’s had all eyes and a mountain of expectations on him for years, Bubba Starling now describes himself as the impatient one.
It was an honest and unassuming assessment by the former Gardner Edgerton High three-sport star and the Kansas City Royals first-round draft pick in 2011.
A region has eagerly waited on him for the better part of eight years, including a stretch from 2017-18 when injuries limited Starling to 100 total games. Royals general manager Dayton Moore has described inquiries from fans about Starling’s arrival in the major leagues as the “most asked question” in his tenure with the franchise.
Last season, Starling finally reached the light at the end of what at times was a very dark tunnel of injuries and anxiety. He debuted with this hometown club in the majors in July, and he finished out the season in Kansas City.
Now, understandably, he’s not fond of this holding pattern dealt by the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic. The 6-foot-4, 215-pound outfielder is antsy about getting a chance to build on last year’s starting point.
“It’s tough, especially the first two weeks,” Starling said during a Zoom call with reporters. “I didn’t know what to do, being stuck inside the apartment and not being able to go do stuff because Kansas City was under a kind of lockdown.”
Starling, 27, was at his parents’ home in Kansas during the call. Lately, he has found himself reading a lot about potential MLB plans to restart spring training and get on to an adjusted-format season. He often finds himself sitting anxiously by the phone.
Starling said his friends and family have avoided contracting the virus thus far, but the waiting game has not been easy.
A highly touted and nationally recruited quarterback coming out of high school, Starling gathered with family watch the first night of the NFL Draft Thursday because it was the closest thing to a live sporting event they, like everyone else, had seen in months. It also helped occupy his mind.
He tries to avoid going stir-crazy by taking short drives. An outdoorsman, he admitted that he’ll just go “throw a lure in” and see if the fish are biting from time to time to pass the hours.
“You’ve got to venture out and clear your head, clear your mind,” Starling said. “For me, I’ve got all this stuff bottled up. Like, ‘When’s baseball going to start? What are we going to do?’”
He’s become increasingly domesticated. He’s spending more time cooking, cleaning, doing laundry. He says his meatloaf has gotten pretty good, and he’s really taken to the grill.
Anything to pass the time.
This was a pivotal spring for Starling. If he didn’t make the Royals’ opening day roster, they would have to expose him to waivers and open the door for another organization to claim him.
Even with that pressure lurking, he’d seemed very comfortable in Arizona. The familiarity of having played in the majors clearly helped. He knew the guys, the routine. He’d had a period of time to adjust to big-league pitching. Having coach Rusty Kuntz back on staff working with the outfielders was also an added comfort.
“It was just going out and playing — that’s all it was, basically,” Starling said. “I was getting better each day and having fun with all of our teammates. (Manager) Mike (Matheny) was making it a fun clubhouse to be in every day, even though it was just spring training. It was fun to be there.”
Starting point
Starling earned Triple-A minor-league All-Star honors last season, batting .310 with 20 extra-base hits and tying for the Pacific Coast League lead with eight outfield assists.
But he struggled to find consistency at the plate after he making the jump to the majors in July despite an 11-game hit streak from July 13-27 during which he batted .341 (15-for-44).
In 56 games in the majors, he batted .215 with a .255 on-base percentage and a .317 slugging percentage with four home runs, seven doubles and 56 strikeouts.
He registered five outfield assists, the most by an AL center fielder from the date of his promotion through the end of the regular season. That included the hardest-thrown outfield assist in the majors last year (100.7 mph), which was also the highest velocity attained on such a play since Statcast started tracking the metric in 2015.
This offseason, Starling worked with his former youth coach, Jeremy Jones, who runs the Building Champions baseball academy, and Royals director of behavioral science Ryan Maid, incorporating technology and a hitting plan developed by Royals hitting coach Terry Bradshaw.
When spring training came to a halt, Starling was shining. He’d batted .367 with a .441 on-base percentage and a .767 slugging percentage. He had also belted three home runs in 30 at-bats. Meanwhile, he’d struck out just four times and walked three.
Matheny was complimentary of Starling’s performance this spring, saying he was “hitting with more authority.”
“I feel good, but obviously my numbers didn’t show that up in the big leagues last year,” Starling said. “I think it’s only going to keep getting better as I keep learning and growing and know the player that I am. I just want to continue to keep growing.
“Obviously, .215 or whatever I hit last year — I’ve got to do the little things. I’ve got to move the runners. I’ve got to quit striking out. I’ve got to do the little things to help the team win and move forward. I think I can do a lot better at that.”
The wait continues
Starling is laser-focused on keeping his weight up — he felt like he shed too many pounds last season — as well as the things Bradshaw and assistant coach John Mabry drilled into him this spring, such as hitting low pitches, using his legs and driving the ball.
Now back home, he has settled into a schedule where he does his running on Tuesday and Thursday and lifts weights and hits on Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
Jones lent him a key to his training facility and Starling’s girlfriend feeds baseballs to him through a pitching machine.
In short, Starling is doing his best to stay ready for when baseball comes back. The possibility of expanded rosters should only bolster his chances of returning to the majors with the Royals.
“I think it could be beneficial for sure, a better chance for me to be up there and, when we do start games, just keep rolling and doing what I was doing in spring training,” Starling said. “It hasn’t stopped since I left there.”
This story was originally published April 26, 2020 at 5:00 AM with the headline "Safe at home but bored, Starling anxious to resume his fight for a Royals roster spot."
