Royals’ Dayton Moore shares approach to MLB trade deadline in this very abnormal year
The typical trade deadline in recent years has come with the assumption that the Kansas City Royals will swap out veterans on short-term deals in exchange for talented young players with both potential and years of organizational control.
But the uniqueness of this season means the Royals — and everyone else in baseball — will view their decisions through a different lens approaching the MLB trade deadline of 3 p.m. Central Time on Monday, Aug. 31.
With an 11-17 record through 28 games, with 32 remaining, the Royals sit three games back of the second wild-card spot in a season featuring an expanded playoff field of eight teams each in the American and National Leagues.
A wide array of unique circumstances, including this 60-game season, the lack of a minor-league season, an altered environment across baseball due to the COVID-19 pandemic and, in the case of Kansas City, a club that started 3-10 and has gone 8-7 since makes it a tough time to be working the trade market.
“With a very limited schedule, it’s just a way different situation with teams’ willingness and unwillingness to be aggressive to make decisions that are impactful,” Royals general manager Dayton Moore said.
“People are looking at anything they do at the trade deadline, anything significant, wanting to get long-term value in any deal that they would potentially make. So you can try to be as aggressive as you want, but you’ve got to have other teams that want to be aggressive as well.”
Last season, the Royals traded away a trio of established veteran players with contracts set to expire at the end of the season, in left-handed relief pitcher Jake Diekman, right-handed starter Homer Bailey and former Gold Glove winning catcher Martin Maldonado.
All three were rentals for the teams acquiring them, though Diekman did re-sign with the Oakland Athletics this offseason.
This year, with the rental period being roughly just one month and teams looking for long-term value, an active trade market might not be in the cards.
On top of that, there has to be skepticism about acquiring young talent not currently active in the majors because teams have no minor-league farm systems at the moment.
Each team this summer has a total of 60 players involved in organized baseball activities on a daily basis, and more than half of those players are working in relative seclusion at alternate training sites. Those sites — the Royals are using T-Bone Stadium in Kansas City, Kan. — and players’ progress within them are a bit of a mystery because they’re closed to media and scouts.
“Every year there’s less teams willing to make aggressive moves for the short-term, and there’s no shorter term in the history of baseball than there is right now,” Moore said. “I mean, it’s one month. There’s no evaluation in the minor leagues. There’s very little information about how young prospects are performing. It’s just a very unnatural time. So to expect anybody to do anything of any significance is very hard to predict.”
Much of the reported trade speculation around the Royals involves them perhaps dealing right-handed reliever Trevor Rosenthal, who they signed to a minor-league contract this offseason. Rosenthal fits the profile of the kind of player the Royals have traded away in recent years: His contract expires at the end of this season.
But he has local ties as a Lee’s Summit native who still has family in the Kansas City area. He also has a relationship with Royals manager Mike Matheny that dates to their time with the St. Louis Cardinals.
Rosenthal’s future in KC remains to be seen, but Moore left the door open to the possibility he’ll look to bolster his current club in some fashion.
“We wouldn’t hesitate to add to this team,” Moore said. “This team is talented enough to be one of eight teams representing the American League in the playoffs. I believe that with all of my heart.
“They’re talented enough to be one of eight teams. So I’m not even beginning to think about dismantling or moving players that help us win at this point. I believe that this group of players is extremely talented and very much capable of being a playoff team.”
In the hunt
Something that may factor into the Royals’ thinking down the stretch: Their 3-10 start came during a time when two of the anchors of their starting rotation — Brad Keller and Jakob Junis — were sidelined after bouts with COVID-19, as were first baseman Ryan O’Hearn and outfielder Hunter Dozier.
Star catcher Salvado Perez came back from his COVID-19 infection in time to start the season with the club despite having a limited number of workouts before jumping into exhibition games.
The fact that these Royals have been competitive when healthy, and have been able to get contributions from young starting pitchers Brady Singer and Kris Bubic, gives this trade deadline a different feeling.
“I think it’s different this year just because I feel like we’re not too far behind,” Keller said Sunday. “We’ve got some big series coming up. I don’t feel like we’re too far out, so it’s different because I felt like in the past two years when the trade deadline came around you kind of knew some guys were going to get sent out and you were kind of waiting around. But guys don’t really put much thought into it. No one’s openly talking about it at all. As far as that sense, I don’t think it’s any different.”
Matheny said he discourages the “junior GM” mentality among his players. There are too many elements of the process they don’t understand, he said, and don’t need to know about. It can become a distraction, in Matheny’s assessment.
When players start lobbying for upgrades at certain spots, he said, it’s basically like pointing a finger at a current teammate and telling him he’s not doing enough. That’s not a good vibe to have in the clubhouse.
“I’ll stay in conversation with Dayton,” Matheny said. “I know right now what we’re thinking is we’re chasing a spot to go play into October. That’s all we need to be concerned with. Let’s try and make our best run at this.”
This story was originally published August 24, 2020 at 12:35 PM.
