Jackson Kowar to make MLB debut for Kansas City Royals in California: here’s the scoop
.jpg "Kansas City Royals relief pitcher Jackson Kowar throws against the Los Angeles Angels during a spring training baseball game Friday, March 6, 2020, in Surprise, Ariz. (AP Photo/Elaine Thompson)")
The circle is about to be complete. Kansas City Royals manager Mike Matheny announced at the end of Sunday’s postgame news conference that pitcher Jackson Kowar will make his major-league debut Monday night against the Los Angeles Angels.
Kowar, 24, will become the fourth member of the Royals’ 2018 draft class to make a start for the big-league club this season, following in the footsteps of his former teammate at the University of Florida, Brady Singer, Kris Bubic and Daniel Lynch. Singer and Bubic made their debuts last season, while Lynch made his debut on May 3.
Minor League Baseball named Kowar the Triple-A East Pitcher of the Month on Wednesday.
Jakob Junis, who pitched as a starter and out of the bullpen, will be optioned to Triple-A, where he’s expected to be stretched out as a starting pitcher. The Royals will need to make another roster move before Monday’s game in order to add Kowar to the 40-man roster.
The Royals (29-28) begin a seven-game West Coast road trip Monday night in Anaheim.
“It’s not a secret that Jackson has been extremely good so far this year,” Matheny said. “He just won the league pitcher of the month and his stats would support how he’s throwing and what we’re hearing from our development people. It’s his time.”
The right-hander ranked the Royals’ No. 4 prospect (third-best pitcher) by both Baseball America and MLBPipeline.com entering this season as well as one of Baseball America’s top 100 overall prospects, Kowar has dominated for Triple-A Omaha since the start of the minor-league season.
The North Carolina native features a fastball in the mid-to-upper 90s as well as a devastating changeup.
Through six starts this season, Kowar has compiled a 5-0 record with a 0.85 ERA with 0.88 WHIP, 11.65 strikeouts per 9 innings, a .165 batting average against, 41 strikeouts and 10 walks in 31 2/3 innings.
In his most recent start on Wednesday, Kowar tossed five scoreless innings and allowed just one hit and one walk. He struck out five.
Kowar, the 33rd overall pick in the 2018 MLB Draft, has been a non-roster invitee to big-league spring training camp the last two seasons.
Last summer, he took part in spring training 2.0 in Kansas City and was one of the pitchers at the club’s alternate training site during the pandemic-shortened MLB season.
“We spent a lot of time together, spent a lot of years together,” Singer said after his start on Sunday. “Obviously, from Florida to now it’s a super-cool story.
“We met each other behind our dorm at Florida. I pulled my truck right up behind the door. A lot of good memories with him. I couldn’t be more excited. I just actually saw him. I’m definitely stoked. One of my best friends in the world. We went from Florida and now here in the big leagues.”
