Nicky Lopez is growing into an offensive catalyst for the Kansas City Royals
All the Kansas City Royals were looking for was solid, basic, fundamental play from Nicky Lopez when they plugged him in as their everyday shortstop out of necessity on Opening Day.
After all, he’d been sent down to begin the season in the minors until Adalberto Mondesi’s injury.
They handed Lopez the job on what surely looked like a temporary basis and planned to hide him at the bottom of the batting order and not ask too much of him. That seemed reasonable, if not optimistic, in April.
Now, it’s September and Lopez has proven himself a high-caliber defender at shortstop and continues to grow into an offensive catalyst for the Royals.
He showed how critical his bat can be to the lineup with a 3-for-5 performance that included a home run and RBI single to drive in the first two runs of Thursday night’s 6-0 win against the Orioles at Camden Yards in Baltimore.
“It’s one of the great stories in the game, in my opinion,” Royals manager Mike Matheny said of Lopez’s season. “A guy who didn’t make our club coming out of spring and now is leading our club as far as average goes.
“His OPS, his quality at-bats in tough situations and leverage, two-out RBIs, it’s just a really nice approach that I think is going to work for him for a long time. He’s been such a bright spot.”
Lopez entered the night with a team-leading .293 batting average, which ranked seventh-best among American League qualifiers.
The left-handed hitting 26-year-old raised his average to .297, and he has an on-base percentage of .365.
Lopez, who also ranks seventh among all MLB players in outs above average, extended his career-best on-base streak to 19 games.
All this has come on the heels of a first 159-game initial foray in the majors as a defense-first second baseman that included Lopez having batted .228 with a .279 on-base percentage with 92 strikeouts and 36 walks.
“I obviously hold myself to very high expectations,” Lopez said. “I know people do as well. I think that’s kind of the reason I got a lot of backlash for my poor play the last year.
“I hold myself to a high expectation, and I think that I can do this and I think that I can do this on a consistent basis. It’s one of those things that was going to take some time.”
Lopez began this season having hit .226 through his first 59 games this year from the season opener through June 13.
He has batted .341 since June 15, and he’s been such a consistent producer that he’s moved up to the No. 2 hole in the batting order.
However, Lopez was quick to point out that he’s still not a finished product.
“It’s not like it clicked for me because I’m still learning,” Lopez said. “And I’m going to continue to learn. I’m still young, and I’m just looking forward to helping this team in the future because this is a very bright future for us.”
Lopez’s first-inning solo home run off Orioles pitcher and Kansas native John Means was his first off a left-hander. It served as the starting point in Lopez’s eighth three-hit game of the season, the sixth since August 18.
All three of Lopez’s hits on Thursday came against left-handed pitching, including the former All-Star Mean.
That’s just the second time in Lopez’s career he’s had three hits in one game against left-handers. The other instance came in Seattle on August 28.
“I love playing the game of baseball and I want to play on an everyday basis,” Lopez said. “I would hate the fact of not being able to face a lefty kind of hinder me playing every single day.
“So to be able to get hits consistently off lefty pitching this year and kind of seeing my name in the lineup every single day has been a huge confidence boost to me. I just look to keep it going and not do too much.”
This story was originally published September 10, 2021 at 12:27 AM.
