Legendary Royals coach is teaching Jac Caglianone intricacies of playing outfield
Ahead of his first home game with the Royals’ Triple-A team on Monday, top prospect Jac Caglianone had another task.
Because Caglianone was making his debut at the Omaha Storm Chasers stadium after being promoted from Double-A Northwest Arkansas on May 18, he had a group of media members waiting to talk with him.
Caglianone, whose feats of strength have wowed fans on social media, has created quite a buzz among Royals fans. Not that he pays attention to that.
“Don’t really look at social media, to be honest with you,” Caglianone told reporters Monday. “So I just kind of focus on my faith and my family and let everything else just kind of take care of itself.”
But Caglianone, 22, is aware that Kansas City fans can’t wait to see him at Kauffman Stadium.
“It makes me feel pretty good,” Caglianone said, per The Athletic. “I haven’t even been there yet, and I can already feel the love from the people of Kansas City. So I’m super thankful for it. Hopefully it stays that way.”
Caglianone was the Royals’ first-round draft pick a year ago as a two-way player. The Royals have kept his focus on hitting, but he’s been getting time in the outfield despite playing mostly first base.
Right field seems to be Caglianone’s most likely spot to play when he one day joins the Royals.
Royals general manager J.J. Picollo said the reports on Caglianone’s work in the outfield have been “pretty solid.”
“There’s still some growing pains that are going to take place, the jumps, the routes, the reads,” Picollo said. “That’s going to take reps, but so far, for having only done it for a couple of weeks, it’s been pretty positive.”
Working with Rusty Kuntz
There’s no such thing as an outfield whisperer, but the Royals have something close in Rusty Kuntz.
While his current title is special assistant to the GM/quality control, Kuntz endeared himself to fans as the Royals’ first base coach during their 2015 World Series championship run.
Before that, Kuntz was the Royals’ minor-league outfield coordinator and he was instrumental in helping Alex Gordon transition from third base to left field.
“I was starting from nothing, from scratch,” Gordon said of Kuntz in a 2020 story on MLB.com. “So I needed his expertise. He taught me a lot. I made a lot of mistakes down there, but no better place to do it than Triple-A.”
Kuntz, 70, also worked with Lorenzo Cain, who became one of the best defensive center fielders in Royals history.
And now, Kuntz is taking the 6-foot-5, 250-pound Caglianone under his wing.
“Even though he’s so big, he’s so athletic, he moves around really, really well (for) a guy with a 17 size shoe,” Kuntz told Steven St. John of WHB-AM. “And having him move around the outfield, not surprisingly good, but you just don’t see a guy that size being able to move a body around the way he does, which makes him very, very special, for sure.
“But then he comes with that type of arm strength coming from the outfield, and he’s just all of his parts, his five tools are some kind of special and he brings that every single day. And the one thing that I will say about him, probably the separator for him, he loves to work. His work ethic and habits are just off the chart.”
That’s high praise from Kuntz.
This story was originally published May 28, 2025 at 9:36 AM.
