This was the Royals’ missing ingredient last year. So have they solved the issue?
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Royals' outfield posted MLB's worst OBP, OPS and runs, costing wins.
- Raising outfield OBP and slugging to league average would add ~5 wins.
- Additions and platoons (Caglianone, Collins, Isbel/Thomas) justify optimism.
For the second time since the 1980s, the Royals stacked together consecutive winning seasons.
And yet we called the second one disappointing.
Well, not we. They did — the players, the manager, the front office. It’s symbolic of the expectation — playoff baseball rather than just winning baseball.
The difference between the two was just five games a year ago.
How can they make up the difference?
They have wiggle room in more than a few areas, each of them worth exploring, but why not first target the aspect in which they were among the very worst in baseball?
The offense from their outfielders.
Or lack thereof.
The Royals start their season Friday in Atlanta, a quick three-game trip before returning to Kauffman Stadium for the home opener Monday against the Twins. They have talked about returning to the postseason, even before they embarked on spring training.
They could get there. But not without better production from the outfield.
The Royals’ outfielders combined last year to finish dead last in on-base percentage, 29th in OPS (on-base plus slugging), 29th in home runs and 30th in runs. They had the highest frequency of soft contact. (All those figures come from Fangraphs data tracking.)
Here’s where that really showed up: Their unquestioned best four hitters — Bobby Witt Jr., Vinnie Pasquantino, Maikel Garcia and Salvy Perez — didn’t have enough run-producing opportunities. Those four all ranked among the top 40 in baseball in non-leadoff plate appearances with the bases empty last season. The rest of the order wasn’t getting on base enough, and 60% of the rest of the order was the outfield.
The outfield is more tweaked than overhauled this year — Kyle Isbel is now likely in a platoon with Lane Thomas in centerfield, and while Starling Marte appears more prepared to serve as a designated hitter, he’s still capable of playing there. Jac Caglianone is back after some rookie-year struggles, though those struggles were only at the big-league level. And the Royals have added Isaac Collins.
That group doesn’t include a middle-of-the-order addition they would have liked to make — the Royals avoided sacrificing their financial future or prospect future to acquire a power bat — but it still should be better.
But the first question: How much better do the Royals need their outfielders to be?
As I mentioned, the group last season compiled the worst on-base percentage of any outfield in baseball — reaching base at just a .285 mark. They were dead last in hits and last in walks. League average for an MLB outfield last season was a .315 OBP.
When the Royals’ outfield did reach base, they scored roughly 36% of the time.
If they could have reached base at even a league-average clip (and scored at the same rate they already did), the Royals would have scored an additional 23 runs as a team. And a league-average slugging percentage from that group would have driven in approximately 25 more runs.
That’s an additional 48 runs combined, which analytic models would calculate as roughly the equivalent of five wins, depending on the season.
Five wins.
Or, you know, the difference between the Royals making the playoffs and referring to an 82-80 season as a disappointment.
They don’t need all-stars in the outfield. The path to five more wins, all else equal, is just producing offensively at a league-average rate.
Can they do that?
Why there’s optimism:
• There should be some expected improvement from Caglianone, who might have been on track to be the minor-league player of the year had the Royals left him in the minors all season. But he hit just .157 in 232 big-league plate appearances, with a 39% chase rate. It’s the last number that will have to improve before the others follow.
• Collins far eclipsed the aforementioned league-average numbers last season alone. He compiled a .368 on-base percentage as a rookie in Milwaukee, though he has fewer than 500 career trips to the plate, and he scuffled this spring while battling some minor injuries.
• The Royals have offered Isbel the aforementioned platoon role in center. Lane Thomas has compiled a career .859 OPS against lefties. Isbel last year had a .546 OPS against lefties but still had 75 plate appearances against them. That might not be full-time, everyday better offense, but it should be better overall.
These are dangerous words around these parts, but it will be tough for the offensive production from the Royals’ outfield to any worse.
It can get better.
It should get better.
And while there are several other factors that can contribute, this is the most obvious path for how the Royals can get better too.
This story was originally published March 26, 2026 at 10:22 AM.