Looking for a left-handed bullpen arm | Kansas City Royals Podcast

Looking for a left-handed bullpen arm | Kansas City Royals Podcast

Do the Royals need to be searching for a left-handed reliever this off season? I’ll give you my thoughts next on Locked on Royals. You are Locked on Royals, your daily Kansas City Royals podcast, part of the Locked On podcast network, your team every day. You are tuning in to another edition of Locked On Royals and the Locked On Network. I am your host Jack Johnson and you can find me on Twitter at johnnyj_15. That is joyj_15. You also can listen to us on wherever you download your podcast. That can be Spotify, Apple Podcast, Amazon Music, Google Podcast Odyssey, and YouTube. Just be sure to hit that follow button and subscribe. For you first-time listeners wondering about this channel and how often you can expect episodes, well, right now we’re bringing you five episodes a week. We do the same thing in the middle of the season. The only time we won’t have five episodes a week is for a small portion in January, basically our off season, but we’ll still be bringing you three episodes a week up until spring training. Before we get started, I want to tell you that today’s show is brought to you by Game Time. Download the Game Time app, create an account, and use code locked on MLB for $20 off on your first purchase. If you go back and look at the Royals 2025 season, I would put the bullpen as maybe the fifth or sixth problem uh for the overall roster. And maybe I wouldn’t even classify it as a problem. I thought the Royals bullpen took a tremendous step forward in 2025. They had their holes. They had their issues in 2024, but to get the production they did from numerous guys, not necessarily the high leverage elite backend relievers, they got a lot of production from their middle inning guys. They got a lot of production from their long relievers. And that can really, you know, put a bullpen in the top of the league. they they can move it from a 18th or 19th best bullpen to top 10 or top seven, which is about where the Royals fell. They still had some issues that they had in 2024. They didn’t strike out many hitters. And you look at the best bullpens in all of baseball. They’re going to have that swing and miss stuff. They got multiple guys that have swing and miss stuff. I mean, I remember watching the Brewers a lot this last season and they just had so much power in the back end of the bullpen. And when you get to October, when you’re in a best of three, a best of five, a best of seven, you want to be able to turn to somebody that can lock down the sixth, seventh, eighth, and ninth inning with a lot of power. You don’t always want to rely on the the soft contact because there’s going to be a night where a reliever comes in and they just don’t have their a stuff. They don’t have their best location. they don’t have the best command of their secondary pitches and they’re going to get hit hard. Whereas guys with high powered stuff, they might have their C++ stuff and it’s still good enough to get it by certain hitters or induce the soft contact. And specifically with this bullpen where I thought it came back to bite them multiple times. Now, I’ve gone on record and saying I’m not really for spending a lot of money on the bullpen. I feel the Royals have good depth there and that is the case. But the more I dissect it, I feel they are totally set when it comes to right-handed relievers. They have an abundance of them. They can turn to multiple guys that are in AAA. They can turn to guys on minor league deals. They get the most out of their right-handed relievers. There’s very few in that bullpen that I just felt super uneasy about. Then they had three lefties in the bullpen last year that certainly had their ups and downs. Sam Long was a disaster early on in the year. Caught on in the middle of the season, had some bumps at the very tail end of the year, but for the most part, if you were just to look at his overall numbers, he was not very good. Uh he had a good stretch in the middle of the season, very much reminded me of Will Smith in 2024 where he was awful early on, hit a good stretch where he had a sub two erra for about, you know, 20 to 25 outings and then he torpedoed at the very end of the year. the other two lefties on Hel Serpa who was utilized the most and then you had Daniel Lynch who had a low ERA but dealt with a lot of base runners didn’t strike out anybody very much was fortunate to post the numbers that he did because I did not really think Daniel Lynch was all that special in the bullpen but he was durable you were able to go to him for a couple of innings if you needed that that lefty lefty matchup late in the game he was somebody you’d call upon fine because you probably already used Anel Serpa. But for this bullpen, we can acknowledge that there’s not that lock down lefty. And the great bullpens out there don’t just have one, they usually have two. One of them is a high-powered guy. One of them is that funky angled lefty that can be really tough to square up. So that brings me to my segment today. Who can they look to in free agency? because that’s really how you’re going to be uh looking for left-handed help. You’re not going to be uh trading for a left-handed reliever. At least I don’t believe so. I feel it’s very easy to go and afford somebody on the reliever market. I feel that the focus needs to be on the offense, but if the market falls in the Royals favor and there’s a left-handed reliever that makes a lot of sense, I wouldn’t be opposed to them upgrading two of those spots. Anhill Serpa. Call me an apologist for him, but I just feel that he’s got a good spot in that bullpen. He throws upper 90s. He’s a sinker ball pitcher. He throws a lot of strikes. He’s got a powerful slider. I’m okay with the role that he has and I feel he can have an even better role next year cuz he won’t be that first lefty you’re calling upon every single time. if you go out and acquire other lefties that are more tailor made for that spot. The first name that came to mind was Hobie Milner. Hobie Milner has had back-to-back subpar years, but if you watch him throw, he is incredibly funky and he’s got a sweeper. He doesn’t throw hard at all, but he basically comes from across the mound. It’s 3/4 submarine. Very reminiscent of Tim Hill. Tim Hill though has the club option as I looked up last night. And I might have brought him up in the episode about being a free agent target. He’s got a club option. So the Yankees very well could just bring him back. I don’t know though. We’ll know at the end of the year who all will actually be available to sign. But I do know Hobie Milner is going to be a unrestricted free agent and he will be available to sign. He’ll also be incredibly cheap. Hobie Milner could replace that Sam Long role, if you will. Uh you just need somebody to get one out. Maybe it’s the ninth inning or the eighth inning. can call upon that lefty specialist. That feels like a better spot for Hobie Milner than it would for Anel Sera. Anhel Sera is a little bit easier to square up than Hobie Milner would be in that spot which burned the Royals multiple times in 2025. Another Texas Ranger that I feel would be a good pickup and he was phenomenal for the Minnesota Twins before the deadline, Danny Kum. Danny Kum had a 1.12 erra in 30 innings before he was traded away to Texas and he struggled once going over to Texas. But I’m going to look to the beginning of his season and maybe view him as that replacement for a a Daniel Lynch, right? I’m getting maybe not the inning workload. I’m not getting 60 to 65 innings, but maybe I’d get a really solid 40 to 45 out of someone like Danny Coloon. So those two don’t, you know, stand out as high-powered guys. They definitely rely on funky angles and off-speed pitches. And the Royals do have a lot of guys in the bullpen that rely on that. I I feel like Danny Kum and Hobie Milner are kind of reminiscent of what John Shriber does. John Shriber relies on the funky angle and locating his slider and his sinker and his fast ball very well. The other name that I would bring up here, just for a lefty specialist, though, this guy is definitely more of the high-powered one, uh, can get the swing and miss, can be somebody you could hand the seventh inning or the eighth inning. It would be Gregory Sodto who spent a long time in Detroit, can run it up to 100, 101, 102, was with the Mets this past season, wasn’t as dominant, but as we see with relievers, that can drive the price down, and then you can be uh in that that good range where you’re not overspending. Maybe you’re giving them a one-year deal or or maybe you give them a deal or a one-year deal with an extra year option, right? you can always be creative when it comes to handing out those those cheaper deals. But those are three relievers that stand out to me. Uh you also have Taylor Rogers who spent a long time in Minnesota, was a San Francisco Giant, then was a Chicago Cub, has that good sinker pitch. Uh but he’s definitely not the guy that he once was. But in evaluating the Royals left-handed relievers, the bar is pretty low. Uh, I feel that you can upgrade in that spot, but I’m also not going to completely change my opinion on how I view their off seasonason. I don’t believe this needs to be the top priority. Uh, if you want to strike a deal before the winter meetings, a one-year deal with somebody to feel better about your bullpen, by all means. I’m also not going to hate it, though, if they go into, you know, January and February and they haven’t added the reliever and then they go with that minor league deal guy, the spring training invite that can make the roster. They’ve hit on that the last two years with Sam Long and then Taylor Clark and they have always shown a willingness to go try it out on the reliever market there because if you hit on that player, you can get really good value for basically nothing. You can get them for the league minimum. So why go out there and roll the dice on somebody who may or may not be great, but you’re going to be paying them five, six, seven, eight million toward your payroll. I feel there could be a better way to spend the money, but again, that was an area for the Royals I thought came up to bite them a few times this year where it was always on Hell Serpa. He’s got to be the left-hander reliever to go in in that spot where if you have two other guys that can take that spot, you can maximize their value and you can also maximize on Hell Serpa’s value. Do you believe the Royals need to go after a left-handed reliever? Let us know in the YouTube comments below. When we come back, we talked about it last night of who we would buy stock in. I’m going to give you one guy I’m not willing to buy stock in. That’s coming up next on Locked on Royals. You are tuning to Lockdown Royals in the Lockdown Podcast Network. I’m your host, Jack Johnson, and you can find me on Twitter, Johnny_15. Want to tell you about the title sponsor and our only sponsor today in Game Time. The NFL season is back and honestly, there’s nothing better than being in the stadium surrounded by fans cheering on your team. But let’s be honest, getting tickets can be a hassle. Between cues, login screens, and prices jumping at checkout, it’s frustrating. That’s why I use Game Time, the app that gives the advantage back to the fans. Game time is fast, easy, and backed by the Game Time guarantee. And you’ll always get 100% authentic tickets delivered on time and at the best price. Plus, all fees are included. So, the price you see is the price you pay. Download the Game Time app, create an account, and use code lockdown MLB for $20 off on your first purchase. Those terms apply. So, again, use promo code L O C K D O N MLB for $20 off. Swipe, tap, ticket, go, and download Game Time today. This is not always the most fun segment to do, but it’s a segment that we have to do. If we’re going to tell you guys that you should be looking forward to watching play in 2026, we got to give you some guys that we just don’t believe are going to be long-term solutions or maybe not even make the roster. Now, let me be clear. I am not going to waste 10 minutes of your time and saying why you shouldn’t buy stock and MJ Melendez, right? I don’t see MJ Melendez being on the roster. I don’t see him being on the 40man roster, but I’ve always hoped that he catches on somewhere. He’s a great guy, has always been incredibly respectful, and I hope nothing but the best for him. But his time in Kansas City, I believe that it has come to an end. So, I’m not going to to sit here for the next 10 minutes and tell you why you shouldn’t buy stock in MJ Melendez. I’ll probably give you some other guys that very well could make the team, could very well be starters, and we just have to take into account here past numbers and maybe what they’re expected to be going in the next year. But the guy I will tell you and I might give you two depending on how quickly I go through this this first player here. The first guy that I’m just not going to put a ton of stock into and it’s a surprise would be Michael Walka. Now when we talk about stock, right, rising stock, I believe they’re going to get better and better. I believe they are rising up the ranks. I said that last night about Stephen Cruz. I believe Steven Cruz can take a tremendous step forward in 2026. So, let me be clear with Michael Walker. This is not to say that he is going to be terrible in 2026. This is not to say that he is going to be bumped out of the rotation. What I do feel confident in saying is that his best year in Kansas City has already happened. That’s just one man’s opinion, but I feel that for a guy that’s entering his mid30s, and maybe I should view Seth Lugo the exact same way, which is you had the incredible 2024, you had a lot of innings, you had a low ERA, you had a low whip, you had a good FIP on your line, you had everything showcase that you were a good starter, you were a valuable starter. and replicating that is so tough to do in your mid to late 30s. So for Waka, I said this at the beginning of the offseason that I view the Royals or I I believe the Royals should view these two guys differently going into next year. You have starting pitching depth. I don’t want to see them run Seth Lugo and Michael Walka into the ground. You cannot expect 185 190 innings out of these guys. I would much rather have their numbers in San Diego next year because that feels more realistic. Give me 130 or 145 innings where you’re really efficient cuz these two guys, I can see them being great for about 130 to 140 innings. But then if I’m asking them for 40 more or 50 more in the last part of the season, that’s when we’re going to see that fatigue set in and you’re going to struggle a little bit more. So, I’m hoping that Mattro, Brian Sweeney, Zack Bo, Mitchet, all those guys get together and have this game plan of how much do we want to utilize these two early on in the year? Are we going to ask them to throw six, eight, seven innings, something like that, right? Are we going to ask that much of them to go over 105 pitches, 110 pitches, or if they’re at 80 or 85 and they’re through five innings, do you feel good enough about that so you can save them for later on? So, back to the not buying stock in this guy. Michael Walka can be very efficient for you for about 20 to 25 starts next year. That’s what I would say. There will be anywhere from five to 10 starts where he just really doesn’t have it because he doesn’t have the powerful stuff that Cole Reagan does, that Chris Bubich does, not even the stuff that Noah Cameron does. And the same goes for Seth Lugo. But Seth Lugo has 10 pitches he’s going to throw at you. He can sometimes get through some of those outings relying on those multiple pitches where if Michael Walk is getting squared up, it’s going to go south rather quickly. And I don’t know if Michael Waka is going to stick around for all four years of his contract, right? I don’t know if they view Ryan Bert as a long-term solution and Steven Kick as a long-term solution and therefore you look to shop Michael Walka in his contract because you don’t want to, you know, just keep a guy hanging on forever because you’re paying him. I feel it’s a different era in Kansas City where if you’re willing to move somebody, you can get value, you’ve got the depth to replace them. Am I there yet with Michael Walka? I’m not. I would like to see him in the rotation to begin the year, and I fully believe he’s going to be in the rotation to begin the year. He’s just not somebody that I’m counting on to, you know, break out again. I’m not counting on him to be unbelievably efficient for 30 to 32 starts this year. I feel that he can be somebody that gives you a solid 20 to 23. And if he gives you that, I still would feel fine about it because maybe you make up those other 10 starts with Ryan Burgerer. Maybe you make up those other 10 starts with, you know, Alec Marsh who will be able to compete again in spring training. Those guys are going to have to perform and they are going to have to show that they are worthy of taking one of those spots in the rotation. And this isn’t to say you bounce him out, but maybe toward the back half of the season when everybody’s hit that wall, you have that fatigue, you can go to a six-man rotation, you can skip him for a start or two just to make sure that he’s fresh. But buying stock and and certain, you know, pitchers going into 2026, the older guys on that staff, I I’m not going to go as far to buy stock into them and say, well, they are going to be one of the top arms in that rotation. They are going to be one of the top arms in that bullpit. No, I’m probably going to turn to the younger guys there. I expect Cole Reagan’s to bounce back. I expect Noah Cameron to look good. I expect Chris Bubich, if he’s healthy, to look really good. The other two guys and Seth Lugo and Michael Walka, take the pressure off of them. Just be the number three and number four of that rotation. give the team 135 to 145 innings and I feel you can make it up elsewhere with the depth that you have in that rotation and in the bullpen. So if you want to get the most out of Micah Waka, if you want to get the most out of Seth Lugo, handling them with care, handling them uh with a little bit more caution in April and May and June might do wonders for you late in the season. you know, you might be able to rely on them for seven innings and a September start when you absolutely have to have it. More importantly, you could rely on them being more fresh in October if you get there. If you get to October and you turn things over to somebody who has 40 to 50 innings in the tank, all the better for you. And we know that in the postseason, you’re not going through all five guys in the rotation. You’re probably going through three or four. And so we’ll see uh if the Royals can get to that point. We’ll see how they’ll handle Michael Walk and Seth Lugo going into 2026. We’ll take our final break of the show. When we come back, an old friend put himself in the history books last night. Let’s praise Will Klein and the journey that he had and what a performance he had in game three of the World Series. That’s next on Lockdown Royals. You are tuned in to Lockdown Royals in the Lockdown Podcast Network. I’m your host, Jack Johnson, and you can listen to us on wherever you download your podcast. If you stayed up last night to watch game three of the World Series, I commend you. Uh I did stay up for all 18 innings. Not that I deserve a reward or anything like that because I’ve definitely gone on record of saying I prefer this over a ghostrunner rule, more so because it is the postseason. But I’ve never been a huge fan of the ghostrunner rule. If they had it in the postseason last night, that game would have been over a heck of a lot earlier than 18 innings. You, the people at Dodger Stadium last night, paid for a ticket for one game and got a postseason double header. 18 innings last night. Dodgers win it six to five. They’re two wins away from going backto back in the World Series. We were treated for one of the all-time performances. Surprise, surprise. It was from Show Otani who went four for four. He walked five times, was intentionally walked numerous times, drove in three, had two home runs, and he’s throwing tonight. Just I always want to say with Show Otani, take into account what you’re watching cuz we’re never going to see it again. This is truly extraordinary what he is doing on both the mound and at the plate. And he had a game-tying home run last night. He is just a unicorn. He is so fun to watch, even if he’s playing in a Dodgers uniform. But this segment is not about Showi Otani. This segment is about a former Royal that many of us had hopes of becoming their closer at some point, one of their high-powered guys in the bullpen. And I honestly forgot that he was with the Dodgers going into last night. I know he’d already had one inning pitched in the postseason. I I can’t really recall it. But Will Klein, the former Royal farmman who was involved in the Lucas Ersig trade, he then went to the Athletics, never really caught on there. He was let go. Dodgers picked him up and of course he finds his groove there. But he throws four innings last night. He strikes out five, walks only two, gives up just one hit. And he was the one, two, three, four, fif, five, six, seven, eight, ninth pitcher out of the bullpen last night for the Dodgers. eight other guys came through that bullpen gate and he’s just hanging back there and they said whether we win or lose this game you’re going to have to throw the rest of these innings and to give the Dodgers four that’s incredible and Will Klein was so easy to root for he was one of the guys that I followed uh throughout throughout his minor league ranks in Kansas City and when he was traded I felt it was the right time to trade him cuz his big hangup was that he wasn’t wasn’t throwing enough strikes. He was always going to get the strikeouts, but he wasn’t throwing enough of them, right? He’d still walked the house. He still had the erratic command, but he had such powerful stuff. And he debuted with Kansas City. He was with them last year at the big league level and threw a couple of big innings for them in in extra innings. So maybe he’s just used to extra innings and and being out there in the highressured environment. But these stories in baseball is what makes the sport so special. You have somebody that might have thought when the athletics of all teams moved on from him, am I ever going to catch on anywhere? I’ve got this, you know, milliondoll arm, multi-million dollar arm, and I just don’t have the best of command. I can’t locate it as well. I know I’ve got the stuff to strike out big league hitters. I can go up against the best. I’ve got the mentality to do it, but it just doesn’t always come together. And Will Klene is one of many, hundreds, thousands of pitchers that have the stuff, but can’t put it all together. And they move through systems and they move through teams and it’s, oh, they could catch on here. Maybe they do for a little bit, but it’s never sustainable. Last night, what’s cool though is you can never take that away from Will Quant. We’re always going to remember this 18 inning game befu between the Dodgers and Blue Jays. And Will Klein’s going to be a big reason as to why. Somebody that was able to come out of the bullpen in the 15th inning, the 15th inning, and throw four scoreless and set up the Dodgers to walk it off in the bottom of the 18th on a home run from Freddy Freeman. That’s extraordinary. and he was a great guy, a very respectful guy. I was talking about with MJ Melendez, Will Klein was another one of those true pros in in the clubhouse and and just with interviews and stuff. In fact, some of the other Royals accounts, I want to say Preston Farre um of Royals miners, he did a great interview or might have been him or it might have been somebody else did. He was interviewed a few times. I do know that and he was always willing to do those interviews. So, that I do respect the heck out of. But for sticking it out, that’s what I respect even more. He’s not 35, 36 years old, right? He’s not at the end of his career, but this is the type of outing that can catapult you certainly into your team’s, you know, fan favorite lore, right? They’re all going to praise Will Quin no matter what happens the rest of the way. It’s this it reminded me a little bit even though we had a much different year but when Boston took on the Dodgers in the World Series back in 2018 and Nathan Naldi went like seven innings in relief. Now he was a dominant starter and they turned to him and they ended up losing that game because Maxy walked him off but the Red Sox forever cherish him because of how he just grinded through that. He just gave them the innings and Will Klein he gave them the innings. He may not pitch again in the postseason, but he’s thrown five scoreless innings for the Dodgers and he was the ninth guy called upon. I can’t get over that. That is so incredible to be the ninth guy in the bullpen. You got to be lonely at some point. And he’s seeing all these guys leave him on the bench. They’re going in. They’re warming up. and he’s just assuming at some point, okay, with this Dodgers lineup, I’m not getting in the game because they’re eventually going to hit a home run. They’re eventually going to get a couple guys on and have that bloop single. The lineup is too good to go through nine innings of extra baseball. This team is too good for it to get to me. But to be there in the 15th inning, right, to be there sitting in the bullpen and that phone rings and you have to go out there, not with the Dodgers up 3 0 in the World Series, you know, oh, you lose this one, it sucks. You were one game away from clinching it and sweeping your opponent, but he has to go in in game three. If the Blue Jays tee off on him and you go into tonight down two to one, even though you’re the Dodgers, even though you have more talent than anybody in baseball, you are looking at those final two games at Dodger Stadium for the entire year and saying, “At bare minimum, we have to win one for sure, right? Because if you you don’t win. If you lose the final two, you get swept to Dodger Stadium and the series is over. But you’re looking at those last two and you got to win both, right? I was about to say bare minimum you got to win one. Yes, that is true. But you go back to Toronto down 3 to2. So you no longer have home field and you got to win the final two in Toronto. So if you lose last night, the series completely flips. And I feel for a lot of series, especially in the World Series, you go back to those numbers of the team that wins game three when it’s knotted up 1-1. usually goes on to win the World Series because that momentum just completely flips. And not even to mention in a game that went 18 innings and the Blue Jays were silent for the final Trying to look it up here. They didn’t score since the seventh inning. Same could be said about the Dodgers, but then the Dodgers scored in the 18th. So, the Blue Jays had multiple chances to cash in and that Dodgers bullpen just threw everybody out there. I thought at some point that we were going to get a position player on the mount, which would have been awful for the World Series. Let’s be honest here. It’s fun to watch him in June and July. I don’t want to see it in the World Series, but they were going to turn to a starter before they turned to um a position player. I mean, they threw Clayton Kershaw out there who technically for this postseason Dodgers team, he is a reliever and he only got one out last night. I root for former Royals and especially ones that, you know, had to bounce around a little bit. Never really got their chance and then get somewhere and show up in huge moments like this. Dodgers fans forever are going to remember Will Klein’s name. Whether they win the World Series or they don’t, he is going down in history for them. And we’re always going to remember an 18 inning game. And he gets to tell his kids, his grandkids, I was the winning pitcher in that game and I threw the final four innings out of the bullpen for our team. You know that he was able to celebrate big time in the clubhouse after the game. And now he gets to kick back and relax tonight cuz they’re probably not going to call upon him cuz it’s not going to go into 18 innings again. and he’s probably already down tonight. He threw four innings and he’s not a four- ining reliever. But that was so cool to see. Easy guy to root for. I tip my cap to Will Klein. Well, that’ll do it for another edition of Lockdown Royals in the Lockdown Podcast Network. I have been your host, Jack Johnson. Thank you for making Lockdown your first listen every day. For your second, find the allnight Lockdown MLB game night every game, every night until a World Series champion is crowned. Get local analysis on a national scale and find MLB game night on Locked on MLB on YouTube or wherever you listen to your podcast. Tomorrow we’ll be bringing you another episode right before noon. But until then, you take it easy, Kansas City.

We look at three guys that might be options for the Royals to add to the bullpen this offseason. Next, we give one player whom you should not buy stock in going into 2026. Lastly, we give praises to an old friend who dominated in the World Series last night.

Host Jack Johnson goes over it all next on “Locked On Royals”!

0:00 – Left-handed arms
12:05 – Don’t buy stock
19:58 – Klein

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