{"id":518863,"date":"2026-01-13T21:47:15","date_gmt":"2026-01-13T21:47:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/518863\/"},"modified":"2026-01-13T21:47:15","modified_gmt":"2026-01-13T21:47:15","slug":"latest-brendan-donovan-update-has-big-implications-for-royals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/518863\/","title":{"rendered":"Latest Brendan Donovan Update Has Big Implications For Royals"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Kansas City Royals have had a productive offseason so far, adding Lane Thomas, Isaac Collins, Nick Mears and Matt Strahm. But there\u2019s still more work to be done.<\/p>\n

The Royals have been one of the main teams showing interest in St. Louis Cardinals All-Star Brendan Donovan, but the market might finally be starting to move for him.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Jeff Passan of ESPN<\/a> reported on Tuesday that the San Francisco Giants are making a push for a second baseman, with Donovan and Chicago Cubs infielder Nico Hoerner among their top targets. The Royals still need one more bat to improve their offense for this year.<\/p>\n

If you like our content, choose Sports Illustrated as a preferred source on Google<\/a>.<\/p>\n

What This Means For Royals\"Cardinals\"<\/p>\n

Sep 12, 2025; Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA; St. Louis Cardinals second base Brendan Donovan (33) gets a base hit against the Milwaukee Brewers in the seventh inning at American Family Field. Mandatory Credit: Michael McLoone-Imagn Images | Michael McLoone-Imagn Images<\/p>\n

If the Giants are making an aggressive push for Donovan, then the Royals are going to have to ramp up their pursuit as well. They have the young pitching that St. Louis would want in trades, so they\u2019ll have to trade from their depth of starting pitching in order to land the 2025 All-Star.<\/p>\n

The Royals\u2019 offense let them down in 2025, and Collins and Thomas should help improve the lineup. But they just need one more hitter, and Donovan could be that missing piece that gets them back to the playoffs in 2026.<\/p>\n

But as of now, it seems as if the Giants are the most aggressive teams, more so than the Royals, Boston Red Sox and Seattle Mariners, Donovan\u2019s other suitors. Passan is a reliable reporter, so that likely means that the Giants are the frontrunners<\/a> for Donovan right now.<\/p>\n

If that\u2019s the case, then it\u2019s time for the Royals to up the ante on their pursuit if they truly want to improve their offense. They\u2019ve done enough to improve their bullpen, but one more bat could make a huge difference for this young team.<\/p>\n

His market has started moving now that Alex Bregman has signed and Nolan Arenado has been traded. But the Royals can\u2019t back off now unless they truly find the Cardinals\u2019 asking price to be too high.<\/p>\n

Still, they can easily meet that price if they are willing to, but they might want to act quickly to avoid missing out on him and watching him go to San Francisco. We\u2019ll see what the next few days bring in his market.<\/p>\n

More MLB: Red Sox’s Desperation Could Cause Trade Ripple Effects For Royals: Insiders<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Kansas City Royals have had a productive offseason so far, adding Lane Thomas, Isaac Collins, Nick Mears…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":518864,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2387],"tags":[5,936,2123,55,2596,2595,4,252],"class_list":{"0":"post-518863","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-kansas-city-royals","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-kansas","10":"tag-kansas-city","11":"tag-kansas-city-royals","12":"tag-kansascity","13":"tag-kansascityroyals","14":"tag-mlb","15":"tag-royals"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/115889992929479798","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/518863","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=518863"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/518863\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/518864"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=518863"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=518863"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=518863"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}