\n\tAs spring training gets underway, the Kansas City Royals have made an addition to the club’s pitching depth, a day after pitchers and catchers reported to open camp.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n
\n\tThe Royals acquired right-hander Mitch Spence<\/a> from the Athletics in exchange for minor league right-hander A.J. Causey<\/a>. Spence, a former 10th-round pick by the New York Yankees in 2019, was taken first overall by the then-Oakland Athletics during the 2023 Major League Baseball Rule 5 Draft<\/a>.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n \n\tSpence spent the past two seasons in the Athletics\u2019 organization, pitching to a record of 11-16, 4.77 ERA, 4.53 FIP, 1.40 WHIP, across 67 games and 236 career innings. Over the two years, Spence has shown an ability to be used both as a starting pitcher and in a relief role.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n \n\tLast season, Spence appeared in 32 games, with eight of those being starts, and went 3-6, with a 5.10 ERA, an identical 5.10 FIP, and 1.44 WHIP in 84 \u2154 innings. Spence\u2019s hits allowed, home runs allowed, and walk rates all jumped from his rookie year, where Spence went 8-10 with a 4.58 ERA, a slightly better FIP of 4.21, and a WHIP of 1.38.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n \n\tThe Royals\u2019 rotation<\/a> will likely consist of Cole Ragans<\/a>, Seth Lugo<\/a>, Michael Wacha<\/a>, Noah Cameron<\/a>, and Kris Bubic<\/a>. Spence will likely slot into the depth group with\u00a0Bailey Falter<\/a>, Stephen Kolek<\/a>, and Ryan Bergert<\/a> as options in case injuries strike. As many Royals fans know, 2025 saw significant injuries to both Ragans and Bubic, so depth is vital across an 162 game season.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n \n\tSpence\u2019s ability to pitch in multi-running roles could allow the 27-year-old to be called up when injuries strike, when the team is playing through a long stretch without a day off, or to help limit some innings on a taxed bullpen.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n \n\tHeading to the Athletics is Causey, who reached as high as Double-A last season with the Northwest Arkansas Naturals. Used solely as a reliever across both Single-A and Double-A, Causey appeared in 48 games, across 73 \u2153\u00a0 innings, pitching to a 11-5 record, 1.72 ERA, and 0.90 WHIP, holding opposing batters to a .186 average against. The 23-year-old is a former fifth-round selection of the Royals during the 2024 MLB draft.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n \n\tThe Royals begin their season in Atlanta on Friday, March 27, at 7:15 p.m. EST.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As spring training gets underway, the Kansas City Royals have made an addition to the club’s pitching depth,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":569318,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2387],"tags":[5,936,2123,55,2596,2595,4916,4,252,13078,4164],"class_list":{"0":"post-569664","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-mitch-spence","15":"tag-mlb","16":"tag-royals","17":"tag-sacramento-athletics","18":"tag-trade"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116061961141207109","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/569664","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=569664"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/569664\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/569318"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=569664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=569664"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=569664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}