4 Royals takeaways from GM Meetings

This story was excerpted from Anne Rogers' Royals Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.

KANSAS CITY -- After Monday's press conference to discuss starter Michael Wacha’s new multiyear contract, Royals general manager J.J. Picollo and his staff headed down to San Antonio for the annual GM Meetings this week.

There, teams lay the groundwork for offseason plans, beginning (or continuing) talks about trades, free agents and other things that help in preparation for the coming season.

The Royals got their offseason started early when Wacha signed, checking off a major item on the to-do list. Now, we’re in one of those lulls: Lots of rumors, names thrown around, but limited activity. That doesn’t mean discussions aren’t happening behind the scenes.

Picollo spoke with MLB.com’s Maria Guardado in San Antonio about his club’s plans. Here’s what stood out to me:

1. Starting pitching
Picollo: “We’re very comfortable with our starting pitching right now. You’ve got Wacha, [Seth] Lugo, [Cole] Ragans, [Brady] Singer, [Alec] Marsh. Kris Bubic was in the bullpen this past year, but we believe he’s a starter. Daniel Lynch went to the bullpen and did a nice job, but he’s another one who could be a starter. We don’t expect to be in the market for a starter moving forward. We’re going to focus on some other things.”

Anything can happen over the course of an offseason, so this doesn’t mean the Royals are 100 percent not going to add a starter. But this comment makes it sound like they really are content with their starting pitching, which makes sense with one of the best rotations in baseball returning in 2025. And Picollo seems pleased with his depth, which also includes prospects Noah Cameron (No. 12), Chandler Champlain (No. 16) and others.

That said, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see Kansas City keep adding to that depth on smaller deals. The Royals were remarkably healthy last year, but they know they can’t rely on that every year. Depth, as always, should be discussed.

2. Brady Singer
Picollo: “We like Brady a lot. We thought he made significant strides this year. He continues to add to his repertoire to help him navigate lineups. And he’ll continue to do that. So Brady’s a lock in our rotation. When you look at our top four, Brady is in it. We’d like to have him because you can never have enough depth.”

There’s been a lot of talk about Singer’s trade value, both internally and externally. A Super Two player, Singer still has two more seasons of control even though he’s entering his third year of arbitration and is due a good raise, with his 2025 salary projection in the $8 million range. The 28-year-old is a solid and reliable starter, something all teams covet. He also just turned in a great ‘24 season, with a 3.71 ERA and 3.1 WAR, according to Baseball Reference. So it’s interesting that Picollo would go so far as to say Singer is a “lock” in the rotation.

Again, anything can happen, and this doesn’t mean Singer is all of a sudden on the Royals’ no-trade list. But it does tell us that when the Royals are thinking about their 2025 rotation, Singer is a key piece of it.

3. Adding to the bullpen
Picollo: “That’s something we’ll let play out in the offseason. Somebody else we’re looking forward to having back is Hunter Harvey. When we acquired him and [Lucas] Erceg, we figured that was our eighth and ninth innings. Then we had some of our guys get hurt, but we had some young pitchers step up. And they really performed exceptionally well, which is exciting for us. And they did it on big stages, in big moments, and that was really encouraging. So we feel very good about our bullpen. Doesn’t mean we won’t do anything, but we feel very good about the depth of our bullpen right now.”

The Royals’ bullpen needs aren’t nearly as dire as last offseason or even at the Trade Deadline this year, when it was the No. 1 priority and led to the Harvey and Erceg pickups. For the first time in a while, the Royals have a legitimate closer they can slot into the ninth inning in Erceg. It sounds like they will be counting on a healthy Harvey too, even though he is arbitration eligible and could be seen as a non-tender candidate based on the back injuries he dealt with this past season.

It’s great that Picollo feels good about the bullpen depth; it shows how far that unit has come in a year, and it includes Lynch, Bubic, Sam Long and Angel Zerpa as young pitchers who stepped up. But the Royals will likely keep an open mind about a bullpen addition this winter.

4. And the offense
Picollo: “We’re looking at trying to add some on-base to our team. It would lend itself well to Bobby [Witt Jr.] hitting two, Vinnie [Pasquantino] hitting three, [Salvador Perez] hitting four. So on-base is a big focus, especially when we want to put the game in motion and be athletic. And ideally, it would be in the leadoff spot and maybe somewhere in the middle of the lineup. If we could do that, I think we’d have a much better team.”

Here’s the expected answer about the offseason priorities, and it doesn’t change from when we talked to Picollo at his end-of-season media availability. It does, perhaps, become more clear after Wacha re-signed. This is the main area the Royals will be focusing on this winter.

They’ll be counting on some internal improvements from players like Maikel Garcia and MJ Melendez to help lengthen their lineup, but any candidate the Royals target in free agency or trades must have the ability to get on base, even more than slug.