Royals: Candidates to hit 20 home runs in the 2020 season

The Kansas City Royals saw an uptick in power hitting during the 2019 season and may have some candidates to keep the ball rolling for 2020.

Now that baseball is officially over, Kansas City Royals fans can begin to look forward to what’s to come in the 2020 season. There should be a lot of moves starting to take place soon and fans will want to be watching.

The Royals have already started making some roster changes, putting Salvador Perez and Kelvin Gutierrez back on the roster, and designating Trevor Oaks and Jacob Barnes for assignment. One can assume there will be even more moves coming as free agency starts to heat up.

While there are many different paths the team can take in free agency, pitching should be a top priority of the Royals. Most of the struggles the team saw during the 2019 season came in the form of pitchers struggling with control and struggling to stay in games for an extended period of time.

One area where the Royals look to be doing well is offense. There were still some slumps and hitters that struggled at the plate during the season, but overall, there were many Royals players who excelled and showed why they continued to be on the field.

Now, the Royals find themselves in a unique position. They continue to have the top-notch defense that they are known for, but they also have something that is typically a foreign concept for the Royals, power hitting.

Not only did the Royals have the American League leader in home runs for 2019, but they have a number of players on the roster that could put up 20 or more home runs in 2020, driving the offense into an even better year. Let’s take a look at some of the candidates who are sure to hit at least 20 home runs in 2020, and some who we can only hope will make the jump.

In 2019, the Kansas City Royals saw two players grow into stars with some power hitting abilities in their arsenal.

Jorge Soler

Jorge Soler is the most obvious candidate for the Kansas City Royals that will hit 20 home runs in 2020. If Soler can continue his production from the 2019 season, he could easily hit 40 or 50 home runs, again breaking the Royals single-season record of 48.

Soler saw some struggles at the plate towards the beginning of 2019. He had a high strikeout rate and struggled to keep his batting average above .200 for the months of April and June. Soler started to figure things out, though, and he took off from there.

Soler managed to float around a month-to-month .300 batting average range during the last three months of the season, and of course, never really saw his slugging percentage decrease. He was able to cut down drastically on his strikeouts and his on-base percentage saw a substantial increase as well.

Soler must continue to produce with this success in 2020 if he wants to hit the 40-50 home run mark again, but there should be no doubt that a player with his power will hit 20 home runs in 2020.

Hunter Dozier

Hunter Dozier is a player that really impressed for the Kansas City Royals in 2019. He appeared in 102 games in 2018, but struggled at the plate, slashing .229/.278/.395. In 2019, Dozier knew he had to prove that he was supposed to be on the field for the Royals every night.

Dozier appeared in 139 games in 2019 and slashed .279/.348/.522, a great increase from his numbers in 2018. Along with the increase at the plate, Dozier knocked 10 triples and 26 home runs. It’s obvious that he has power, and the Royals can only hope he continues to grow.

Dozier’s power-hitting that showed in 2019 makes him an obvious candidate for 20 home runs in 2020. It’s likely that he may hit even more, given that he missed some games due to injury and seemed to slump for a while after coming back to play.

Between Dozier and Soler, the Royals could see a large number of home runs next year if they can both continue to produce as they did in 2019. While this type of power hitting is not always the norm for the Royals, after a few disappointing seasons, it might be time they try something a bit different.

The Kansas City Royals have some well-known power hitters on their roster for 2020, but a couple of other players could add their names to that list.

Whit Merrifield

It is likely strange for many to see Whit Merrifield on a list of Kansas City Royals players to hit a large number of home runs. Whit is definitely known for his ability to hit and put the ball in play, but typically, he is not much of a power hitter.

In 2019, though, Whit did see a bit of a rise in his slugging percentage and increased his 2018 numbers from 3 to 10 in triples and 12 to 16 in home runs. While Whit has not had a season in which he hit 20 home runs, he has come close with 19 in 2017.

Whit makes the list of wishful thinking players who could hit 20 home runs in 2020 because he simply has the athletic ability to do just about whatever he wants at the plate. Another, more justified reason, is that Whit has started to focus his abilities on certain aspects of the game.

In 2018 Whit the MLB in hits and stolen bases. In 2019 he led in hits and tied for the lead in triples, while he saw a sharp decrease in his stolen base numbers. Instead of focusing on a lot of different things, he has zeroed in on his hitting and scoring, which showed an increase in his extra-base hits.

While this is just wishful thinking, if there is a likeliest unlikely candidate to break 20 home runs in 2020, Whit Merrifield would be at the top of the list.

Ryan McBroom

Ryan McBroom is a fairly new name to the Royals organization. He was acquired from the Yankees and made his major league debut with the Royals, appearing in 23 games at the end of 2019. While he didn’t have any home runs during his short stint with Kansas City, he did show up decently at the plate, slashing .293/.361/.360.

Where the argument comes for McBroom is in his ability to continue to succeed through the minor league system. McBroom has shown consistently good numbers as far as batting average and on-base percentage and has shown an ability to knock the ball out of the park during a few years.

McBroom stayed consistent as he rose through the minors and was able to produce, putting up his best numbers 2019 at AAA slashing .315/.402/.574 with 26 home runs over 117 games. While he didn’t have a home run in the 23 games he played with the Royals, McBroom shouldn’t be counted out too quickly.

McBroom needs time. The major league sample for him is very small and doesn’t provide enough information to really make a full opinion. This lands McBroom in the wishful thinking category. While he may not produce power numbers like Soler or Dozier, there is every possibility that once he is able to acclimate to the new level of baseball, McBroom will start to hit some balls out of the park.

It would be awesome to see McBroom and Whit blast 20 homers into the stands in 2020, but it is likely they will sit around the 15 range. Combine their hitting ability with the other power hitters listed previously, though, and the Royals just might have a chance to shake up the field in 2020.