Tough arbitration decisions face KC Royals, Moore

The KC Royals usually avoid arbitration. But with big offseason decisions to make, how will they approach the process this year?

Major League Baseball Trade Rumors published its annual arbitration salary projections for all 30 teams, including the KC Royals, just Thursday. Their predictions have already spawned droves of Internet reaction.

The projections came with a caveat of sorts. Because baseball arbitrators generally limit statistical performance arguments to the immediately preceding season, MLBTR predicted three separate outcomes: one based on the 60-game 2020 season, one extrapolating 60-game stats to the regular 162-games, and one applied to players not in their first arbitration season that first projected raises based on 162 games, then adjusted to 37 percent of that number.

Baseball’s lack of an agreement covering the shortened season’s effects on arbitration drove MLBTR’s alternative projections; the current Basic Agreement contemplates a 162-game schedule and, while the players and clubs may negotiate a resolution, they haven’t yet.

For the Royals, arbitration involves more than determining what salaries to offer. Because payroll money all comes from the same pot, the club must determine whether to offer extensions to several key arbitration-eligible players; how to budget for club extensions and club improvement; whether to save money by cutting arbitration-eligible players loose; and what to offer players they don’t extend.

What favors the Royals is veteran general manager Dayton Moore, a master of arbitration avoidance who almost always negotiates deals with his players. But the KC Royals’ impressive cast of players eligible for arbitration—Brad Keller, Adalberto Mondesi, Jorge Soler, Hunter Dozier, Jakob Junis, Mike Montgomery, Maikel Franco, Kevin McCarthy, Franchy Cordero, Jesse Hahn and Glenn Sparkman—may make his job more difficult this time.

The decisions will be hard. Let’s see what they might be.

(We’re using only MLBTR projections based on the just-completed 60-game campaign and the extrapolation to the usual 162 contests. All references to 2020 player salaries are based on Baseball Prospectus’ invaluable Cot’s Baseball Contracts and are not prorated to 60 games).

Every team has expendable players. The KC Royals have three prime candidates for non-tender.

The 11 KC Royals eligible for arbitration played the 2020 season on one-year contracts. The club will tender new contracts to those it wants to keep and “non-tender” the ones they don’t. Non-tendered players become free agents; tendered players can accept or reject their tenders. Rejections lead to salary negotiations, failed bargaining begets arbitration. Three non-tenders make sense for KC.

Mike Montgomery.  Montgomery pitched just three times this season. He suffered a lat injury in his first start, then pitched 3.1 innings over two late September relief appearances. It’s no surprise, then, that MLBTR projects an arbitration award matching his 2020 $3.1 million base.

The Royals will be wise to non-tender Montgomery and save their money. He is, and perhaps always will be, most remembered not for his body of work but for getting the final out for the Cubs in the 2016 World Series. Kansas City picked him up from Chicago in a 2019 midsummer trade and he went 2-7 with a 4.64 after the deal. His 23-34 career record (17-24 as a starter) doesn’t commend him to a rotation soon to be flush with talented young hurlers. He’s definitely expendable.

Kevin McCarthy.  McCarthy is also expendable. He’s been serviceable in five KC seasons, but this season’s bullpen resurgence relegated McCarthy to just five games and he spent most of the season at the alternate training site. McCarthy’s base was $607,000 and MLBTR predicts he’ll get bumps of $93,000 under the 60-game model and $193,000 under the extrapolated projection. Either figure is too much and the fact he fell into disuse suggests the Royals may feel they have better options. They do.

Glenn Sparkman.  Sparkman is in the same boat as Montgomery. Injury forced sidelined him Aug. 4 and he didn’t see action again. MLBTR believes he’ll get a $4,500 pay cut to $600,000.

Sparkman’s had some good moments with the Royals, but his KC record (4-14 and 5.67 ERA in 52 games) doesn’t warrant a tender. With the coffers low after a season without any paid attendance, and considering the club needs money for other players, $600,000 can be better spent elsewhere.

For different reasons, four KC Royals shouldn’t be extension candidates.

The Royals have four players to whom they should tender 2021 contracts, but not extension offers.

Maikel Franco.  Franco’s base this season was $2.95 million. MLBTR predicts arbitration will bring him $4.5 million or $8 million. Why so much? It’s simple—the Royals acquired Franco to hit and field and he did both. He played every game, hit .278, led the club in RBIs with 38 and his eight homers tied for third. A handful of errors in 51 games at third base eliminated him from Gold Glove consideration but he was serviceable.

Extending Franco, though, isn’t the right move. He played well enough to deserve mention in the extension discussion, but he may get squeezed out of the KC picture sooner than he’d like. Adalberto Mondesi is set at shortstop, which means super shortstop prospect Bobby Witt Jr., who’s coming on strong and could find his way to Kauffman Stadium sometime next season, will need a place to play. He’s been working at third, so extending Franco now could turn out to be a mistake. Arbitrating with Franco could be worth the risk.

Franchy Cordero.  Cordero came to the Royals in the July trade that sent Tim Hill to San Diego. Despite a wrist injury that cost him several weeks on the Injured List, Cordero still managed to slash .286/.447/.733 in 38 games. He played solid defense and gave the club good reason to bring him back. His base was $571,100; MLBTR projects he’ll do well in arbitration ($900,000 or $1 million). Those numbers are probably a bit high; he isn’t an extension candidate yet, but the KC Royals should tender him.

Jesse Hahn.  Credit Hahn for playing a big role in the bullpen’s 2020 comeback. In only his second season as a reliever, he was 1-0 with a minuscule 0.52 ERA and three saves in 18 games, and averaged almost 10 strikeouts per nine innings. While MLBTR’s projections of $1.1 million and $1.7 million are fair, expect the club to offer a bit less. He’s not quite ready for an extension; even if he was, others are ahead of him. But the Royals need to keep him.

Jakob Junis.  If 2020 wasn’t a lost season for Jakob Junis, it was close. He missed time after a preseason positive COVID-19 test, was sidelined by back spasms in August and optioned to the alternate training site for a week in September. His numbers weren’t pretty—0-2, 6.39 ERA and a 1.618 WHIP—but arbitration can be quirky and MLBTR predicts a $1.5 million or $1.7 million salary (his 2020 base was $608,000). Both amounts are excessive and the club won’t offer either.

Junis won nine games three years in a row before 2020, but his losses increased from three to 12 to 14. He’s trending down, not up, so an extension shouldn’t be in the picture. The KC Royals won’t give up on him yet, but they don’t need to make him a millionaire.