KC Royals Trades: How the midsummer deals worked out

With just a few days to go until baseball’s typically player transaction-rich Winter Meetings kick off in San Diego, the KC Royals haven’t been wheeling and dealing. They’ve announced nothing but routine moves bordering on the mundane—Kansas City prepared for the Meetings’ Rule 5 Draft by recently setting its 40-man roster, let pitchers Jake Brentz, Nathan Webb, catcher Sebastian Rivero, and outfielder Brent Rooker go, and lost pitchers Luke Weaver, Tyler Zuber and Gabe Speier to waiver claims.

The Royals have yet to surprise their fans with a major offseason player transaction, leaving the deals they made at, or leading up to, last summer’s trade deadline the only recent big ones to ponder.

The deadline brought significant change to Kansas City’s big league roster—traded away and replaced primarily by prospects were key Royals Whit Merrifield, Andrew Benintendi and Carlos Santana. The results for KC were mixed.

Two players the KC Royals received in midsummer deals are already gone.

A pair of minor trades netted little for Kansas City. The first came Aug. 1 when the Royals shipped infielder Emmanuel Rivera to Arizona for reliever Luke Weaver. While Rivera homered six times and hit .227 for his new team, Weaver pitched in 14 games for his, gave up 15 runs (12 earned) in just 19.1 innings, and found himself on the waiver wire and claimed by Seattle late last month.

Kansas City dealt reliable backup catcher Cam Gallagher to San Diego for outfielder Brent Rooker the next day. Rooker spent the rest of the season bouncing back and forth between KC and Triple-A Omaha and went 4-for-25 for the Royals. DFA’d earlier this month, he’s now with Oakland.

Gallagher spent all his time in Triple-A, ended the season with Baltimore, and is a free agent. It’s always possible the Royals could bring him back.

How did the rest of the deals work out?