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4 player moves KC Royals likely wish they could undo

Four transactions have reaped rewards for other clubs.

By Mike Gillespie |
/ Jim McIsaac/GettyImages
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Time will tell whether the mid-July trade the Kansas City Royals made to get reliever Hunter Harvey from the Washington Nationals will pay any dividends. Alternatively, it'll be written off as an ill-advised, but well-intentioned, move to shore up the club's bullpen before the race for the MLB Playoffs shifted into high gear.

Harvey pitched only six times for the Royals after they dealt Cayden Wallace, their then-No. 2 prospect, to the Nationals for him — he went on the Injured List in early August and never returned. Still under team control for another year, Harvey should be back next season; it's then that the success or failure of the deal can be gauged.

But what of other relatively recent high-profile Kansas City transactions? Some have turned out to be rousing successes — like last year's trade with the Texas Rangers for Cole Ragans, or this season's trade deadline swap with the Oakland Athletics to land Lucas Erceg — while others aren't looked back on as fondly.

Let's examine four transactions the Royals might like to take back.

The KC Royals' 2022 trade with the Braves for Drew Waters hasn't worked out

Lamenting a deal that snared another club's No. 1 prospect might seem odd, especially when the Royals gave up only a Competitive Balance draft pick to swing the deal, but that's what they should be doing two years after acquiring Drew Waters from the Atlanta Braves. The reason to regret the move is simple — Waters hasn't proved he can hit against major-league pitching.

Through 137 games and 465 plate appearances spread across parts of three seasons, Waters is slashing .229/.306/.396 with 13 home runs and 51 RBI. His OPS+ is 63, his wRC+ 91, and he's struck out 32.9% of the time.

Strikingly dissimilar are his numbers at Triple-A Omaha. In 2022 after the trade with the Braves, Waters homered seven times and hit .295 with a .399 OBP in 31 games. In 13 games in 2023, he hit .327 with 13 homers and 61 RBI, and this season, he slashed .290/.379/.494.

It's clear Waters is a good "AAAA" player, but his failure to stick in Kansas City should have the Royals thinking he may never make it in The Show.

The KC Royals may regret putting pitcher Luke Weaver on waivers two seasons ago

Few fans gave the move a second thought when the Royals placed Luke Weaver on the waiver wire after the 2022 campaign ended. Obtained from the Arizona Diamondbacks at the trade deadline in exchange for infielder Emmanuel Rivera, the right-handed reliever pitched only 19.1 innings down the stretch, didn't figure in any decisions or save any games, and posted a 5.59 ERA. So when 97-loss Kansas City started making postseason moves, letting Weaver go made sense.

The Seattle Mariners claimed Weaver and, through a curious series of subsequent moves, he ended up with the New York Yankees late last season. The rest, as the old saying goes, is history — Weaver is now the king of New York's bullpen, a closer so efficient that manager Aaron Boone doesn't hesitate to use him in tough spots. That he's become so good after leaving Kansas City is reason enough for the Royals to bemoan cutting him loose.

But what he did to them recently must make their collective blood boil.

It was Weaver who, with Kansas City trailing by just a run, snuffed out the Royals' promising potential eighth-inning rally in Game 1 of the American League Division Series, then closed them out with a three-up, three-down ninth. And, as we suggested he could immediately following the opener, he remained a thorn in KC's side by saving Game 3, and then the deciding Game 4.

A do-over? That would be nice...

Trading Ryan O'Hearn to Baltimore early last year wasn't the KC Royals' best move

Kansas City chose Ryan O'Hearn in the eighth round of the 2014 amateur draft. Four years later, with the Royals stumbling their way to a 100-loss season just three years after winning the World Series, he made his major league debut, and quickly made himself known. In 44 games, O'Hearn homered 12 times, collected 30 RBI, and hit .262 with an excellent .353 OBP.

But his subsequent struggles in Kansas City are the stuff bad legends are made of. He batted .195 each of the next two seasons, .225 in the third, and .239 in the fourth, while averaging a shade over six homers across each of those four seasons. It became clear after the 2022 campaign that something had to change.

And change, it did — the Royals traded the once-promising O'Hearn to the Baltimore Orioles for cash a few weeks before spring training began in 2023, and there he resurrected his career. Across two seasons as an Oriole, he's hit .275 with a combined 29 homers and 119 RBI, a performance finally commensurate with his excellent rookie campaign with the Royals.

Is the O'Hearn trade something the Royals would like to take back? Probably. He's become a proven big league hitter and, because he can play the corner outfield positions, he'd be a refreshing change for the club, especially in right field.

KC Royals would likely undo designating Brent Rooker for assignment in 2022

Add Brent Rooker, who played only 14 games for the Royals after the San Diego Padres traded him to Kansas City for Cam Gallagher at the 2022 trade deadline, to the list of players the club would probably like to have back. The Oakland Athletics claimed him off the waiver wire that winter after the Royals designated him for assignment to create roster space before the Rule 5 Draft.

What Rooker has done since that time is nothing short of remarkable. Not much of a big league hitter before Oakland grabbed him two days after the Royals DFA'd him, Rooker exploded in 2023 by smashing 30 home runs and earning an All-Star berth in his first full major-league season. Rooker didn't repeat as an All-Star this year, but his numbers suggest that could have been a mistake — he homered 39 times, drove in 112 runs, slashed .293/.365/.562, and had a 164 wRC+ and 5.0 fWAR.

And, as we pointed out early this season, he's absolutely punished the Royals since they let him go.

Like O'Hearn, and perhaps even more so, Rooker could help transform the offensive side of Kansas City's outfield. Maybe general manager J.J. Picollo, the master of last offseason's successful KC roster overhaul, will make a pitch to the A's for his services this winter.

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