Former KC Royals top draft pick needs to prove himself in 2025

The Kansas City Royals startled baseball in 2021 by making high school pitcher Frank Mozzicato their top draft pick. Talent wasn't the issue — after all, he'd thrown four straight no-hitters that season and his curveball seemed destined to make Mozzicato a legend in his own time. Instead, bewildering was how KC passed on still-available collegiate superstar hurler Kumar Rocker, a curious move made somewhat more palatable when the New York Mets chose him but he didn't sign and underwent shoulder surgery that fall.

Rocker is now in the majors pitching for the Texas Rangers while Mozzicato still hasn't moved past High-A Quad Cities, where he's worked parts of the last two seasons and may begin the 2025 campaign. That Rocker spent three years at Vanderbilt maturing and refining his formidable skills while Mozzicato chose to turn pro when the ink on his high school diploma was barely dry helps explain their disparate progress. Now, Mozzicato's concerning professional performance makes 2025 a critical point in his career.

It's time for Mozzicato to prove himself.

KC Royals prospect Frank Mozzicato needs a good season

To say Mozzicato's progress has been slow captures the essence of his development. Although they could have tested him immediately after he signed, the Royals chose to work him out at their Arizona complex and then in the Fall Instructional League before assigning him to Single-A Columbia to begin the 2022 season. There he went 2-6 with a 4.30 ERA, numbers not shockingly marginal considering his age and inexperience, but he walked 51 in 69 innings.

Unfortunately, walking 16.7% of the batters he faced — a startling 6.65 BB/9 — foretold the control problems that quickly became his nemesis. In 2023, Mozzicato's walk rate dipped a bit to 14.5% at Columbia but jumped to 18.5% at High-A, where a workout injury forced him to miss time and may have affected him when he returned to action. He brought it back down to 14.5% for the River Bandits in 2024, but all those numbers are too high and won't serve him well.

Also unsettling, especially for a first-round draft pick, is Mozzicato's fastball. Never on par with his outstanding curveball, his velocity is by all accounts a concern — it fluctuates from the low 90's to high 80's, needs to get better, and failing to add the strength necessary to increase and sustain velocity could imperil his chances to eventually break into Kansas City's starting rotation.

Mozzicato's three-season record of 9-25 in 62 minor league starts also requires improvement. Even those who tend to pay such counting stats little mind can't deny 9-25 suggests trouble.

To his credit, Mozzicato is still quite young — he won't be 22 until mid-June — and has time to smooth out the rough spots in his game. He posted a 3.45 ERA, his lowest full-season mark so far, in 2024, and his career 10.58 K/9 is definitely encouraging. But all that doesn't mean he can easily afford another questionable campaign. For the pitcher MLB Pipeline ranks as Kansas City's 11th-best prospect, 2025 needs to be his finest season yet.