2 relievers, outfielder involved in new KC Royals roster moves

Finally free from a disturbing seven-game losing streak, and just days after plucking Tommy Pham and Robbie Grossman from the waiver wire, and then trading for Yuli Gurriel, the KC Royals are busy making more adjustments on their day off from the field.

With no game to play until Friday, when they open an important three-game home weekend series with Minnesota, the Royals brought an outfielder back to the big league roster and made moves with two relievers.

Returning from the Injured List where a hamstring strain had kept him since Aug. 2 is right fielder Hunter Renfroe, for whom Kansas City cleared space on its 28-man active roster by optioning reliever Steven Cruz back to Triple-A Omaha. They also designated reliever Dan Altavilla for assignment.

What do these moves mean for the KC Royals?

For starters, Kansas City gets Renfroe's bat back ... but just what manager Matt Quatraro decides to do with it will be interesting to see. Renfroe was the club's regular right fielder before injuring his hamstring, and after a long, slow start to his first season as a Royal — he was hitting .178 with only four homers at the end of May — was batting .286 with a .358 OBP and eight homers since the beginning of June.

Now, though, Pham seems comfortable in right field, where's he played every day after reporting to the Royals Sunday. The big three-run homer he hammered early in Wednesday's game against Cleveland proved to be the difference in the Royals' 4-1, losing skid-snapping victory over the Guardians, and he's hitting .294 in his first four games with his new club.

Whether Quatraro chooses to hand the majority of playing time in right back to Renfroe remains to be seen. He and Pham are both right-handed hitters, which takes a traditional platoon off the table. Also relevant is that despite his improvement at the plate since May ended, Renfroe's .238 August average was a marked departure from the .333 and .297 he hit in June and July, respectively.

Returning Cruz to Omaha won't send shock waves through the KC fan base. Used only three times during his two brief stints with the Royals this season, he had a pair of strikeouts and allowed one of the three runs he inherited to score in his three appearances. He's 6-1 with a 3.35 ERA and two saves in 44 games at Omaha.

The club's move with Altavilla also isn't surprising. Signed as a free agent in December, Altavilla had been charged with six runs in 3.2 innings with the Royals, and his one start in five outings, a mid-June "opener" assignment against the Yankees, went badly.

Altavilla was also 1-2, 4.11 in eight games for Omaha, where he'd been pitching recently on an injury rehabilitation assignment after suffering an oblique strain earlier this summer.

The Royals probably aren't done making moves

Sending Cruz to the minors may signal more to come from Kansas City. His transfer to Omaha left the Royals with 13 pitchers, but they have room for one more under baseball's September roster expansion rules. Adding another hurler seems likely, especially considering the club's continuing bullpen problems ... but supplementing the pitching staff will necessitate the cutting of a non-pitcher.

Stay tuned.

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