3 burning KC Royals questions, and 3 answers

Question 2: How much longer are the KC Royals going to give Hunter Dozier?

The increasingly sad baseball journey of once-promising Hunter Dozier continues. The man who opened so many eyes in 2019 with 29 doubles, 10 triples, 26 homers, 84 RBIs and a .279/.348/.522 line, has two hits this season after managing a single Friday. He's now hitting .223 since that almost-forgotten 2019 campaign, and will bring an ugly .095/.136/.095 seven-game line and one RBI into this afternoon's game against San Francisco.

The Royals entered the season counting on Dozier to be their regular third baseman but, with no end to his troubles at the plate in sight, they should resort to Plan B, which could be Bobby Witt Jr. taking over at third with Omaha's Maikel Garcia coming up to play shortstop, or Matt Duffy, who's 6-for-10 with a homer so far, taking over the hot corner.

In all likelihood, however, Dozier will stay in the lineup for the foreseeable future. He's in the third year of the four-season, $25 million deal he signed just before the final full season of the Dayton Moore era began, meaning the Royals will stick with him as long as they can—Kansas City isn't a franchise prone to dumping what are, by their measure at least, big contracts even in the face of failure.

The hope is that Dozier will suddenly recapture the magic of his 2019 season and lay long-term claim to third base at best, or make himself an attractive trade piece at worst. So, at least for the immediate future, don't look for the club to do anything more serious than benching him.