Royals just got brutal reminder that small markets can build winners

After missing the postseason for the second season straight, the Kansas City Royals are trying to figure out what they need to do to make their second playoff appearance since they won the World Series in 2015. With their superstar player — Bobby Witt Jr. — on the roster, they've struggled to build a consistent winner around him, even though they have given out large contracts for a small-market team.

Maybe they should start to follow the models of the small markets currently in the playoffs. A graphic posted to X (formerly Twitter) by MLB Pipeline showed how much WAR each roster in the playoffs was worth and broke it down by how the players were added to the roster.

In the AL, the two teams that stand out are the Tampa Bay Rays and Cleveland Guardians, and the fact that their compositions are very different.

Tampa Bay had 48.2 WAR, of which 31.6 came from players they traded for. Cleveland had 46.1 WAR, with 26.7 coming from players they drafted. In the NL, the Brewers had 53.7 WAR, with an almost even split: 21.7 coming from trades and 23.0 coming from the draft.

The Royals shouldn't try to be the Dodgers or the Yankees when they can't match their payrolls

The biggest thing to take away from that is that free agency isn't the main way those teams have become successful. Unlike the Dodgers, who have almost 50% of their WAR from free agents, or the Chicago Cubs, who are over 40% from free agents, the small-market teams draft well, develop well, and trade from their surplus to supplement the roster. That is the path the Royals need to start heading in.

In the past, that is the path the Royals took. A lot of the 2015 core was homegrown talent, with some free agents and some trades. The current regime needs to figure out that path again. It's great that the Royals don't need to be a bottom-ten team in payroll and feel they have the flexibility to spend on free agents, but unless they can be one of the top spenders, building from within needs to be the way to go.

They have already started, which is great. Witt, Jac Caglianone, Carter Jensen, Maikel Garcia, Vinnie Pasquantino, and Michael Massey are all homegrown players. The next step is to use their minor league prospects to make trades to build around that core.

There are small market teams in the playoffs showing the Royals the blueprint, and the nice thing is, there are multiple blueprints to follow. Now, Kansas City needs to pick one to follow and get themselves back to the playoffs in a very weak AL Central.

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