Royals superstar perfectly sums up Jac Caglianone's impact amid youngster's dominant run

The Kansas City Royals are on a roll of late, winning seven of their last nine and sweeping two of their last three series. This has been a night-and-day contrast to the streak they were on immediately before this run, dropping 12 of 15, highlighted (or low-lighted in this case) by a dreadful eight-game losing streak. One of the leaders amid their hot stretch has been former top prospect Jac Caglianone, who's seemed to have put his early season troubles behind him and become the bat many Royals fans have been clamoring for since his star-studded arrival last June.

Since the start of their series with the Los Angeles Angels last weekend, Caglianone has made a strong case to be more than just a platoon bat in the Royals outfield. In 27 plate appearances across eight games, he's slashing .261/.370/.565 with two homers, six RBI, a 14.8% walk rate and a 154 wRC+. And his contributions are certainly being noticed within Kansas City's clubhouse, especially after creating a three-game RBI streak this past weekend in Seattle, as All-Star Maikel Garcia offered quite the rave review for the up-and-coming Royals outfielder.

"He's been showing like good at-bats, the last couple of weeks," Garcia told Jaylon Thompson of the Kansas City Star after their extra innings win over the Mariners on Saturday. "He's young, but he's growing up like a pro baseball player."

"We know he has good talent and we trust him," he said. "He's done a great job staying aggressive with the fastball."

Compared to his 49 wRC+ in his lackluster rookie campaign, Caglianone's 109 wRC+ output to start the new season has been quite the pleasant contrast. And as Garcia said, he's showing his evolved maturity as a pro. This has been made especially evident through his advanced metrics, particularly in when it comes to his quality of contact which is now matching his existing incredibly strong bat speed.

And it's not just the year-over-year improvement that Royals fans should be excited about when it comes to Caglianone, it's the fact that in the process of his strong start, he's become one of the more feared hitters in baseball. His hard-hit rate, average exit velocity and bat speed are all elite in comparison to the rest of the league, sitting in the 95th percentile or higher, and his bat speed is amongst the 88th percentile.

Royals' youth movement has been perfect complement to core four in lineup

One of the biggest questions staring the Royals in the face heading into the year was how the rest of their lineup would compliment the four staples atop the order in Garcia, Vinnie Pasquantino, Salvador Perez and of course their franchise cornerstone in Bobby Witt Jr.

And so far, the two names that have not only been leading the charge of the "best of the rest", but even exceeding the output of some of the Royals' aforementioned stars, have been Caglianone and his fellow youthful comrade in Carter Jensen. Both firmly rank amongst Witt and Garcia atop the Royals leaderboards in both OPS and wRC+.

As mentioned earlier, Caglianone has been a run-producing catalyst in the Royals lineup of late. This includes providing the game-tying RBI in bottom of the ninth multiple times in recent days, with a two-run shot last Sunday against the Angels and most recently, a clutch RBI base knock on Saturday in Seattle.

And Jensen was just named the Royals Hitter of the Month for April, after posting team-leading totals with a six homers, 17 RBI, an .818 OPS and 123 wRC+.

Even the best young players can be hit-or-miss in any given season, so the fact the Royals appear to be hitting on both of theirs will only strengthen this lineup as players like Witt, Pasquantino and Perez continue to look more like themselves after slower starts.

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