The Kansas City Royals got nothing but praise after their 2018 MLB Draft where they took Brady Singer, Jackson Kowar, Daniel Lynch, Kris Bubic, Jonathan Bowlan, and Austin Cox. They loaded up on pitching and almost all of these arms were having success throughout the minors.
The Royals raced many of them up to the major leagues with Singer, Kowar, Lynch, and Bubic all making their debuts not too long after they were drafted. All four of them struggled to adjust to the major leagues as you might expect from young arms. In 2021, many felt it was an adjustment period, but all four outside of Brady Singer faced a lot of the same struggles in 2022 leading many to question the ability of the organization to develop pitchers. The Royals seemed to be known for not utilizing analytics and data to help improve the development of their arms.
As we approach 2023, the Kansas City Royals fired their pitching coach Cal Eldred and hired the Cleveland Guardians bullpen coach Brian Sweeney in his stead along with Minnesota Twins assistant pitching coordinator Zach Bove as Kansas’ new assistant pitching coach. Sweeney comes over from the Guardians where they are considered a “pitching factory”. Bove has developed an extremely strong reputation for using analytics to help pitchers improve, including the development of new pitches, and will assist Sweeney as a strategist in developing the Royals’ arms at the major league level.
The combination of these two pitching coaches could play dividends for the many young Royals arms. Two I want to focus on are Daniel Lynch and Jackson Kowar. Mainly because these two have been considered to have some of the best stuff out of all of the young arms. Both have struggled to find consistency at the major league level. It seemed like it would be a good time to dive into both and see where there might be likely room for improvement under the new pitching regime in Kansas City.
Daniel Lynch, LHP
Lynch has experienced the most success compared to the rest, although you could argue at times that has been Kris Bubic. He features a four-pitch mix that includes a fastball, slider, change-up, and curveball. With this four-pitch mix, a new pitch being added to his arsenal isn’t what will help Lynch get to that next level. He is going to have to find ways to miss bats with his fastball and get more consistency with his change-up. In the last two seasons, he has relied heavily on his fastball and slider while mixing in his change-up. He rarely will go to his curveball. According to baseball savant, he threw his fastball 43% of the time and slider 30% of the time.
What stuck out to me the most is Lynch is in the first percentile in HardHit% and his fastball was hit hard 52.2% of the time. 43.2% might not seem like he was throwing his fastball a ton, but with the way it was getting hit and the inability to induce whiffs, it might be time for Lynch to cut his fastball usage down. His average fastball velocity was around 94mph which is right in the median, but he was constantly catching too many barrels.
Increasing his slider usage seems like an area that would be a good start for Lynch. His slider has some nice late bite to it and it’s above league average in terms of its velocity. Increasing the use of his change-up might also help as it is a pitch that has good tumble and fade to it. It is a borderline plus pitch as he lacks consistency with his command of it and doesn’t always seem confident in throwing the pitch. Developing these two pitches will help him put hitters away. Lynch featured above average SwSt+ according to Alex Fast, but below-average K% which seemed to showcase his struggles in putting away hitters.
The lack of his quality fastball is really going to have Lynch needing to lean on his slider more and have consistency with that pitch as a put away pitch. That is how he will find success. Developing more command of his change-up and getting that pitch to a plus pitch that creates more deception on his average fastball.
Jackson Kowar, RHP
Jackson Kowar has always been a curious case to me. The guy has an electric fastball and Bugs Bunny 70-grade change-up. The stuff he has is probably the best out of the Royals young arms. But Kowar has struggled the most, posting an 11.27 ERA in 2021 and 9.77 ERA in 2022. They are small sample sizes in both years, but nonetheless, the struggles with command and the long ball were evident. Even though he has struggled in the majors, at times, he has absolutely dominated the minor leagues which gives you some hope for his development, especially given that he is only 26 years old.
Kowar features a three-pitch mix that includes a fastball, change-up, and slider. He relies heavily on his fastball throwing it 46% of the time in 2022 followed by his change-up which he threw 42% of the time. A lot of his struggles with his fastball are related to his mechanics. He lacks consistency with them. This has led to struggles with the command which has contributed to the home runs and walks. Looking at his heatmap on Baseball Savant, Kowar left a lot of his fastballs middle-middle. Hitters were slugging a whopping .893 against his fastball. Kowar needs to refine his command so his fastball can play up more and really focus on using his changeup.
Kowar’s fastball velocity is insanely good and ranks in the 83rd percentile and 55th percentile in terms of spin. Although his velocity is great, like Lynch, he could benefit from using his fastball less and increasing the usage of his changeup. When he uses his change-up early and often, Kowar finds his way to success. As Royals Weekly pointed out, in the one game he was spot on he had a change-up usage at 52% which is Devin Williams territory. This is what you want to see out of Kowar.
Even an ounce of improvement in his fastball command could lead to Kowar becoming an elite late-inning reliever. In terms of his slider, it is still developing. He has shown vast improvements in the pitch, but you can tell he still lacks confidence in the pitch. If the new pitching regime can turn this into an above-average pitch, Kowar could get closer to his ceiling of a mid-rotation type starter. Here is to hoping we see Kowar live and breathe his changeup in 2023.
Conclusion
There is still hope for many of the former Royals pitching prospects in guys like Daniel Lynch and Jackson Kowar. We saw Brady Singer take significant strides and with the new pitching regime, the hope is that both Lynch and Kowar can take significant strides in their development by changing up their pitch mix, diving deep into data and analytics, and finding ways to keep hitters off their fastball. For both Lynch and Kowar, the hope is to make their secondary pitches more primary to help their fastballs become more efficient and effective.
We have seen new pitching coaches come in and quickly change the dynamics and talent of a pitching staff for the better. We have seen arms like Andrew Heaney and Tyler Anderson go to organizations that are known for developing pitchers and completely revitalize their careers. Outside of Lynch and Kower, Kris Bubic, Angel Zerpa, Jon Heasley, and many others could really benefit from this new change in Kansas City. There is hope that Brian Sweeney and Zach Bove can do that in Kansas City with the plenty of talented arms in the Royals system that has yet to maximize their potential.