Royals Could Turn To 'Far From MLB Ready' Prospect To Fix Outfield Problem
The Kansas City Royals have an alarmingly low potential for plate production coming from their outfield.
Could Kansas City call upon an unexpected prospect to provide some pop in 2025, even if he's not ready to make the jump to the Majors yet?
On Friday, FanSided’s Jacob Milham wrote about a young lefty bat that many Royals fans probably haven’t heard of.
“If the Royals want to realize their playoff aspirations in 2025, something will have to change in the outfield—and fast,” Milham wrote.
“Baseball America … revealed their list of prospects who impressed scouts most in spring training—largely playing away from many fans' eyes in either Arizona or Florida. The Royals had a lone representative on the list of 50, and it was surprisingly outfielder Spencer Nivens.”
“The Royals drafted Nivens … 142nd overall in the 2023 MLB Draft. … Nivens … handled business this spring, hitting a home run and scoring three runs in five plate appearances. The 23-year-old didn’t see much action in spring but will start the season with Double-A Northwest Arkansas after an expected promotion.”
“Nivens is far from MLB ready, due to lingering plate discipline and swing mechanics concerns from last season. He has the chance to assuage those concerns in Texas League action … Nivens could be part of the solution to the Royals' outfield woes.”
Nivens has a career .240 batting average, .340 on-base percentage, and .788 OPS in the minors (480 at-bats).
He’s still just 23 years old with plenty of time to develop. At some point, Royals management might be faced with the decision to either rush Nivens along in his growth or otherwise turn to the trade market for outfield reinforcements.
On the other hand, Maikel Garcia is off to a hot start to 2025 playing both in the outfield and infield for Kansas City.
Perhaps some of the Royals’ above concerns will be alleviated by a breakout Garcia season.
More MLB: Royals Slugger Predicted To Produce 'Significant Home Run Uptick' In 2025
-0663bdabe71d386728d098a436d30d0b.jpeg "Colin Keane")
Colin Keane is a contributing journalist for "Kansas City Royals On SI." Born in Illinois, Colin grew up in Massachusetts as the third of four brothers. For his high school education, Colin attended St. Mark's School (Southborough, MA), where he played basketball and soccer and served as student body president. He went on to receive a Bachelor of Arts in English Literature from Villanova University. Colin currently resides in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. For all business/marketing inquiries regarding "Kansas City Royals On SI," please reach out to Scott Neville: scott@wtfsports.org