Royals Sign Bobby Dalbec To Minor League Deal

The Royals announced, via their official player development account, that they have signed infielder/outfielder Bobby Dalbec to a minor league contract. He opted out of a minor league deal with the Brewers last week. He will presumably join Triple-A Omaha in the coming days.

The book on Dalbec is well known around baseball at this point. He has big home run power but also strikes out a ton. He has 1,065 major league plate appearances in his career with 47 homers but a 36.6% strikeout rate. That’s led to a .222/.290/.422 batting line and 90 wRC+.

This is his third minor league deal of the year. The previous two came with the White Sox and Brewers. The Sox called him up for about two weeks in late April/early May. He struck out in 6 of his 21 plate appearances before getting designated for assignment. He cleared waivers and elected free agency before signing with the Brewers.

His numbers in the minors have been great, with a .276/.356/.531 line and 131 wRC+ this year. He has 16 home runs in 312 plate appearances but also a 33.7% strikeout rate. Triple-A success is nothing new for him, however. Dating back to the start of 2021, he has a .264/.357/.525 line and 123 wRC+ in 1,268 Triple-A plate appearances, despite a 34.4% strikeout rate.

Defensively, Dalbec has mostly been playing the corner spots this year, though he also has some middle infield experience. The Royals are presumably most interested in him as a depth outfielder, as they already have Maikel Garcia and Vinnie Pasquantino at the infield corners. The offense from their outfield has been notoriously weak for a long time, though they bolstered the group ahead of the deadline by adding Randal Grichuk and Mike Yastrzemski.

Photo courtesy of Jesse Johnson, Imagn Images