Royals’ trade deadline acquisition silencing critics with promising second impression

When the Royals opened their trade season by re-acquiring Adam Frazier from the Pittsburgh Pirates last month, there were certainly reasons to question why this reunion was prioritized.

Frazier was coming off 2024 season with Kansas City that was underwhelming to say the least, as he slashed just .202/.282/.294 with four homers, 22 RBI and a career-low 64 wRC+.

Then, after signing with the Pirates in free agency this winter, he didn’t do convince the doubters that he’d suddenly become a more adequate hitter. His stats may have been better than they were the year prior, but he was still just a .654 OPS and 82 wRC+ hitter. Certainly nothing to write home about.

However, you’d never guess that Frazier had been a below average hitter since the first half of the 2021 season with how strong he’s looked since returning to the Royals.

Adam Frazier is silencing the critics with a strong second impression with Royals

When the Royals acquired Frazier, the second-half of the season had yet to begin and they were coming off a pretty shambolic first-half as an offense. They sat in the bottom five in baseball in team wRC+ (27th at 83), OPS (26that .674), runs scored (29th at 328) and home runs (29th at 73).

With how he’d performed in Pittsburgh to start the 2025 campaign, it wasn’t egregious to think that Frazier wasn’t going to be a key part of this lineup on a regular basis.

But that’s precisely what the veteran utility man has gone on to be in this revamped Royals lineup, as he’s become quite the unexpected catalyst.

In 86 plate appearances across 24 games, the veteran utility man is slashing .316/.349/.456 with two homers, 13 RBI, a 12.8% K-rate and a 119 wRC+.

And since his arrival, the Royals have looked night and day on offense. As a team, they rank amongst the Top 10 in baseball in wRC+ (8th at 110), OPS (6th at .773), runs scored (8th at 147) and home runs (6th at 43) post All-Star break.

He may have been brought back into the fold to be a strong veteran presence in the locker room, but Frazier has quickly become a part of their regular lineup that Royals simply can’t live without at the moment.