Royals News: Luinder Avila bullpen, City Connect announcement, Ryan Bergert injury

The Kansas City Royals have had their ups and downs to start the season, which their 5-7 record so far perfectly symbolizes.

While starting pitching has stolen the show when it comes to positive headlines, the bullpen’s struggles and the continued offensive inconsistencies have stolen the show in a negative sense and Carter Jensen and his oversleeping saga has stolen the bizarre Royals headlines, there several other storylines that Royals fans should be aware of.

From potential resolutions for the bullpen, to some brand new threads coming in the future, to some unfortunate injury news out of Omaha, here’s what fans should also be paying attention to as we inch closer to the middle of the first full month of the season.

Matt Quatraro outlined Luinder Avila’s role in the Royals’ pitching staff moving forward

Last weekend, the Royals called up Luinder Avila to start their series opener against the Milwaukee Brewers.

Following a strong showing to end 2025 and then a winter that was headlined by a solid spring training and excellent World Baseball Classic with Venezuela, many thought that Avila had earned a spot on the Royals Opening Day roster.

However, while it’s better late than never, a role as a starting pitcher wasn’t likely what Royals fans had in mind, given the struggles he’d had as a starter in Triple-A last season before trying his hand out of the ‘pen.

And his first outing out of the Royals rotation on Saturday didn’t go as planned, as he surrendered five earned runs off eight hits and three walks in just 3.0 innings of work.

However, as bad as that start was, Avila wasn’t sent down back down and remains part of the big league staff and Anne Rogers of MLB.com reports that manager Matt Quatraro has a role in mind for him moving forward.

“Luinder Avila is available out of the bullpen today and moving forward,” Rogers wrote on X on Wednesday.

“And it sounds like he’ll remain there instead of going back to Triple-A to start, for now, because of the need with KC right now,” she added.

And it didn’t take long for him to hop into game action out the ‘pen, as he was thrust into action after the Royals needed a bit of length following Cole Ragans’ exit in the first inning of Wednesday afternoon’s game.

Royals appear to tease new City Connect jersey drop this week

After an apparent leak at the end of March, it appears as though the Royals are finally set to formally announce their new City Connect uniforms this week.

In a somewhat ambiguous promotional video released by the team on Friday, the team dropped the date of April 9th with the caption: “As a city, as a team; We flow forward, We press onward”.

Now, with the Royals’ City Connect logo along with the Nike logo also appearing with the date at the end of the video, while not officially coming out point blank saying that this is the plan, many have been able to do the math at home, especially after the earlier leak and put two and two together.

This timeline makes sense as well, as the Royals will return to Kauffman Stadium on Thursday for a four-game weekend set against the Chicago White Sox, which would line them up for a Friday night home game which is when team’s wear their City Connect uniforms.

Royals pitching depth suffers another blow after Ryan Bergert leaves Triple-A start early

Finally we wrap with an unfortunate bit of injury news, this time down on the farm.

It wasn’t just Cole Ragans who was lifted from his start prematurely this week, as down in Omaha on Tuesday, Ryan Bergert was reportedly lifted from his Triple-A start after just 31 pitches, as per Iowa Cubs broadcaster Jason Kempf.

The extent of his injury remains unknown at this point, but it represents yet another major league capable arm facing injury uncertainty for Kansas City in the early going.

Bergert was one of several names seemingly in the running for the fifth and final rotation spot this spring before Noah Cameron eventually landed the role.

Whether or not he deserved to be sent to the minors out of camp, Bergert was crafting a solid season with Omaha, as in his first three starts he was throwing to a 2.79 ERA with 9.31 K/9.

If Ragans needs to miss any time with his left hand contusion, Bergert’s injury could be magnified that much more if he were to miss time as well. As alluded to earlier, the Royals have several 40-man arms already on the IL including fellow starter Stephen Kolek along with bullpen arms such as closer Carlos Estévez and long-man Bailey Falter.