Royals predicted to sign $5.5 million All-Star to become depth option behind Jac Caglianone originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
The Kansas City Royals were looking for another outfielder all offseason, but were unable to get one to take over a starting job. Now, they should shift from focusing on starters, and looking for depth options if they want another outfielder.
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FanSided’s Christopher Kline predicts that the Royals could find another outfielder in veteran All-Star Jesse Winker, who was a decent backup for the New York Mets last season.
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“He may be more of a DH than an outfielder at this point, but if the Royals — a team still in search of consistent outfield production — stick him in right field every now and again, there could be worse outcomes.Winker is basically a spark-plug emergency bat at this stage. He won’t cover much ground on defense and he’s not an everyday thumper in the heart of a lineup. As Kansas City searches for more juice behind Maikel García and Bobby Witt Jr., however, sprinkling in Winker as a fourth or fifth outfielder is a worthwhile adventure,” Kline wrote.
This past season, Winker slashed .229/.309/.400/.709 with five doubles, two triples, a home run and 10 RBI in 26 games. While it’s definitely a small sample size, if he were to do that for the Royals as a backup, it would definitely be worth it.
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He’d also be cheap. Winker’s projected to receive a one-year, $5.5 million deal, and for a mid-market team like Kansas City, that’s a contract they definitely give out.
The Royals are 4-4 in the AL Central, so if they want to see if Winker can be the guy to shake things up for them, they better get to working on a deal, and quickly.
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‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source sports.yahoo.com ’
