Southpaws signing elsewhere puts Royals at risk of missing out on major relief need

The Kansas City Royals have made their priorities clear this winter; outfield reinforcements were at the top of their to-do list.

However, as MLB.com’s Anne Rogers reported last week during the Winter Meetings, another area GM J.J. Picollo and the Royals front office were seeking to improve was their left-handed relief corps, specifically looking for “a left-on-left arm that could fit in the back of their bullpen”.

However, while their outfield search may not be over they certainly have made enough additions to that area to think that it could be time to turn to some of these other more secondary matters, like a lefty reliever.

And even if it’s still on the back burner for them, they might need to move it to the forefront sooner rather than later, given the amount of suitable left-handed free agent options that have come off the board recently.

Royals can’t keep letting left-handed options slip away in free agency

The first good fit, and probably the biggest blow, to come off the board was Gregory Soto, after signing with the Pittsburgh Pirates. The former Tigers closer hadn’t necessarily found much success as closer beyond his days in Detroit, but developed himself into one of the more effective lefty-on-lefty specialists in the majors.

And since then, other southpaws like Hoby Milner, Caleb Thielbar, Caleb Ferguson and most recently Drew Pomeranz have all found homes elsewhere and, like Soto, all had favorable splits against left-handed hitters.

Now, none of these guys are be-all-end-all sort of lefties and this isn’t to say that the market is suddenly devoid of left-handed relief talent all of a sudden and the Royals brass should lose sleep over missing out on these guys.

However, it does show that that the market is definitely moving a fairly rapid pace when it comes to impact lefties. Suddenly names like Sean Newcomb and Danny Coulombe, again not ground breaking names, could find themselves with numerous suitors on their doorstep given they’re now likely the top names available.

The options are definitely there for Picollo and Co. to go out and get, so perhaps it’s time to shift focus, or at the very least multi-task, in addressing offseason priorities before the clock runs out – especially considering they’ve let multiple southpaws go already this winter.