{"id":2262482,"date":"2026-02-02T07:26:54","date_gmt":"2026-02-02T07:26:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2262482"},"modified":"2026-02-02T07:26:54","modified_gmt":"2026-02-02T07:26:54","slug":"rangers-sign-struggling-former-1st-round-pick-away-from-royals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/rangers-sign-struggling-former-1st-round-pick-away-from-royals\/","title":{"rendered":"Rangers Sign Struggling Former 1st-Round Pick Away From Royals"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Before there was Vinnie Pasquantino or Jac Caglianone, there was Nick Pratto.<\/p>\n

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The Kansas City Royals love themselves a lefty-hitting first baseman. Pasquantino has established himself as the starter after four strong seasons to start his career, and Caglianone, who has converted to a right fielder, is a natural first baseman who could move back there at any point.<\/p>\n

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But in 2017, the Royals used their first-round pick (No. 14 overall) on Pratto, the high-schooler out of Huntington Beach, Calif. who once hit a walk-off single to win the Little League World Series. Eight-and-a-half years later, the 27-year-old’s journey in a Kansas City uniform came to an end. <\/p>\n

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If you like our content,\u00a0<\/em>choose Sports Illustrated as a preferred source on Google<\/em><\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

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Aug 6, 2022; Kansas City, Missouri, USA; Kansas City Royals first baseman Nick Pratto (32) celebrates with teammates after hitting a walk-off home run against the Boston Red Sox during the ninth inning at Kauffman Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jay Biggerstaff-Imagn Images | Jay Biggerstaff-Imagn Images<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n

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According to a report from MassLive’s Chris Cotillo, Pratto plans to sign<\/a> a minor-league contract with the Texas Rangers that includes a non-roster invite to spring training in Arizona next month. His Royals tenure comes to an end with just 144 games played at the major league level, and none since 2023. <\/p>\n

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Pratto’s one shining moment in a Royals uniform, pictured above, was a walk-off home run against the Boston Red Sox in August of 2022. He hit just 14 home runs in total, putting up a .659 major league OPS and totaling negative-1.6 bWAR.<\/p>\n

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Pratto was out of options prior to last year and ended up being outrighted to Triple-A Omaha for the whole season. He didn’t have a strong year there, with a .620 OPS in 114 games, so even if he wasn’t blocked by Pasquantino, Caglianone, etc., a change of scenery always made sense.<\/p>\n

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It’s very difficult to catch on as a first baseman at the major league level unless you absolutely mash, and at times, the Royals thought Pratto might be athletic enough to handle a corner outfield spot. But in either scenario, Pratto’s pathway to the Rangers’ major league roster is almost as tricky to spot as it was in KC.<\/p>\n

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However, never discount the power of a change of scenery for baseball players as talented as fringe major leaguers.<\/p>\n

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More MLB: <\/strong><\/em>Another Royals Star Commits to Play in World Baseball Classic<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

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\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n

\u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.si.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Before there was Vinnie Pasquantino or Jac Caglianone, there was Nick Pratto. The Kansas City Royals love themselves a lefty-hitting first baseman. Pasquantino has established himself as the starter after four strong seasons to start his career, and Caglianone, who has converted to a right fielder, is a natural first baseman who could move back […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2262483,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2262482","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-royalty"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Rangers-Sign-Struggling-Former-1st-Round-Pick-Away-From-Royals.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2262482","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2262482"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2262482\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2262484,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2262482\/revisions\/2262484"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2262483"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2262482"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2262482"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2262482"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}