{"id":2270965,"date":"2026-02-07T04:37:49","date_gmt":"2026-02-07T04:37:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2270965"},"modified":"2026-02-07T04:37:49","modified_gmt":"2026-02-07T04:37:49","slug":"kauffman-stadium-fence-change-aims-to-optimize-royals-roster","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/kauffman-stadium-fence-change-aims-to-optimize-royals-roster\/","title":{"rendered":"Kauffman Stadium fence change aims to optimize Royals roster"},"content":{"rendered":"

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When Royals general manager J.J. Picollo and the club\u2019s research and development staff over the offseason approached owner John Sherman about compressing the cavernous confines of Kauffman Stadium, Sherman initially was uncertain what to think. Perhaps he was even skeptical.<\/p>\n

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Even after being persuaded and granting the go-ahead, he has found himself wondering how recent winter weather is affecting the process on what he referred to as The K\u2019s \u201cfrozen tundra.\u201d<\/p>\n

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And the other day at Royals Rally at The K, the team\u2019s annual spring-training kickoff event, he was momentarily jarred by the radical appearance of the change \u2014 largely, reeling in the arc of the outfield wall perimeter by 8-10 feet<\/a> while still flowing out to the remaining 410-foot anchor of center field.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI guess I was looking at the wrong line; I looked at those posts that are really the warning track \u2026\u201d Sherman said, smiling and joking that ace pitcher Cole Ragans was distressed by the sight.<\/p>\n

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More seriously, Sherman said he\u2019d spoken with a number of Royals pitchers about the shift and found them \u201cpretty comfortable\u201d with the concept.<\/p>\n

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The Royals have compelling data. That includes but isn\u2019t limited to how the cozier confines should enhance star Bobby Witt Jr\u2019s production<\/a> \u2014 he was one of the players who was \u201cprobably most negatively impacted,\u201d Piccolo said last month \u2014 and leave (relatively) unmussed pitching that in 2025 induced MLB\u2019s best soft-contact rate:<\/a><\/p>\n

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\u201cThe analysis,\u201d Sherman said, \u201cis that we\u2019ll benefit.\u201d<\/p>\n

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How it plays out and to what degree that proves true will be a fascinating variable in 2026 as the Royals seek to return to the postseason after falling short in 2025 in the wake of 2024\u2019s rousing turnaround.<\/p>\n

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Because barring a blockbuster acquisition between now and their home opener on March 30 (after the Royals launch the season in Atlanta on March 27), this dimensional reset looms as the most substantial change the club has made in an offseason marked more by spackle than any obviously profound roster addition.<\/p>\n

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This move, years in consideration and understood to be for the duration of the Royals\u2019 projected time at The K, wasn\u2019t intended to be a substitute for adding an imposing bat.<\/p>\n

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It\u2019s meant to optimize the intriguing current roster.<\/p>\n

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One that\u2019s highlighted at the plate by budding MVP candidate Witt, Sal Perez, Maikel Garcia, Vinnie Pasquantino and the intriguing potential of Jac Caglianone and Carter Jensen.<\/p>\n

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And one that figures to have a night-in, night-out chance with stellar starting pitchers, including Ragans, Seth Lugo, Michael Wacha and Noah Cameron, and an exceptional back end of the bullpen fastened down with Carlos Estevez and Lucas Erceg.<\/p>\n

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While Pasquantino perceives a vast number of ways to try to process what this means,<\/a> he is exhilarated by the concept in terms of individual production \u2014 \u201cyou kidding me?!\u201d \u2014 and appreciates the move in the context of the Royals\u2019 history \u2026 and future.<\/p>\n

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The bottom-line rationale, as he sees it:<\/p>\n

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\u201cMost people that follow baseball would agree the Royals have always built their teams in specific ways, which was to fit the ballpark,\u201d he said at Royals Rally. \u201cThe Royals have not traditionally won a ton of games.\u201d<\/p>\n

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As they take aim at resetting a modern tradition that has led to only three postseason berths since 1985, the Royals believe this boosts them in multiple ways. It enables them to maximize what they\u2019ve built, be more flexible in future roster construction (particularly in the outfield) and benefit from a park that will play more neutral and fair over the course of 81 home games.<\/p>\n

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It should also alleviate at least some of those routinely exasperating moments over the years.<\/p>\n

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At a news conference last month to announce the change, the first instance that came to mind for Picollo was Eric Hosmer\u2019s left-center shot in the 2014 American League Wild-Card game. But at least that became a triple when Oakland\u2019s outfielders collided.<\/p>\n

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Too often, it\u2019s been something like what then-new Royal Jonathan India experienced to lead off the 2025 opener.<\/p>\n

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He crunched the ball 368 feet \u2026 only to have it caught by Cleveland outfielder Steven Kwan.<\/p>\n

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That shot would have been out in 11 other stadiums, a routine matter to look up when watching games at Kauffman. Now that hit would be over the fence \u2014 just one of who-knows-how-many moments Picollo described thusly:<\/p>\n

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Seeing and hearing a ball and thinking it\u2019s definitely gone … \u201cAnd it\u2019s not,\u201d he said. \u201cNot only is it not gone, it\u2019s an out.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Given that both teams play in the same circumstances, how much of a positive difference this would have made had it been done sooner in the recent past isn\u2019t entirely clear.<\/p>\n

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No point obsessing on it, anyway. Perez joked that he didn\u2019t like thinking about how many more home runs he might have (303 as it is) because \u201cI don\u2019t want to get mad.\u201d<\/p>\n

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But led by the formidable mind of Daniel Mack<\/a>, the Royas\u2019 assistant general manager for research and development, KC certainly has the metrics to support going forward with this.<\/p>\n

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Or as manager Matt Quatraro put it: \u201cIt wasn\u2019t like, \u2018Oh, let\u2019s just give this a shot.\u2019 \u201d<\/p>\n

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Instead, Quatraro sees it like this: \u201cWe believe that it will be more beneficial to the hitters than punitive to the pitchers, and overall more beneficial to us as a team.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Naturally, starter Seth Lugo smiled and said he\u2019d prefer to play on the biggest field possible. But in his decade in the big leagues, he\u2019s also seen this before and has learned to shrug it off. And that\u2019s perhaps more easily reconciled since metrics shared by the Royals revealed scant difference in how things might have gone in the 310 innings he\u2019s pitched for them the last two seasons.<\/p>\n

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\u201cIt\u2019s already part of my game plan not to let hitters get the ball to the gaps,\u201d he said. \u201cSo if I can eliminate that, it shouldn\u2019t be an issue to think about.\u201d<\/p>\n

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As for the inevitable moments when this works against the Royals?<\/p>\n

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Maybe Lugo put that best.<\/p>\n

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\u201cAs you get older, you\u2019re just kind of wasting your time and thought process thinking about the \u2018what ifs\u2019 or \u2018what should have (been),\u2019\u201d he said. \u201cYou move past that pretty quick. I\u2019m sure it\u2019s going to happen, but hopefully (it won\u2019t be) something I\u2019m going to dwell on.\u201d<\/p>\n

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It bears mention that this isn\u2019t the first time the Royals have made such a move. Before the 1995 season, they moved the fences in 10 feet and went from artificial turf to grass.<\/p>\n

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At the time, The Star wrote that doing so \u201cwill probably mean more, in the long run, than who owns the club or who is managing it or whom the players might be.\u201d<\/p>\n

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It didn\u2019t turn out that way.<\/p>\n

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Albeit coinciding with the steroids era and suspicions baseballs were juiced, a more accommodating home environment allowed the Royals to score the most runs in franchise history (879) in 2000. They enjoyed three of their four most prolific seasons ever before they moved the fences back for the 2004 season.<\/p>\n

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Trouble was, the Royals were outscored in each of those seasons and managed only one winning record in the nine-year span before the fences were moved pushed out again. Then the return transition started with three straight 100-plus-loss seasons for a franchise encumbered by an aging and less nimble lineup and an outfield \u201cwith more gaps than every mall in North America,\u201d as The Star\u2019s Joe Posnanski put it at the time.<\/p>\n

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This time around, the scheme is far more steeped in data and appears much more promising.<\/p>\n

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So this isn\u2019t an identity crisis but a logical evolution, one that doesn\u2019t abandon what the Royals have long stressed but seeks to fortify it.<\/p>\n

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And while Kauffman will retain top 10 status in outfield dimensions, the sight of it won\u2019t be as extreme as Sherman thought at a glance the other day.<\/p>\n

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At least as the Royals get ready to report to spring training next week, though, the contrast still stands as their most pivotal move since last season.<\/p>\n

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Add a big bat or not, how much it proves to benefit them will be one of the prevailing storylines this season, for the rest of their time at The K and with potentially enduring implications in their next home.<\/p>\n

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Related Stories from Kansas City Star<\/h5>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\n <\/a>\n <\/div>\n
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Vahe Gregorian<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The Kansas City Star<\/span><\/p>\n

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Vahe Gregorian has been a sports columnist for The Kansas City Star since 2013 after 25 years at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. He has covered a wide spectrum of sports, including 10 Olympics. Vahe was an English major at the University of Pennsylvania and earned his master\u2019s degree at Mizzou. <\/span>\n <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\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.kansascity.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When Royals general manager J.J. Picollo and the club\u2019s research and development staff over the offseason approached owner John Sherman about compressing the cavernous confines of Kauffman Stadium, Sherman initially was uncertain what to think. Perhaps he was even skeptical. Even after being persuaded and granting the go-ahead, he has found himself wondering how recent […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2063884,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[91466,432552,43627,311235,439633],"class_list":["post-2270965","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-royalty","tag-bobby-witt-jr","tag-dimensions","tag-kansas-city-royals","tag-kauffman-stadium","tag-royals-fence-move"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/Kansas-City-Royals-can-expect-brighter-future-despite-2025.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2270965","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=2270965"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2270965\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2270966,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2270965\/revisions\/2270966"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2063884"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2270965"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2270965"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2270965"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}