{"id":2500523,"date":"2026-07-13T18:38:23","date_gmt":"2026-07-13T18:38:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2500523"},"modified":"2026-07-13T18:38:23","modified_gmt":"2026-07-13T18:38:23","slug":"kansas-city-royals-first-half-awards-bobby-witt-jr-michael-wacha-lead-the-way","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/kansas-city-royals-first-half-awards-bobby-witt-jr-michael-wacha-lead-the-way\/","title":{"rendered":"Kansas City Royals First-Half Awards: Bobby Witt Jr., Michael Wacha Lead the Way"},"content":{"rendered":"

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With the All-Star break here, let\u2019s take a look at the Kansas City Royals<\/a>\u2019 first half from a player\u2019s perspective. There aren\u2019t many positive things to say about the Royals, who currently have the worst record in MLB at 38-59.<\/p>\n

Most Valuable Player<\/b><\/p>\n

SS Bobby Witt Jr<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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This isn\u2019t a surprise whatsoever. In 360 at-bats, Witt has a .286 average with an .816 OPS and 30 stolen bases. He has 20 more stolen bases than the next-best player on the Royals, Tyler Tolbert<\/a>. Witt also has played the most games, with 91.<\/p>\n

Witt is hitting .330 against left-handed pitching, while 10 of his home runs have come against right-handed pitching. He continues to be Kansas City<\/a>\u2019s best and most consistent player.<\/p>\n

Cy Young<\/b><\/p>\n

SP Michael Wacha<\/a><\/p>\n

Wacha has posted a 3.77 ERA over 119 1\/3 innings, with a 96-34 strikeout-to-walk ratio. He hit somewhat of a snag in July, allowing four runs in six innings to the Phillies on July 4 and then giving up six earned runs in 4 2\/3 innings against the Mets<\/a> in his next start.<\/p>\n

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Wacha has 14 appearances of six or more innings in 19 starts. He and Seth Lugo<\/a> are both trade candidates at the deadline, with the Royals reportedly having massive asks for either pitcher.<\/p>\n

\n

Most Disappointing<\/b><\/p>\n

Closer Lucas Erceg<\/a><\/p>\n

Erceg leads MLB with six blown saves in 18 opportunities, though his last came on June 2.<\/p>\n

He has a 5.11 ERA in his third season with the Royals. His strikeout-to-walk ratio is also abysmal at 27-21. Erceg had a 2.64 ERA in 2025, making him the Royals\u2019 go-to closer for 2026, but it became very clear he wasn\u2019t the late-inning guy they thought they had.<\/p>\n

Erceg had another hiccup recently against the Baltimore Orioles<\/a> after hitting Blaze Alexander<\/a> on the hand, leading to a bench-clearing tussle at Camden Yards.<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

Most Surprising Player<\/b><\/p>\n

OF Jac Caglianone<\/a><\/p>\n

Caglianone played in 62 games in 2025 as a rookie, hitting seven home runs and posting a .157 average. This season, he is well outpacing his previous mark, with 15 home runs in 90 games and a .260 average.<\/p>\n

He will participate in the Home Run Derby on Monday night, as he has established himself as one of the more impactful power bats on the Royals\u2019 roster. Additionally, his left-versus-right splits don\u2019t expose him as a right-handed pitching specialist, as he\u2019s hitting .242 with five home runs against left-handers this season.<\/p>\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 sports.yahoo.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With the All-Star break here, let\u2019s take a look at the Kansas City Royals\u2019 first half from a player\u2019s perspective. There aren\u2019t many positive things to say about the Royals, who currently have the worst record in MLB at 38-59. Most Valuable Player SS Bobby Witt Jr. Advertisement This isn\u2019t a surprise whatsoever. In 360 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2500524,"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":[357719,491801,91466,279830,310650,311283,311237,244474,402966,345063,22091,326961],"class_list":["post-2500523","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-royalty","tag-baltimore-orioles","tag-blaze-alexander","tag-bobby-witt-jr","tag-jac-caglianone","tag-kansas-city","tag-lucas-erceg","tag-michael-wacha","tag-seth-lugo","tag-the-kansas-city-royals","tag-the-mets","tag-the-royals","tag-tyler-tolbert"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Kansas-City-Royals-First-Half-Awards-Bobby-Witt-Jr-Michael-Wacha.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2500523","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=2500523"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2500523\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2500525,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2500523\/revisions\/2500525"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2500524"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2500523"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2500523"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2500523"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}