Kansas City Royals future rotation is starting to take shape

The Kansas City Royals are giving plenty of innings to their young arms and getting a glimpse of a tantalizing future.

The Kansas City Royals might not be a playoff team in 2020 — even in a shortened season — but they’re making the most of the 60-game 2020 campaign by giving their young pitching prospects a chance to show what they can do.

Two years ago, the Kansas City Royals made it a point to select five straight college pitchers in that year’s draft. Pitching was declining in Kansas City and starting pitching, in particular, had never been an area of strength for the Royals, even during their World Series seasons in 2014 and 2015.

By taking college pitchers, the Royals made it known that they saw themselves contending sooner rather than later and that these pitchers were going to play a major role in helping them get back to relevancy.

The Royals aren’t loaded with cash like teams such as the Yankees, Dodgers, and Cubs are. Instead, they have to rely on their draft picks and farm system players panning out if they want to go anywhere during the course of the season.

The Royals have seen one future potential rotation option make his debut this season, now another one is getting his big league call-up

In just their second game of the season, the Kansas City Royals called up former 2018 first-round pick (18th overall) Brady Singer, who pitched for the Florida Gators during the College World Series in both 2017 and 2018 and was the ace of that staff.

There were a lot of high expectations for Singer when he got to Kansas City because fans were able to watch him pitch in the College World Series in 2018 and saw firsthand what he could do.

After moving up the minor league ladder in 2019, Singer’s stock rose by the day this offseason. There were discussions all offseason about how he could sneak into the rotation as the fifth starter and then, once both Jakob Junis and Brad Keller tested positive for COVID-19, Singer making the rotation was no longer a matter of if, but when.

Singer got the nod to start Game 2 for the Royals and had a brilliant debut. He threw five innings while only surrendering two runs and striking out seven. Singer only ran into issues in the third inning, which is when those two runs were scored, but he was calm throughout the chaos.

Royals fans got to see their potential future ace make his MLB debut last weekend, but now another future rotational piece is making his debut for the boys in blue — this time, it’s Kris Bubic, their 40th overall pick in the 2018 draft.

Bubic pitched at Stanford and despite being the fourth college pitcher taken by Kansas City two years ago, is the second out of that group to make it to the big leagues. Singer and Bubic both pitched in the Future’s Game in Cleveland last summer, so in theory, this shouldn’t have been a surprise, but it still is because it seems early in the season to have two from this group toe the slab.

Even if Bubic doesn’t have the debut that Singer did, it’s still a big moment in Kansas City because their future rotation is beginning to form.

Former 2018 first rounders Jackson Kowar and Daniel Lynch and 2020 first rounder Asa Lacy are the other three that Royals fans are hoping to see in the rotation and if that’s the group Kansas City eventually has, their starting pitching could be flat-out dominant for years to come.