Cole Ragans will start on Opening Day

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Cole Reagan's was named the opening day starter for the Kansas City Royals.

Do we believe it was the right pick and was it an easy choice?

We'll tell you in this edition of Lockdown Royals.

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It is a full, I guess, look ahead now to the regular season for the Kansas City Royals.

The World Baseball Classic is wrapped up.

Spring training is pretty much wrapped up at this point, and over the next week, we'll

just be gearing up for Friday night when the Royals take on the Atlanta Braves.

And we now know that Cole Reagan's is the opening day starter.

This will be the third consecutive year that he is the opening day starter for the Royals.

Nick Kapel, who does a great job for Royals PR.

He put out a tweet of the guys who have made multiple opening day starts for the Royals

and Reagan's is slowly climbing his way up the list there.

He's coming off a year, as we all know, that was not up to his standard.

He wasn't as durable.

He dealt with two separate injuries with the growing strain, also had the rotator cuff

strain.

And he was fortunately able to come back in September and finish out the year with some

authority there.

And that was important for him when I spoke to him down in spring training.

He really wanted to work back whether the Royals were going to be in playoff contention

or not.

He did not want it to end with that night in St. Louis, where he was just working back

from the growing injury.

And the Velo is down.

He was getting hit hard and his ERA was going to be north to five, though I don't think

many of us would have thought that differently.

If Cole Reagan didn't finish out the year strong in September, but maybe it gives you

a little boost going into the year, knowing that once he was fully healthy, that version

of Cole Reagan still exists.

Because I know that with the comments we have when discussing Cole Reagan's, it's not

as pro Cole Reagan's, as you would think.

There definitely are some people out there that say he was a one hit wonder.

He's not as durable.

There are better options to be the ace for this rotation.

I push back on it because I've said this before and I'm just going to say it again.

He's the only one of the five, and even with the depth options, that has pure ace stuff

when he's on.

And I'm talking 98 to 99 with the fastball from the left side, a devastating changeup,

devastating curveball, a slider that can make left-handed hitters look really foolish,

a cutter when placed correctly can induce a lot of soft contact.

That's ace-like stuff.

Seth Lugo doesn't have it, Michael Walker doesn't have it.

Just Boobitch, when he's healthy, has the best chance to do.

So when I get it to, we've had some people go, well, Jack, you're saying all these things

about if this guy is healthy, if he can do this, he's got a high ceiling.

And I get that I can do it a little bit too much, but that's also what we do in baseball.

So what we do in sports, if I'm being quite honest with you, there are guys that even

if they're not durable, we can all acknowledge the ceiling.

We've seen the ceiling of Seth Lugo.

We've seen the ceiling of Michael Walker.

And it comes to someone like Noah Cameron, that's up to your opinion of him.

Do you see him being a frontline starter?

Do you see him being a number three or number four guy?

Or do you see him being moved to the bullpen at some point this year?

We'll talk about Ryan Berger in the second segment, and probably Steven Colick and Bailey

Falter and Louinda Ovala.

But those are guys that are probably going to be penciled in as bullpen options in Kansas

City for the first half of the year.

I've also gone on record of saying that my hot take would be by the end of the season,

Ryan Berger has one of those jobs in the rotation.

Does that mean Lugo, Walker, or Noah Cameron is out?

Those would be my picks, but I also can't be naive and not acknowledge the injury history

of Cole Reagan's and Chris Babich.

But back to the point about Reagan's being the opening day starter.

This was not a difficult decision.

As long as he got through spring training, and there's still a couple of games to go,

as long as he got there healthy, he was going to be the guy.

There was no competition whatsoever for the opening day job other than Cole Reagan's.

It was Cole Reagan's and how he felt health wise.

That's really what the competition was going to be.

The royals have had a very good idea what the rotation was going to look like for a long

time.

I know there were people that thought Ryan Berger, Steven Colick, could give maybe Noah

Cameron a run for his money.

There were four guys in the rotation that had a spot locked down.

I was never concerned about Chris Babich, not having one.

You're paying Michael Wock and Seth Lugo a lot of money to be in this rotation.

Noah Cameron coming off the year he did, it would be foolish of the royals to just say,

well, he's had a bad spring training.

He had to earn a job back to the bullpen he goes.

It was more so of the case for Ryan Berger, and even though Berger pitched pretty well,

and we'll highlight this more in the second segment, they have pictures with options

and they're going to maximize that.

That also might mean some guys getting onto the roster, the opening day roster that they

just didn't want to DFA coming out of spring training.

They want to at least give them one more opportunity to begin the regular season.

From a big picture standpoint, Cole Reagan is the guy that drives this rotation.

We can spend pretty much no time on discussing how Noah Cameron has to pitch, how

Lugo, Wocker, Babich, anybody else that log to start for the royals.

We don't need to spend any time in this segment talking about what they need to do.

Well, you need to have a high floor from me.

I don't need to do any of that.

This all falls on the shoulders of your number one, and this goes for every team in baseball.

Look at who every team's opening day starter is.

If you were to ask each and every general manager what they need out of that guy, it's for

them to be the workhorse, the ace.

If they're not that guy, whether it's numbers or it's durability, you're not going to

reach your ultimate goal.

I mean, can the royals make it to the postseason without Cole Reagan's?

Maybe.

Maybe.

If someone like Ryan Berger, Steven Cole, Glwinder Avala really burst onto the scene and

the way that he was able to in 2023, but I'm not holding my breath for that.

If they make the postseason without him, he doesn't have good enough numbers.

That's one thing here.

I don't believe they can make a deep run in the postseason without Cole Reagan's.

They might be able to get there, get a wild card spot.

To me, he's the difference maker because there's going to be moments of this season where

it's the Sunday getaway game or you're trying to sweep a really good team late in the season

and you want to hand a ball to the guy that the other side says, great.

Now we're going to be lucky to get two runs.

Because there anybody in the rotation last year after Reagan's and Babuch got hurt where

you thought, yep, we can go get seven endings of one run ball from this guy.

Noah Cameron had his moments and I'm a big Noah Cameron guy, but I'm not sure I ever

viewed him as that ace to go grab the ball and say, I can stop the bleeding or I can

carry the momentum.

Reagan's did that in 2024, which is why they were so great at avoiding the sweep until

I want to say late June.

If I can recall correctly, the 2024 royals were not swept until they went to Texas in

late June in 2024 and got swept because they would have so many moments in the first

couple of months where they would be down 02 in the series.

They give the ball to Reagan's and he shoved or they needed him to win a rubber match and

they weren't great at that in 2024, but there were a couple of times.

You just felt better about a series.

How different we view three game series when you know your ace is throwing in one of them.

And if Cole Reagan's comes out of the gates hot Friday night in Atlanta against Chris

Sale, I don't know why for a while.

I thought it was going to be Spencer Strider.

That was dumb on my part.

It's going to be Chris sale likely.

It'll be Reagan's versus sale.

I expect it to be a really good pitcher's duel.

I don't know what the weather looks like just yet.

I'm sure it's out there for Atlanta.

But to me, that can be a tone setter.

It's game one of 162.

So even if he throws a perfect game, it doesn't mean he's going to be a side young winner

at the end of the year.

You can set the tone though.

You go out there and you're hurling 97 to 99.

You strike out eight or nine guys.

It sets the tone for what your season might be.

It lets people dream a little bit.

You go out there and you're grinding through four and a third.

You've walked four or five guys.

It's not the end of the world.

But that's kind of the way it felt last year on opening day against Cleveland.

He grabbed the ball.

He still had somewhat of a strikeout numbers.

But man, it was a grind to get through those five innings.

And the Royals had a lead when he left the game.

They didn't win that game though.

And the post game, their people were questioning how healthy is he.

He didn't look like he had the best command.

He was fighting his mechanics and he echoed that.

And it was a tone setter for the rest of the year.

He'd have a start or two where he looked or appeared to be vintage Cole Reagan's.

Then he would have a really rough start.

The Royals cannot reach their ultimate goal if the 2024 Cole Reagan's can come back.

I know some of you think there's no chance that's going to happen.

And he can't be the ace because he can't work deep into games and he's not healthy enough.

Look.

We're more than able to sound off in the comments.

What do you think about Cole Reagan's being the opening day starter?

My opinion, I don't believe it was a hard decision whatsoever.

I think he was the opening day starter.

The minute he showed up to camp and he's going to be that guy moving forward.

He's going to be the guy every single year.

It's just he's grabbing the ball and game one of 162.

If you think it's somebody else, let us know in the YouTube comments below.

If you support the decision, also sound off in the comments below.

We'll take our first break at the show when we come back.

The Royals did make some roster moves last night.

Do we feel that they made the right moves?

We'll tell you next on Walk Down Royals.

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Last night, the royals made a couple of roster moves.

They optioned Ryan Berger to triple A. They optioned Mason Black to triple A. Same goes

for Cameron Meisner and John Rave.

So now the roster is at 50 in spring training.

That's going to dwindle a lot over the next couple of days and it really zeroes in on who

the royals are counting on getting the final bench spot and who the royals are counting

on to get the final bullpen spot.

I have had a complete change of heart over the last 24 hours in what their goal might be

for the bullpen.

When it comes to the bench, I'm not really sure because it's up in the air.

Michael Massey is trying to work back from his injury right now in camp.

It's not a severe injury.

It's just something that's lingering a little bit.

And with Michael Massey dealing with stuff like that over the last couple of spring trainings,

you want to play it slow.

But if he's not ready to go on opening day, now you've got two spots open on the bench.

Will that go to Nick Lofton?

Will that go to Tyler Tolbert?

Will Josh Rojas be involved there, Kevin Newman?

That I'm just not sure about if Michael Massey, of course, is on the aisle to begin the year.

We did have an episode.

I believe it was on Monday.

I said, I've changed my opinion on Rojas for often.

I don't have any concern about Lofton making the roster.

To me, it's about the bench as a whole.

If Massey's there, then yeah, I stick with what I said on Monday.

If Michael Massey's not, now it gets a little bit more complicated.

Is that Tolbert? Is that Rojas, Newman, Jury?

There's plenty of options there they could go with for another spot on the bench.

When it comes to the bullpen, this is what I've had at a 180 on.

I thought about a week ago, Bailey Falter had no chance of making the roster.

The numbers weren't good.

DeVilo wasn't good.

He didn't have to light it up in spring training.

But I needed to see a reason to keep him on the 26-man roster, other than he's out of options.

That is playing a factor here, though.

With Ryan Berger going to AAA, and Andy Rogers reported this the other day, that Michael

Treo said, he pitched really well in camp.

We know he's going to be a part of this team in 2026, but he's got options.

That's something that we heard in spring training when we were down in surprise a month

ago now, that players with minor league options are important for roster construction.

We can't just put everybody that played well in spring training on the 26-man.

A lot of it does come down to minor league options.

Fans aren't going to be happy with what I'm about to say, but I'm now starting to lean

that way in pretty heavily.

I'm 75% confident this is going to be the route for the Royals based on what Andy reported

the other day and based on the digging I've done on minor league options for all the options

the Royals have.

Ryan Berger is going to start in AAA because he has minor league options.

Alex Lange can compete for this final spot.

I think he's had his moments in camp.

What does he have?

One minor league option.

Okay.

You don't have to put him on the 26-man roster and you can still have him in Omaha.

You can stash him in that bullpen.

The Winder Ovala.

I would love to see him in the bullpen.

If it were me, he's my pick to be in the bullpen, but it's not me making the pick.

Right?

I got to go with the logic here and not my heart.

And my heart would say after what I saw on the WBC from Ovala, I want that in the bull

pit.

Unfortunately, but also fortunately for the Royals and the roster construction, he's got

minor league options.

He's got plenty of them too.

So I could see them saying once you get back to camp, maybe we throw you out there for

a game or two.

I have my doubts about that though.

I could see them just sending him to Omaha, optioning him there.

Another guy that is competing for a spot, Daniel Lynch, he's got minor league options.

I don't see him starting the year in AAA.

I see him being in this bullpen.

He was on my opening day roster projection.

That hasn't changed.

It brings me to Bailey Falter.

And he did look good the other night.

He pitched out of the bullpen.

He was supposed to start actually.

Then he goes to the bullpen, throws three perfect innings and strikes out five.

It's against a bunch of minor leagueers for the Dodgers.

He doesn't mean much to me.

I'm sure that was good to see from the Royals standpoint of last minute, you move into

the bullpen, you want him in long relief, maybe you want him in short stints, and he also

another great story on Bailey Falter kind of making that switch and going from a starter

to the bullpen, but him being out of options.

That puts the Royals in a situation where I'm not sure they want to defa him or trade

him when they've gotten about 10 innings out of them.

They've also contemplated the six man rotation.

He's got starting experience.

It wasn't good last year.

I can add some trust though in the Royals pitching department that if they think there's

still something left in the tank for Bailey Falter, it doesn't hurt them to put him in

the bullpen as the long relief guy.

Because if he doesn't pitch well, if he is terrible in April, you can then make the decision

to defa him.

You say, we tried it.

And now you can turn to Ryan Berger, Lewandar Avala, or Alex Len.

Those three having options, that's what it's going to come down to.

Now I could be way off.

I could be speaking way too soon, and they're just trying to showcase Bailey Falter in

these final couple of games, and they're going to trade him for some outfield death.

That could be a situation here.

What if they trade Bailey Falter to go get somebody that could replace Massey on the

opening day roster if he's hurt?

There's still some time left.

There's nine days to go before opening day.

So I'm not going to say it's locked in 100%, which is why I said, Bailey Falter's

got about a 75% chance of baking the roster, where I was at 15 about seven days ago.

But the royals do want to, I guess, see what they have left.

And a guy like Bailey Falter.

And truth be told, he didn't get much of an opportunity to show what he was worth.

He wasn't good last year when they acquired him, but you go inside the mind of a general

manager.

And whether it's right or wrong, if you give up pieces to acquire somebody, and then

the next year in spring training, you know, he's got club control, but he's out of options

and you DFA.

After you got 10 endings out of them, it doesn't look very good to give up on somebody

that quickly.

He might not be good whatsoever.

There's also the chance that he provides the royals some good, long relief.

But it is a spot in April where it's not a high value position in the bullpen.

You put Luinda Ovala or Ryan Berger, and I know I said I would have liked to see Berger

in that spot when it's April and you've got rainouts that are going to happen.

You've got off days that happen.

Are you really going to need the long relief role many times in the first month of the

season?

Probably not.

I would be surprised to see them carry three lefties, but that's kind of how things

are shaking out now where they'd have strong linch and Bailey Falter.

If you were to ask me my choice today, it wouldn't be my pick, but I can see the royals

going with Bailey Falter because he's out of options and the other three that are battling

it out for that final spot in the bullpen.

They are a little bit more expendable when it comes to options, not expendable as players.

They are very valuable players for the 2026 operation, but when you have a roster conundrum,

you've got a decision you got to make.

Most managers, most front office members would say, okay, who's got options, who doesn't?

Maybe they just want to see if Falter has found something, been working on some stuff

in the off season.

If it doesn't work out, you can cut bait in April, and one of these other guys can come

up and join the bullpen rather quickly.

Do you see Bailey Falter making the bullpen now, or do you still see a guy like Luinda

Ovala, Alex Lang, or somebody else cracking the opening day roster out of the bullpen?

You can let us know in the YouTube comments below.

When we come back, we will quickly recap the WBC final team, Venezuela, Michael Garcia,

or Michael Garcia, Salvador Perez, and Luinda Ovala, our champions and team USA fall short

for the second consecutive time in the tournament.

We'll dive to that next, on Lockdown Royals.

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We are wrapping up this Wednesday edition of Lockdown Royals and a Lockdown podcast.

Network, I'm your host, Jack Johnson.

Last night, we got the World Baseball Classic final, and boy, what a rough showing for

Team USA for 7 and 2 thirds of the game, or at least offensively speaking, 7 and 2 thirds.

Pitching wise, no McLean, Brad Keller, the former Royal looked pretty good.

They pitched well enough to win that championship, but Team Venezuela was just better.

Michael Garcia, going to have to get used to saying that now.

I can't believe that's the actual pronunciation, and I even know from the pronunciation

guide for the Royals going into next week, it still says Michael, but I guess it is

Michael, per Michael Garcia, but they were just much better in this game.

They were more poised in this game.

They struck first.

They were able to add on a solo shot from Will You Rebrae you, not long after that, Bryce

Harper did have one of the most iconic home runs in World Baseball Classic Championship

history, and just the WBC in general, but it's all for not.

And what I can't wrap my mind around.

I said too in yesterday's episode that I was going with Team USA.

I wasn't going to bet against them now, even though they didn't have someone like Terrick

Scoobal throwing, and it was going to be at Water Rodriguez who was phenomenal for Venezuela

last night, I wasn't going to go against that American lineup.

There's too much power, there's too much star power, and too many guys just didn't show

up.

It was a road game for Team USA.

It had been that way in the semi-finals as well against the Dominican Republic.

Still, I just thought the offense was capable of putting up more than nothing, only two hits

in the first seven innings.

But Harper hits the two run shot, flips the game on its head, you got all the momentum,

and Mark Derosa, who we've had our gripes about, he doesn't go to Mason Miller.

And I thought in the moment in watching that game that he was not available whatsoever.

And I want to say that we discussed that yesterday, that I didn't believe that Bednar or Mason

Miller was going to be available.

New for effect, Bednar was not going to be thrown.

He had basically pitched in every single game it felt like, but you're in the championship.

And after the game, Mark Derosa asked, why not Miller in the ninth?

And he said it was to honor the Padres, and so I went, okay, that makes sense that the

Padres called you and said, don't throw him in this one.

I don't care if you've got the leader, whatever, you've got to go to somebody else.

And Garrett Whitlock had been very good in the tournament, but come to find out they were

only going to throw him if they had a safe situation.

They could have thrown him last night in a two to two game.

And this is what bugged me.

Everybody knows in baseball.

And I thought Derosa would know this being a baseball man himself.

If you're the home team, and your clothes was available, you throw your clothes or in

the ninth inning.

You don't play for extra innings as the home team, which team USA was?

You go to Miller in the ninth.

If they don't walk it off in the bottom, then you go to Garrett Whitlock in the tenth.

Like the fact that he was available, but you were only going to throw him if there was

a safe situation.

You know, I get it.

Down three to nothing, you know, maybe don't use Mason Miller there.

I guess then you could save him for extra is I don't know why you would.

But to hear that they could have used him and I like I said Garrett Whitlock was good in

the tournament.

He's not Mason Miller in that spot.

And many of you listening are die hard baseball fans.

We know about the shut down inning.

And team USA didn't get it.

A lead off walk to a guy that doesn't want to walk in Luis Arise.

Ben Trunner steel second base.

It was a close play, but still swipe second and A.U. Haneo Suarez pokes one in the gap

and left center.

That was the game because Polencia had been so good all tournament long.

The Americans had no chance.

And it's crazy to think that with that lineup, I said that multiple times.

They look like they got no chance in this game.

They don't look like they can do much against this picture.

And the offense was ghastly in the final two games of the tournament.

I can acknowledge the Dominican Republic and team Venezuela had a loaded bullpen.

Not always the biggest names out there, but they had 97 to 100 with movement.

And I thought when Bryce Harbor club the two run home run, the tie the game, you send

Miller out there.

And I'm not even sure if Venezuela would have gone to Polencia because that's the flip

side to this.

If you are the road team, you save your closer because you have to go and get three more

outs if you're going to win the game.

You got to take the lead somewhere and they did the ninth inning.

The next go around in 2029.

Either Deroza and company have to get much better at this.

And he said he'd absolutely come back.

I've got no doubt he believes that.

There's just a different feel when it comes to how Venezuela, the Dominican Republic,

Mexico, Italy all managed the game and how the US did.

And the US seemed it was catering a lot to, well, we were told not to pitch this guy.

Or well, I'm going to go with my gut here.

And I just don't know how with the championship on the line in that environment after that

home run, you know, scratching and clawing, just trying to find someone to get on base

and you tie the game.

And Miller's ready to go and no doubt in my mind he would have wanted to go out there.

You go to Whitlock.

I mean, again, somebody that's pitched well, but also he's not Mason Miller disappointing

end to team USA's run in the tournament.

They also had to play DR in the semi finals and then got team Venezuela because they thought

they had advanced in pool play and they needed Italy to beat Mexico.

So they already had one loss before getting to bracket play, elimination play.

They still would have had to go through Japan, but maybe Venezuela would have gotten knocked

out by the Dominican Republic.

And who knows, might have been seen as a better match at the time, I doubt it though.

But still, congratulations to Venezuela, Michael Garcia, Salvador Perez, Luinda Ovala,

their champions.

It was so cool to see.

Even though it was written for US, it was nice to see some royals be able to hoist the

hardware when it was all sudden done.

The first championship in the World Baseball Classic for Venezuela, they tie the US and DR

for one a piece.

Japan is still comfortably leading all time in the WBC with three titles.

That's going to do it for another edition of Lockdown Royals in the Lockdown Podcast

Network.

I've been your host, Jack Johnson.

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You've got one more episode tomorrow before a mailbag Friday on Friday.

So until then, you take it easy, Kansas City.