I'm not a Royals fan, but I can imagine if I was how I'd feel if my team just announced a signing like this.

Over 12 more or less full seasons (pandemic notwithstanding) covering more than 1300 innings, he has a career 5.10 ERA (ERA+ of 83), 1.43 WHIP, and negative career WAR.

If there's a press conference (I don't know that there would be one), how does one spin this? "Veteran leadership"? "Rotation depth"?

Lyles' main asset seems to be he knows how to get to the ballpark on time and shows up, and he doesn't injure himself when throwing baseballs. His velo dropped last year, he seemed to greatly benefit from the pushed back fences at Camden Yards, and is pretty much the definition of #5 starter. So.....two years, $17M!

After this contract is up, he will have made over $50M in his career, with just three 1+ WAR seasons (and no 2 WAR seasons) unless he somehow puts it all together for KC.

The Royals rotation is looking like Brady Singer, Daniel Lynch, Jordan Lyles, Brad Keller, and Ryan Yarbrough, but apparently they're still pursuing Greinke so one of those last two could get bumped. Season tickets are now on sale!

Why would you do this instead of just playing whoever you've got in AAA?

Why would you do this instead of just playing whoever you've got in AAA?

Because they did that after Greinke in 2022 and except Singer all the guys pitched worse than Lyle's career numbers?

They did this so they could demote one of their guys who needed to go back to the minors, rather than taking another drubbing cause someone has to pitch, not to win games in 2023/4.

I wouldn't have paid Lyles this much. But, all the teams are flush with money. And, with Lyles, you know he'll be good to toss 160+ IP (he's basically done 180 two years in a row) of his mediocre slop. I mean, he might get hurt eventually. But, maybe not.

Because they did that after Greinke in 2022 and except Singer all the guys pitched worse than Lyle's career numbers?

They did this so they could demote one of their guys who needed to go back to the minors, rather than taking another drubbing cause someone has to pitch, not to win games in 2023/4.

Yea, I still don't buy it, they have a lot of guys they could use (Kris Bubic, Carlos Hernandez, Max Castillo, Jon Heasley, Jackson Kowar), plus they can always pick up guys off the waiver wire and try them out and the results may not be much different. I'd much rather see the younger guys with some upside.

I'd much rather see the younger guys with some upside.

While this is true, put me down with #4. You need 1-2 guys who can eat innings. Teams churn through 30+ pitchers a year, it's not like any young guy with upside isn't gonna get a shot at some point during the season. What you don't want is 800 innings from your pen because none of your SP can make it past the 4th.

Let's not equate "upside" with "this guy might not suck as bad as we think he will." Uncertainty is not potential.

And I gotta give Lyles credit -- how many other pitchers cann claim their ERA pitching for the Rox was as good as their ERA pitching elsewhere?

They also have to spend a certain amount or the MLBPA files a grievance to try and get some of their sweet, sweet revenue sharing taken away. Before this, the Royals only had $35M committed for 2023, plus a bunch of arb guys. They probably need to get up to $75M to not be too obvious.

FWIW, RotoGrinders HATES Lyles.

I'd much rather see the younger guys with some upside.

I'd rather see those guys win the job rather than have it handed to them.

They also have to spend a certain amount or the MLBPA files a grievance to try and get some of their sweet, sweet revenue sharing taken away.

The MLBPA made a lot of noise about low payroll a few years ago and (maybe? don't trust my memory) the Marlins even got a rap on the knuckles at one point. But has this actually ever happened? And the MLBPA doesn't seem to have made too much noise about this the last few years -- maybe especially now with the pre-arb pool. The Pirates' payroll the last few years has been $60 (give or take), $45 and $55 and currently about $64. The Guardians were under $50 in 2021 and under $70 in 2022 and won 80 and 92 games so what can the MLBPA say? The A's dropped to $48 last year and don't seem to be doing much this offseason. The Reds are still at $83 but $43 of that is Votto and Moose and they have zero commitments after this year -- as it stands, the 2024 Reds will have no post-arb players.

I think that ship has sailed. And they just finished a CBA and the best they could come up with was the draft lottery and the pre-arb pool (which I think comes out of a cross-team pool, not the team itself). I'm sure a team would catch it if they tried to go with an all-min roster but I think the MLBPA might be stuck with 2-3 $50 M teams a year.

If you sign Jordan Lyles, you don't care about winning ball games. And if you don't care about winning ball games, then anybody who isn't injured can eat innings. Even if random AAA guy is worse than Lyles, a 7-2 loss is just as much of a loss as an 18-2 loss. Heck, at least the fans get to see some offense when you really get blown out.

Why not get creative and sign 10 Japanese league guys or Venezuelans. If you're going to lose, expand your fanbase