The following article was published in the Topeka Capital-Journal on May 26, 2018 – you can read it here.
Desperate times call for desperate measures. When your big league club is one of the worst in baseball, and your farm system is viewed with even greater derision, you are willing to look anywhere for help.
The Royals turned to a little-known process to add a couple of prospects this past winter, and thus far like what they found.
Right-handed relievers Brad Keller and Burch Smith were acquired in separate trades after each was selected by another team in the December Rule 5 Draft. In accordance with the rules of the draft, the Royals committed to give Keller and Smith an opportunity in their depleted bullpen.
Neither player saw it coming.
“There just aren’t many players picked each year,” Keller said. “So I definitely wasn’t expecting it. I didn’t really pay much attention to the process. When it happened, I got a bunch of congratulatory messages. It was such a good feeling.”
“I didn’t really know much about it or how it worked,” said Smith, who appeared briefly with the San Diego Padres in 2013. “I knew I was eligible, but beyond that I didn’t have much expectation. I was really excited because I knew it would be a real good opportunity for me to get back to the major leagues.”
The Rule 5 Draft is a bit complicated. In general, players over 23 years of age with four or more professional seasons under their belts must be protected on their teams’ 40-man major league roster. If they are not protected, they are eligible to be drafted by another team, with the only caveat being they must stay with their new major league club for the entire season. The cost of the selection is $100,000.
The biggest catch is that if at some point the new team doesn’t want to keep the player on the big league roster, he must be offered back to the original club for $50,000.
“It’s awesome to think that a team has that much trust in me that they would try to keep me at this level for the whole year,” Keller said. “The Royals had the confidence in me to compete for a role in the bullpen in spring training.”
Being a Rule 5 pick puts an unproven player in a unique position. Without the option to shuttle the player back and forth from the minor leagues, the player will be utilized differently than a player with ‘options.’
“We don’t go about it differently, really,” Smith said, comparing himself and Keller to other young relievers on the team. “We still take the same approach. We see it as an opportunity that we want to work hard and prove ourselves.”
Not a lot of Rule 5 picks make much of an impact. Most are relief pitchers hidden in the shadows of the bullpen, rarely making appearances in pressure situations. Players like D.J. Carrasco, Andrew Cisco and Nate Adcock made small contributions during the dismal era before the Royals turned the corner in 2013.
Gene Watson, the Royals’ assistant general manager and senior director of professional scouting, acknowledged in a Sporting News article this spring that the bullpen is the best place to try to carry a Rule 5 pick: “We try to find ceiling arms,” he said.
From the outset, Royals manager Ned Yost saw no point in trying to protect Keller or Smith from the limelight. Each is among the team leaders in appearances and has Yost’s trust in pressure situations.
“It’s great that they trust us, and hopefully we can continue to build that trust, so that they feel like they can put either of us in, whatever the situation, and we can do the job,” Smith said.
“I feel like that’s the best way to get accustomed to competing at this level is just to get thrown into the fire,” Keller added. “I am glad the Royals trusted me to get out there and try to help the team from the beginning.”
For a team in rebuilding mode, the Rule 5 Draft provided the Royals a chance to infuse their major league squad with some new, if unproven, talent.
“We try to explore every avenue to acquire players,” Watson said in the Sporting News article. “We always take a lot of pride in our preparation for the Rule 5 Draft. We feel like it’s been helpful for us.”
For the past several seasons, the Royals have passed on using their picks, because of the abundance of talent on their roster. Not since 2010 have the Royals attempted to carry a Rule 5 pick through an entire season.
But there is always the hope that a team will strike gold in the Rule 5 Draft, which the Royals did in 2006 when they plucked Joakim Soria from the San Diego Padres farm system. Soria became an instant success in the Royals bullpen, saving 160 games and making two All-Star teams over the next five seasons.
Keller and Smith may not become All-Stars. But they are looking more and more like building blocks as the Royals attempt to reconstruct a championship ball club.