The Kansas City Royals have their first baseman for Year 1 of the post-Eric Hosmer era.
On Wednesday, the Royals signed free agent slugger Lucas Duda. Jon Heyman of FanRag Sports reports the one-year deal is worth $3.5 million with another $1.5 million in incentives. The team announced the signing but not the contract terms.
The 32-year old left-handed hitter is likely the favorite to start at first base for the Royals, who had Hunter Dozier, Ryan O’Hearn, and Frank Schwindel contending for playing time there.
Duda is best-known to Royals fans as the Mets first baseman whose wild throw in Game 5 of the 2015 World Series allowed Eric Hosmer to score on an infield grounder. Duda is not considered to have a good glove, but has very good power, smacking 30 home runs last season. In 127 games between the Mets and Rays, he hit .217/.322/.496 and was a 1.1 WAR player according to Fangraphs. He has always been a low-average hitter with good power and a solid walk rate of 11% while striking out 24% of the time in his career.
Duda has a pretty big platoon split, and may have to sit against lefties, which could allow Hunter Dozier to platoon with him if he makes the club. The ZIPS projection system predicts him to hit .229/.331/.471 as a 1.5 WAR player.
Duda gives the Royals at least one legitimate bat in their lineup, although his upside isn’t all that high. As far as expecting him to be a trade piece, the Mets dealt him last summer for a pretty fringy minor league relief pitcher, so I wouldn’t expect Duda to have all that much value. The market is clearly moving away from older players who hit home runs. Some fans may have preferred Logan Morrison - who signed a $6.5 million deal with the Twins earlier this week - but Duda is actually a pretty similar player.
