The Royals will be looking to add an outfield this off-season with Alex Gordon announcing his retirement at the end of the 2020 season. The Royals have multiple players that are eligible for contract extensions in Jorge Soler, Brad Keller, Adalberto Mondesi and Hunter Dozier. Some of these contracts won’t be cheap for the Royals. With multiple players eligible for contract extensions, the Royals need to find players on the free agent market that have arbitration years remaining and won’t put a huge dent in the Royals salary cap. I believe Ben Gamel is a Royals type of player. Recently, the Royals have been signing players who have had down years, and hope they can bounce back, like Miakel Franco for example. When the Royals signed Franco, Franco was coming off one of the worst seasons in his career. Now, I am not saying Franco had a horrible season in 2019 with the Phillies; the Phillies just didn’t see Franco in their long-term plans, so they cut him loose allowing the Royals to sign him to a cheap one-year contract. Franco has a year of arbitration remaining, allowing the Royals to possibly bring him back on a pretty cheap contract. I believe Gamel could be the next Franco for the Royals. Unlike Franco, Gamel doesn’t have too much pop in his bat; but if he can get on base consistently, I think he could be a good signing for the Royals. In 2020, Gamel batted .237 batting with an on base percentage of .315. This is thanks to the lack of playing time in 2020 with the Brewers. Even though Gamel doesn’t have too much pop in his bat, I still believe he could help the Royals in 2021. With Gamel being just 28 years of age, I still believe he has a few good years left in him. In fact, I believe he has about three good years left in him. I believe the Royals could get Gamel on a pretty cheap one-year deal worth about $3 million or $5 million. Despite his struggles at the plate in 2020, I think he still has some room to grow offensively. Defensively I believe he is above average. According to fangraphs.com Gamel’s speed is a 55 which is above average in my opinion. I believe Gamel could play a good left field for the Royals for at least two seasons before a young outfielder is ready for the big leagues. I think it’s also important to remember that if Gamel did struggle with the Royals, they could option him down to the minors with Gamel having a minor league option remaining heading into the 2021 season. Even though there are multiple outfielders the Royals could sign, I believe Gamel is probably the best option on the market for the Royals.
