Thursday, October 01

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Bobby Witt Jr.’s stats have steadily been climbing over the past few weeks, to the point that anyone who was worried about him at the very beginning of the season can put that in the past.

But there was one glaring number that popped up on the scoreboard every time he stepped to the plate before Sunday.

Home runs: 0.

Entering the sixth inning Sunday against the Angels, Witt had a homerless drought of 157 plate appearances dating back to Sept. 20, 2025. It was the longest of his career, and while no one around Witt or even Witt himself was ever really worried about the power stroke, it was still interesting that Witt had gone nearly a month without a homer.

Game 28 of the season changed that when he drove a 1-0 changeup from Reid Detmers a Statcast-projected 427 feet out to left-center field for a two-run home run as part of the Royals’ wild and thrilling comeback.

“You always want to hit one,” Witt said. “But it just kind of happens. I’m not trying to hit homers up there, so you go up there and get one. I’m not ever worried about not hitting or whatever, so just go up there and enjoy the moment.”

Witt said it “wasn’t really” in his mind that he hadn’t hit a homer yet because “the stats on the board are all in the past.”

“Focus on today,” Witt said. “That’s all we’re worried about.”

Witt said some variation of that a few times last week, a sign of what he’s trying to instill in his teammates as they try to get back on track after an 11-17 start to the season. There are plenty of signs that’s happening after the 4-2 homestand that saw the offense score at least five runs in every game and was capped by a win on Sunday that we’ll be talking about for a long time if the Royals play well through the summer.

And if Witt uses Sunday’s homer to go on a hot streak like we’ve seen him have in the past? Even better for this team.

“He has plenty of power,” manager Matt Quatraro said before Witt’s homer on Sunday. “It just hasn’t clicked yet to leave the park. He’ll go on one of those runs.”

Looking at Witt’s batted ball profile might offer insight into why the power was slower to begin this year, even though Witt is hitting the ball harder than ever this year with a 52.2% hard-hit rate, which would be a career high over last year’s 48.5%.

Witt’s 34.4% ground ball rate is a career low, but the airball distribution isn’t conducive to more home runs. He’s hitting line drives more than ever at 30%, a career high, which is a good sign for where his swing is at, especially if those are shooting through the gaps.

However, his 21.1% flyball rate is a career low, while his 14.4% pop-up rate is by far a career high, which also speaks to why his 18.8 degree launch angle is up from where it usually sits at 15.8 degrees for his career. So he’s hitting the ball in the air, but probably not where he wants to hit it in the air outside of those line drives that fall and lead to doubles and triples.

Witt also hasn’t pulled the ball as much this year -- down to 26.7%, a career low -- and his pulled airball rate (percent of batted balls that are pulled flyballs, line drives or pop-ups) is down to a career-low 12.2% as well.

We know that Witt can hit opposite-field and straightaway home runs, but 64 of his 106 career homers, including Sunday’s, were to his pull side.

But Witt is also smoking the ball in 2026, and his contact quality metrics are all in line with where he’s typically at or better, like the hard-hit rate. While he’s chasing (33.5%) a bit more than his career (32.1%), he’s also walking at an 11.2% clip, which would be a career high, and probably speaks to opposing teams not wanting to face him all that much when the middle of the Royals’ order is still trying to get going.

It’s also notable that Witt hit just two home runs before the end of April in 2024, the year he hit 32 home runs overall. Last year, he hit four homers in the first month of the season and finished with 23. It is harder to hit homers in April, especially with the weather as a major factor.

There is a lot to like about Witt’s overall performance lately, leading to a .294/.368/.422 slash line, and he's always trying to improve. Like he said, he’s never really worried about not hitting. No one should be when it comes to him.

“Bobby’s going to hit homers,” Quatraro said. “It’s not a question of if; it’s when. I don’t want him going up there thinking, ‘OK, now I have one, and I have to add a streak of them together.’ He just has to keep putting good swings on the ball, and I think he did that [Sunday]. Using the whole field again, right-field line, left-center. I see a lot of positives with what he’s doing right now.”

Salvador Perez hits a new milestone every season, but he’s coming up on a big one. His home run Saturday night was the 307th of his career, meaning he’s now just 10 away from George Brett’s franchise record of 317.

When Perez catches Brett, he’ll become only the third active player to own his current team’s all-time home run record, joining Mike Trout (412 with the Angels) and Manny Machado (196 with the Padres).

Perez also has 134 home runs at Kauffman Stadium, just two shy of matching Brett (136) for the all-time record in the Royals’ ballpark, and he’s two bases shy of becoming the fifth player in Royals history with 3,000 career total bases.

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