2025 Royals X-Factor: Maikel Garcia
Where Garcia shines, where he struggles and why he's critical in Kansas City's bid for a repeat playoff berth
When the margins are as thin as they are in Major League Baseball, particularly in the American League Central and the junior circuit’s wild card race, teams need more than just two or three players to rise to the occasion throughout the season.
Yes, Bobby Witt Jr. jogging out to shortstop every day, Salvador Perez enjoying a late-career renaissance and Cole Ragans firing upper-90s fastballs provides a pretty stable floor, at least as stable as you can expect in this unpredictable sport. But what if the bottom of the order can’t produce — at all? If the pitching staff doesn’t stay healthy? If the bullpen isn’t as improved as we believe it to be?
Superstars, though critical in reaching the peaks of baseball success, can only get you so far on their own. Along the path to the postseason, teams need their 7-9 hitters to provide something — anything — to keep the line moving. They need sixth, seventh, eighth and even ninth starting pitchers to fill the gaps. They need utility players who can man several positions to avoid roster crunches.
They need guys who can steal a base, play Gold Glove-caliber defense, put the bat to the ball in key situations and bring a little energy to the ballpark.
Teams need guys like Maikel Garcia.
The recently turned 25-year-old third baseman is entering his third full Big League season, primed for a pivotal role with the postseason-contending Royals. With the addition of Jonathan India, he’ll slide from the leadoff spot to somewhere in the bottom third of the order most days, but Garcia’s value goes far beyond his bat.
In spite of a mostly punchless 2024 at the plate, even the most bearish of projection systems view Garcia as a 1.5-2 fWAR player in 2025 thanks to his glove and baserunning. The more bullish systems, ZiPS and Steamer, project him for closer to 2.5 wins, on par with revered hitters like Kyle Schwarber, Christian Yelich, Bryan Reynolds — and India.
You may quibble with the value fWAR places on defense and baserunning, but I won’t — Garcia is a massively important player to this year’s iteration of the Royals, and he’s going to be at the center of this team’s success if it finds itself back in October.
Defensive Prowess and Versatility
Let’s start with where Garcia brings his biggest impact to the roster: in the field, whether he’s on the dirt or, potentially, the grass in 2025.
After posting an elite 15 Statcast Outs Above Average in 2023 (including 13 at third base, where he finished second among qualified defenders) he followed it up in 2024 with a more pedestrian 2 OAA. It’s important to qualify that 2024 mark, however — he was awarded 4 OAA at the hot corner (good for 10th in MLB among qualified third basemen) and was dinged for -3 OAA at second base, a position he’s unlikely to be asked to man nearly as often with the addition of India and presence of Michael Massey. His FanGraphs Ultimate Zone Rating of 1.6 in 2023 climbed to 2.8 in 2024 at third base, another top 10 mark across the league.
We can confidently say he’s a borderline elite defender at the hot corner. Nearly as importantly, he can competently handle shortstop (1 OAA in each of the last two campaigns), allowing Kansas City some flexibility on its bench without the need to carry an extra shortstop should Witt need a breather.
While he won’t be asked to play the keystone in 2025, at least not often, the Royals are testing him on the outfield grass a bit in Spring Training. Whether Garcia can play left field or center field is to be determined, but his athleticism and above-average speed tell us it’s at least plausible.
If he can play some center, even just one day a week, it opens a world of lineup flexibility to manager Matt Quatraro, who’d then have the option to platoon Garcia and Kyle Isbel against lefties. Garcia roaming Kauffman Stadium’s expansive outfield also opens third base for India, freeing up the DH spot for Perez or Vinnie Pasquantino — or top prospect Jac Caglianone, if you’re eager for the world in which the young slugger is ready to make his mark in KC later this summer.
Speed and Baserunning
Circling back to Garcia’s aforementioned wheels, he finished 2024 with a 66th-percentile sprint speed, per Statcast, which helped fuel his career-high 37 stolen bases along with his instincts and savvy.
He was awarded 5 Statcast Basestealing Runs and 8 Statcast Baserunning Runs, metrics intended to show a player’s value through both stolen bases and, in the case of Baserunning Runs, the ability to take an extra base when the opportunity presents itself. Those 8 Baserunning Runs were good for second in baseball last season, tied with Shohei Ohtani who ripped off 59 bags in his National League MVP campaign.
Hitting in the seventh or eighth spot this season, Garcia likely won’t have as many opportunities (by nature of less plate appearances), but his speed and efficiency on the basepaths can bring a spark to a bottom of the order that’s likely to need some life.
Patience (Perhaps Too Much?) At the Plate
For a couple years now, it’s felt like there’s something more to Garcia than he’s shown us in the batter’s box. Whether it was the pressure of hitting leadoff last season, a barking elbow that required offseason surgery or something a bit more difficult to pinpoint, he faltered in the second half and finished with a paltry 69 wRC+ in 2024.
Despite the ugly surface numbers like a .231/.281/.332 slash line, he routinely made quality contact evidenced by his 90.4 MPH average exit velocity (70th percentile) and 42.8% hard-hit rate (65th percentile). Pair the batted-ball data with his elite 92nd-percentile chase and whiff rates and it’s a bit confounding to see him post a .613 OPS.
Garcia is one of the most patient (maybe passive is the better word) hitters in the Major Leagues. Among 129 qualified hitters, he finished 108th in swing rate in 2024 at 43.1%. While it’s true that type of approach works for batters in that same swing rate range like Juan Soto, Aaron Judge and Mookie Betts, those types of stars also see fewer strikes than a player like Garcia. In fact, among the bottom 30 hitters in swing rate last year, Garcia is one of just three who saw a zone rate of 45% or higher.
It’s possible, especially now that he won’t be hitting in front of Witt and Pasquantino, that he needs to take the bat off his shoulder more often and capitalize on pitches in the strike zone.
Garcia is ripping the cover off the ball in Spring Training, posting an elite 97 MPH average exit velocity and 65.2% hard-hit rate in 25 Statcast-tracked plate appearances. He’s still swinging at just 40% of pitches, however, so it remains to be seen if the solution lies in a change in approach or if he’ll continue to be one of the stingier swingers in MLB.
Maikel Garcia isn’t a superstar. He’s not going to receive MVP votes, he’s unlikely to make the All-Star game and the team store probably isn’t scrambling to keep No. 11 jerseys in stock.
But he’s an X-factor for the 2025 Royals, a core homegrown member of the organization’s foundation who will be at the center of this team’s success should it reach its goals in the upcoming campaign.
Completely opposite of what I was saying in your article about India (and Massey), I believe Garcia's value is directly linked to his versatility. He might end up as the primary 3B again, out of necessity, but I don't think he'll ever have enough pop to be a true everyday 3B. Not ideally anyway. But if he can continue to improve at the plate, run the bases well, and provide outstanding defense at 3B, SS, 2B, and maybe even the OF (especially CF, though I think that's a tough ask- I'm not saying he can't do it, but it feels like a lot of fans assume he can step right in with no problems at all, and that's not usually how it works), he can be an extremely valuable player on this team for years to come.
After yesterday’s incident, he seems considerably more important.