{"id":96303,"date":"2025-02-24T23:31:16","date_gmt":"2025-02-25T04:31:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/?p=96303"},"modified":"2025-02-24T23:31:16","modified_gmt":"2025-02-25T04:31:16","slug":"royals-top-prospect-jac-caglianone-spring-training","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2025\/02\/24\/royals-top-prospect-jac-caglianone-spring-training\/","title":{"rendered":"Royals Top Prospect Jac Caglianone Homers in Spring Debut"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">\u00a0<\/span><a class=\"editor-rtfLink\" href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2023\/08\/08\/jac-caglianone-2024-draft\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\"><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Jac Caglianone<\/span><\/a><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\"> the top prospect for the Kansas City Royals has opened some eyes early in spring training. Caglianone was the sixth overall pick by the Royals in 2024. He is a two-way player who played college baseball at Florida. Although he can hit and pitch, the fastest way for him to get to Kansas City is by hitting. Caglianone is a massive human, being listed at 6&#8217;5 and 250 pounds according to his <\/span><a class=\"editor-rtfLink\" href=\"https:\/\/www.mlb.com\/news\/jac-caglianone-hits-first-spring-training-home-run-with-royals?msockid=196d73f2550764972df461955479659f\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">player page<\/span><\/a><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\"> on MLB&#8217;s website.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2>Royals Top Prospect Jac Caglianone Homers in First Spring Game<\/h2>\n<p>Jac Caglianone wasted no time introducing himself to Cactus League action, as he hit a home run that traveled a whopping 435 ft and had an exit velocity of 115.4 mph. It&#8217;s just spring training, but someone who can hit a home run at that velocity and that far will garner some attention from the fanbase. It would be fun to see what he&#8217;s got on the mound, but it appears the Royals want him to prioritize his bat.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">Swing, power, &amp; poise as advertised.<\/p>\n<p>Jac Caglianone\u2019s first Cactus League hit is a missile of a solo homer to the CF berm.<\/p>\n<p>435 ft. \/ 115.4 mph EV \u203c\ufe0f <a  href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/7SPlYEBeZp\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/7SPlYEBeZp<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Jake Eisenberg (@JakeEisenberg_) <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/JakeEisenberg_\/status\/1893785198333976967?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">February 23, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Whenever Caglianone is ready, he could serve as the second piece to a deadly offensive duo along with<\/span><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2023\/08\/06\/bobby-witt-jr-rise\/\" target=\"_self\">Bobby Witt Jr<\/a><\/span><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">. One thing to watch with the Royals this year is how their offense will produce around Witt.<\/span><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\"> He&#8217;s an incredible talent who can carry the team when he gets on a roll, but the Royals can&#8217;t rely on that all the time. It would be surprising to see Caglianone in the majors in 2025, but it&#8217;s fun to envision what he could do for the Royals offense when he&#8217;s ready.<\/span><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h3>First Base a Perfect Fit<\/h3>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">First base is the perfect position for <\/span><a class=\"editor-rtfLink\" href=\"https:\/\/www.cbssports.com\/fantasy\/baseball\/news\/royals-jac-caglianone-shows-off-power\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Caglianone<\/span><\/a><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">. Sure, he&#8217;ll have to develop a bit of range, but it&#8217;s one of the infield positions that fits his build the best. His height and big build will allow him to have a sturdy presence on first base, which will help with staying on the bag. For anyone <\/span><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">who&#8217;s<\/span><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\"> wondering if there&#8217;s any chance they&#8217;ll see him on the mound, you can move on. He&#8217;s listed as a position player and first baseman only.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>The Royals see the top prospect&#8217;s potential in the batter&#8217;s box. If they want to give him a chance on the mound, there will be plenty of time for that. His major league ETA is 2026, so that gives him over a year to develop. The kid is only 21 years old, so there&#8217;s no reason to rush him. Kansas City sees the talent in him, so they&#8217;ll be careful.<\/p>\n<h3>The Royals&#8217; Future is Extremely Bright<\/h3>\n<p>The Royals have the opportunity to have one of the best young cores in MLB in a season or two, from the offensive side at least. They&#8217;re on the brink of contending if everything goes according to plan. Identifying talent is the hard part, and they&#8217;ve done it. The easy part is making a trade that can put them over the top or signing a key free agent. In a season or two, the Royals should have all the pieces to go on a deep postseason run.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u00a0Jac Caglianone the top prospect for the Kansas City Royals has opened some eyes early in spring training. Caglianone was the sixth overall pick by the Royals in 2024. He is a two-way player who played college baseball at Florida. Although he can hit and pitch, the fastest way for him to get to Kansas [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5319,"featured_media":96326,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[12,926,1071],"tags":[2583,6534,28839],"class_list":["post-96303","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-royals","category-milb","category-mlb","tag-bobby-witt-jr","tag-jac-caglianone","tag-kris-bubic"],"modified_by":"Lewis Masella, Site Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96303","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5319"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=96303"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96303\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":96327,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96303\/revisions\/96327"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/96326"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=96303"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=96303"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=96303"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}