The Royals announced Friday that they’ve signed righty Thomas Hatch to a minor league deal. The Moye Sports client will be in major league camp as a non-roster invitee this spring.
Hatch, 30, originally agreed to a one-year deal with the Korea Baseball Organization’s Doosan Bears back in November, but that deal fell through after the Bears raised some concerns about the right-hander’s physical. Since the Royals announced this deal, he’s already passed a physical with Kansas City.
Hatch spent the 2024 season with the Hiroshima Carp in Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball but logged more time with their farm team (72 1/3 innings) than their big league club (22 innings). He struggled in his brief run with the Carp, yielding 18 runs with an 18-to-10 K/BB ratio and five homers allowed in those 22 frames.
From 2020-23, Hatch pitched at least one major league game per season. He totaled 69 innings between the Blue Jays and Pirates, logging a 4.96 ERA with a 19.7% strikeout rate, 10.7% walk rate, 46.9% ground-ball rate and 1.17 homers per nine innings. A disproportionate amount of his struggles came in his lone 2022 appearance; the Jays left him on the hill to take his lumps in a blowout where he clearly didn’t have his best stuff, and he was torched for 10 runs in 4 2/3 innings. Any pitcher looks better if you’re setting aside his worst outing, but that one nightmarish performance balloons Hatch’s career ERA from 3.92 in 38 other appearances to its current 4.96 mark.
Hatch has pitched in parts of three Triple-A seasons and sports a 4.49 ERA in 242 1/3 innings there. He’s worked both as a starter and a reliever in the upper minors and in the majors as well. That could put him in competition to win a swingman role with the Royals, or he could simply be ticketed for Triple-A Omaha to serve as rotation depth.
At the moment, Kansas City’s rotation is quite full — even after trading Brady Singer to acquire Jonathan India from the Reds earlier this winter. Cole Ragans, Seth Lugo, Michael Wacha and Michael Lorenzen give K.C. an experienced quartet on which to lean. The Royals are moving lefty Kris Bubic from the bullpen (where he thrived in 2024 as he returned from Tommy John surgery) back to his more typical rotation role in 2025. Righty Alec Marsh (4.53 ERA in 129 innings last year) gives them a sixth candidate, though he has a minor league option remaining. Kyle Wright, returning from 2023 shoulder surgery, is another option. Daniel Lynch IV, Jonathan Bowlan, Noah Cameron and Luinder Avila are all on the 40-man roster as well, but Lynch is the only one of the bunch with any MLB experience of note.