Rosternomics
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Royals KCR

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GM: Dayton Moore (since 2007)

2017 roster — every player, value & surplus

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-3.2
WAB — wins above budget
-9.2
TAB — roster Talent above budget
80–82 (0.494)
record
-58M
surplus $M (value/$)
26.2
roster fWAR
$143.5M
payroll
PlayerAgeServiceGfWARSalary $MSurplus $M
Lorenzo Cain 31 FA-elig 155 4.8 11.0 +5.2
Eric Hosmer 27 FA-elig 162 3.7 12.2 +0.2
Danny Duffy 28 FA-elig 24 3.6 5.0 +7.3
Whit Merrifield 28 pre-arb 145 3.3 0.5 +10.7
Mike Moustakas 28 FA-elig 148 2.6 8.7 +0.0
Mike Minor 29 FA-elig 65 2.2 4.0 +3.5
Jason Hammel 34 FA-elig 32 2.2 5.0 +2.4
Salvador Perez 27 FA-elig 129 1.9 4.2 +2.3
Jason Vargas 34 FA-elig 32 1.8 8.0 -1.9
Joakim Soria 33 FA-elig 59 1.7 8.0 -2.2
Scott Alexander 27 pre-arb 58 1.2 0.5 +3.4
Jakob Junis 24 – 20 0.9 – –
Alcides Escobar 30 FA-elig 162 0.5 6.5 -4.9
Nate Karns 29 arb 9 0.4 0.6 +0.9
Peter Moylan 38 FA-elig 79 0.4 1.0 +0.3
Jorge Bonifacio 24 – 113 0.3 0.5 +0.7
Kevin McCarthy 25 pre-arb 33 0.2 0.3 +0.4
Kelvin Herrera 27 FA-elig 64 0.2 5.3 -4.7
Sam Gaviglio↔ SEA 27 – 4 0.2 0.0 +0.6
Travis Wood↔ SDP 30 FA-elig 28 0.2 2.8 -2.2
Neftalí Feliz↔ MIL 29 FA-elig 20 0.2 2.2 -1.6
Ryan Buchter↔ SDP 30 arb 29 0.1 0.2 +0.3
Eric Skoglund 24 – 7 0.1 0.2 +0.3
Al Alburquerque↔ CHW 31 – 11 0.1 0.0 +0.3
Mike Morin↔ ANA 26 pre-arb 6 0.1 0.1 +0.2
Ramón Torres 24 – 33 0.1 0.3 -0.0
Cam Gallagher 24 – 13 0.1 0.1 +0.1
Ian Kennedy 32 FA-elig 30 0.0 13.5 -13.4
Brian Flynn 27 arb 1 0.0 0.6 -0.5
Miguel Almonte 24 pre-arb 2 -0.0 0.0 -0.1
Brandon Maurer↔ SDP 26 arb 26 -0.1 0.7 -0.9
Billy Burns 27 pre-arb 7 -0.1 0.0 -0.3
Luke Farrell↔ CIN 26 – 1 -0.1 0.0 -0.3
Terrance Gore 26 arb 12 -0.1 0.5 -1.0
Matt Strahm 25 pre-arb 24 -0.1 0.5 -1.0
Andrés Machado 24 – 2 -0.2 0.1 -0.6
Christian Colón↔ MIA 28 arb 7 -0.2 0.2 -0.7
Adalberto Mondesi 21 pre-arb 25 -0.2 0.5 -1.2
Onelki Garcia 27 pre-arb 2 -0.2 0.0 -0.7
Seth Maness 28 arb 8 -0.2 1.2 -2.0
Melky Cabrera↔ CHW 32 FA-elig 58 -0.3 5.6 -6.6
Chris Young 38 FA-elig 14 -0.3 5.8 -6.8
Paulo Orlando 31 pre-arb 39 -0.3 0.6 -1.7
Brandon Moss 33 FA-elig 118 -0.6 3.8 -5.7
Alex Gordon 33 FA-elig 148 -0.6 16.0 -18.1
Cheslor Cuthbert 24 pre-arb 58 -0.7 0.6 -2.9
Drew Butera 33 FA-elig 75 -0.7 1.5 -3.9
Jorge Soler 25 arb 35 -0.9 3.7 -6.5
Trevor Cahill↔ SDP 29 FA-elig 10 -1.0 0.8 -4.4

49 players appeared (WAR is complete); salary & surplus are on record for 48 of them (98%). Players without a salary show "–" — no single historical salary source is fully complete (especially 2020–2022).

WAR = FanGraphs (fWAR). Green = produced more value than paid (bargain); red = paid more than produced. Service: pre-arb (<3 yr) / arb (3–6) / FA-eligible (6+). Click headers to sort.

History: front-office performance & develop-vs-buy (1985–2024)

Trade ledger (realized WAR, all-time)

Best acquisitions
PlayerYearWAR for KCR
Charlie Leibrandt198316.8
Danny Tartabull198613.9
Joe Randa199812.8
Jeff Montgomery198812.0
Joakim Soria20069.8
José Offerman19958.1
Brad Keller20177.9
Chris Haney19926.9
Ones that got away
PlayerYear tradedWAR elsewhere
Mark Ellis200122.1
David Cone198721.2
Jorge De La Rosa200813.1
Sean Manaea201511.2
Rance Mulliniks198211.1
Bret Saberhagen199110.8
Charlie Leibrandt19899.9
Jon Lieber19939.8
Rosternomics — quantifying front-office skill, attribution-clean. Follow @rosternomics on X. Decision-makers on record back to 1933; resource-controlled metrics (WAR & payroll) cover 1985–2026.
Data: FanGraphs (WAR), Baseball-Reference & the Chadwick Bureau register (rosters, IDs), the Lahman Database, Baseball America prospect rankings (via The Baseball Cube), and public payroll records. Transaction and trade data was obtained free of charge from and is copyrighted by Retrosheet. Executive birth/death data via Wikidata (CC0); bios are original. Emoji graphics by OpenMoji (CC BY-SA 4.0).
All figures are franchise-level outcomes credited to the decision-maker in the acquisition year — not solely attributable to one executive.