The Royals are sending Lucas Erceg to Triple-A Omaha, a move that would have sounded almost unthinkable not long ago for a reliever who once sat at the center of their late-game plans. On Tuesday, Kansas City opted for a reset, giving Erceg a chance to step away from the big-league pressure and work his way back after a rough season.
Manager Matt Quatraro made clear this is not a goodbye so much as a pause.
“We have a lot of confidence in his ability to get really good hitters out,” Quatraro said. “We’ve seen him do it.
It’s not that it’s just a hope. We’ve seen him execute it.
I think it’s just building up a little confidence and getting him on a more regular routine for a little while, so he can work on some things and hopefully get back up here and regain his form.”
Kansas City filled Erceg’s roster spot by recalling Carlos Duran, the hard-throwing righty acquired in the trade that sent Kris Bubic to the Dodgers earlier this month. Duran brings power stuff, including a nasty slider, and he made three appearances for Omaha, working three scoreless innings before the call-up.
For Erceg, 31, this is a stunning turn after the role he held entering 2026. He opened the year as the Royals’ top leverage arm, a spot he earned through a dominant 2024 after Kansas City got him from the A’s at the Trade Deadline.
That year, he posted a 2.88 ERA and helped push the Royals into the playoffs. He followed that with another solid season in 2025, finishing with a career-best 2.64 ERA even as his strikeout rate slid from 28.5% in ‘24 to 19.3.
This year has gone in the opposite direction. Erceg owns a 6.23 ERA across 47 appearances and 43 1/3 innings, along with six blown saves, a 14.9% strikeout rate and a 13.9% walk rate.
The Royals pulled him out of the closer’s job, then away from high-leverage spots, then began trying to find softer matchups for him. Nothing has really stuck.
The frustration showed on Monday, when Erceg came in for the ninth inning with a five-run lead and walked two of three batters without recording an out.
“We identified some things that he was working on,” Quatraro said. “We saw them in flashes, but the sustained success wasn’t there.
And it was, in our opinion, wearing on him. To get the reset might be the best thing for him.”
Now Erceg will head to Omaha in the coming days and pitch on a regular schedule, with a full development plan from the Royals’ pitching department. The focus will be on his delivery, his pitch shapes and how he attacks right-handed and left-handed hitters. The point is simple: get him consistent work without the nightly strain of the majors hanging over every outing.
That matters not just for this season, but for what comes next. Erceg is arbitration eligible this offseason, and the Royals are already looking ahead to 2027 as they try to reshape a bullpen that entered Tuesday ranked second-worst in MLB with a 5.24 ERA.
Some of those answers could come internally, with Duran one possibility depending on how he handles the opportunity. Others may come from outside the organization this winter.
But Kansas City knows one thing: if Erceg gets back to anything close to his old form, that changes the conversation.
“He’s worked his tail off to try to get back to the form that we all know he can do,” pitching coach Brian Sweeney said. “It’s been hard.
And it was really tough just on him because he’s worked his tail off, and he probably thinks, ‘How and why? Why did this happen?’
And it’s OK. I want him to know that.
He’s not a failure. It’s tough to hear the boos and not get the job done for your teammates.
But some of the best pitchers in the world have had tough times on the mound.
“This is a reset to go down with a plan, for [pitching coaches] Dane [Johnson] and [David Lundquist] to execute with him, to help him get back to the version that’s closer to what we saw in 2024 and early part of ‘25. It’s a hard message to hear, it’s a hard message to tell, but Lucas is a part of our future. He really is.”
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