When the Royals signed Chris Owings to his inexplicable big league deal way too early in the offseason, a lot of people wondered what about Nicky Lopez. All Loepz did after a solid spring was hit .353/.457/.500 in Omaha with five strikeouts and 20 walks.
So after putting up those numbers in AAA, the question was answered. Things started off great with hits in eight of his first nine games and a .405 OBP, but then things changed massively. He struggled for weeks, hitting far too many weak grounders and not enough of anything else. He was consistently making ineffective contact, and at that, not nearly as much contact as was expected.