Before COVID-19 interrupted the 2020 MLB season, Royals outfielder Alex Gordon was looking forward to his 14th season in the big leagues. The veteran inked a one-year, $4 million deal with the Royals in January.
Gordon, 36, is a three-time All-Star and seven-time Gold Glove Award winner, but has had four consecutive average-or-worse seasons. From 2016-19, he hit an aggregate .237/.320/.366 and was worth 4.1 WAR per Baseball Reference, an average of just over one WAR per season. Some believe it might be Gordon’s last season, but he put that notion to bed.
Gordon spoke with Lynn Worthy of the Kansas City Star, saying, “I feel like I still want to play at least a few more years, and I want to get back to not losing 100 games, pushing for the playoffs, stuff like that to get back to kind of what we’re talking about (the World Series runs in 2014 and 2015).”
The Royals haven’t been back to the postseason since winning the World Series in 2015. Whether Gordon can recapture his productive ways and help the Royals out of their rut remains to be seen, but it sounds like he still has the drive to keep on playing beyond 2020.
