Before the 2026 season began, the Royals swung a deal with the Brewers for Isaac Collins, sending over Angel Zerpa and receiving Collins and Nick Mears. The Royals were looking for an impact outfield bat, while the Brewers were looking for another bullpen arm. In the end, both teams really didn’t get much value from their received pieces as Zerpa hit the 60-day IL and Collins wasn’t the impact bat he was expected to be.
It was a rough season for Collins in a new organization, as he slashed .213/.320/.321 with an OPS of .641 and a wRC+ of 83. Let’s dive deeper into why Collins struggled in Royals colors this season and if he gets another shot next season as the starter in LF.
Lack of Power and Minor Changes in Approach
The name of Collins’ game is being a good contact bat with a solid approach at the plate, and for the most part, he did both things well. He had a contact rate of 80.5% and a walk rate of 12.3%, but both of those things kind of came back to bite him in other aspects of his game.
Collins is not a guy who is going to get you 10 home runs in a season, as he has only hit 15 in his career. He is more suited as a singles and doubles guy who walks a good amount. The issue of not being a power threat is the ability to create your own luck, and it showed in 2026 for Collins.
He had a hard-hit rate of 39.3%, an average exit velocity of 88.1 mph, and a barrel rate of 5.2%. Those are in line with his previous numbers, but the underlying numbers have not been super favorable for Collins profile. His BABIP in 2026 was .276, which is exactly 50 points lower than his 2025 BABIP. A key factor for this dip lies in his line drive rate being 16.5% this season compared to 24.6% in 2025.
Looking at his splits for his batted balls, line drives are where he does his damage. In 2026, he had an absurd 415 wRC+ on frozen ropes, but his next-best batted-ball wRC+ was on bunts at 85. It was similar in 2025, but he also saw a lot of success and power on fly balls, with a 110 wRC+ and a .383 ISO. 2026 saw those numbers drop to 50 and .219, which is a major reason for the decline.
Another big reason Collins struggled in 2026 was his approach. While he does have a solid approach, a couple of key numbers saw changes that led to inconsistencies. His swing rates saw some interesting changes: he swung at more pitches outside the zone at 21.9% while swinging at fewer pitches in the zone at 58.4%. That isn’t exactly an ideal change to have.
Despite the high contact rates, especially in the zone (90.3%), with fewer swings, he was taking more strikes (19.6% called strike rate), and when he did make contact, it was not likely a line drive. This is also shown through his swing/take profile as he struggled in the heart and shadow of the strike zone with values of -19 and -18. Most of the negative value in the heart comes from his -12 take runs, and in the shadow, a majority of his negative value comes from his -19 swing runs (he had +1 in take runs in the shadow).
In short, his swing decisions were slightly off, and whenever he made contact, it wasn’t likely to be a good result. The best thing he offered in the lineup was his walk rate, but with his profile, he was pretty much Johnathan India 2.0 in the outfield: low swing rate, high contact, with little pop and a good walk rate.
Defense was Also an Issue
Now, Collins wasn’t the best defender coming up in 2025 with the Brewers, but he was solid in LF. With the Royals, it was a somewhat different story. Most of Collins’ value defensively came from his arm, as he racked up 11 outfield assists, which tied for third in the league as a whole. Outside of his arm, however, he regressed with the bigger dimensions of Kauffman. He had -2 OAA, 0 FRV, and 4 DRS. His DRS was a major improvement from 2025, but his OAA dropped immensely, and his FRV dropped off a little.
The biggest issue was that he didn’t have the range needed to cover ground at Kauffman, as shown through the FRV calculation, since it takes range run value and arm run value. For his arm, he had a value of 2, while for range, he was at -2.
Conclusion
It was a disappointing first season for Isaac Collins and the Royals, and with a ton of outfielders vying for spots on the 2027 roster, it isn’t guaranteed that Collins gets a spot. Collins has one more year before becoming arbitration-eligible, and he has all of his options, so there is a world where the Royals start him in the minor leagues to get him back on track at the plate to start 2027. Or he can show out in Spring Training and win the LF job outright.
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