5 top takeaways from the Kansas City Royals season opening series

The Royals are built for speed in 2019. Against the Whitesox, they showed why it can be a real weapon for the squad. In the first game of the season, the Royals hit two triples and stole two bases. In the second game of the year, they stole another base. On Sunday, the Royals really couldn't run and they lost. Expect that to be the trend for the rest of the season.

While the Royals did hit their fair share of doubles, the team didn't hit a single home run in the opening series. There aren't a lot of power hitters on this club. That's another reason they're going to need to have some aggressive base runners.

Jorge Soler has always been the guy who people expect to put it all together at some point. If he can stay healthy, this could be the year. He's started the year hitting .455 and already has three doubles. He's also one of the only guys on the roster who is capable of around 30 homers.

You will hear teams talk, every now and then, about how an opening day pitcher isn't really the ace. It appears Brad Keller might be. On opening night, he went seven innings, allowed just two hits and no runs while striking out six. He pitched quite well in his audition as the member of the rotation last year as well. It will be interesting to see what he does as an encore this coming week.

If there is one big negative for the Royals in this opening series, it was the bullpen. On opening day, the pen almost blew a 5-0 lead by allowing three runs in the 9th. They also allowed three runs in the 7th on Saturday. The group allowed two runs on Sunday as well. Worst of all, it was a different pitcher struggling every single day. If the Royals want to surprise some people and compete, there needs to be better performances from that group.