Royals' southpaws bringing out each other's competitive spirit

This story was excerpted from Anne Rogers’ Royals Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.

SURPRISE, Ariz. -- There is trash talk. There are eye rolls. There are frustrated laughs and annoyed huffs and satisfied grins when they know they’ve just struck a nerve with the other.

There are two left-handed starters in Royals camp who were hell-bent on beating each other in every competition during the daily pitchers fielding practice workouts before games started this spring, and the banter hasn’t stopped.

“Cole and Noah,” one coach said, laughing, as he walked away from a fielding drill for the pitchers one morning, “might kill each other.”

Cole Ragans and Noah Cameron have emerged as two of the fiercest competitors the Royals have, and they’ve turned that competitiveness on to each other. All in good fun, of course.

“I think everybody knows it,” Cameron said. “I told him, ‘Hey, you are a lot better at throwing a baseball than I am, but I will beat you in everything else.’”

Ragans shook his head in mock disappointment. (Or real disappointment. Who’s to say?)

“We know each other’s buttons we can push, so we just aggravate each other constantly,” Ragans said.

This all seems to have started because of the pitcher athlete rankings that are going on their third consecutive spring, a competition created by bullpen coach Mitch Stetter to inject some energy and fun into what can be monotonous days of PFPs before Cactus League games start. When camp begins, Stetter puts out a “preseason” list ranking the pitchers in terms of their athleticism. He uses previous competitions, their background in sports and their defense from previous seasons to help put the list together.

Then Stetter lets the competition play out in fielding drills, and others not really related to what could happen in a game, like shooting a baseball into a bucket, using a fungo bat to see who could hit a ball closest to a cone set up in the shortstop area of the dirt or catching a tennis ball hit with a racket high in the sky with their bare hand.

These drills are what Cameron is the best at … and what irks Ragans so much.

“Did you see some of the competitions he won?” Ragans said, incredulously. “Like bounce a tennis ball three times and hit it to a cone? Who is good at that? Why is he good at that?”

Cameron can only laugh at this.

“I’ve always been really coordinated,” Cameron said. “Good at a lot of stuff. I’m trying to humble myself. I can’t keep going.

“... I may not be able to run very fast or jump very high or throw very hard. But I can hit a ball close to a cone.”

Adding fuel to the fire is the fact that Cameron actually won the athlete competition this year, coming in first ahead of Alec Marsh, Michael Wacha, Seth Lugo and the rest of the group.

“Cole wasn’t even close,” Cameron laugh-whispered.

Ragans sighed, then said: “If anyone else won, I wouldn’t say anything at all, but of course it’s him.”

The Royals get a kick out of watching Cameron and Ragans go back and forth with each other, and some teammates egg them on, too. What the Royals really love, though, is that they get to see the competitiveness of each of them play out when they’re pitching important games this season.

“They’re into it, they do some goofy things, and it’s awesome to watch,” manager Matt Quatraro said. “And it transfers into the game, too.”

And what’s the harm in a little fun?

“We love each other,” Cameron said. “It’s just really fun to mess with him.”