KANSAS CITY -- Andrew Hoffmann was ready for a change.
The Royals pitcher wasn’t happy with his performance in 2024 or really since arriving in the Kansas City organization when the club sent a Competitive Balance Draft pick to Atlanta for Hoffmann, Drew Waters and CJ Alexander in 2022.
Hoffmann had just finished a ‘24 season in which he posted a 6.08 ERA. That was coming off his 5.53 ERA in ‘23.
The 25-year-old wanted -- and needed -- to find better results on the field.
A trip to the Dominican Republic, a new pitch and a new role has done just that. And now Hoffmann is getting an opportunity in the Royals’ bullpen, with the team adding him to the roster and promoting him Wednesday.
Hoffmann arrived in Kansas City on Tuesday, unsure of when or if he’d be activated. He watched the game that night on his iPad in the lobby of a hotel with his fiancée. Royals director of player development Mitch Maier called Hoffmann after the game to let him know he’d be activated Wednesday.
“One of the best days of my life,” Hoffmann said.
He’s been through a lot in his young career, but he’s been a different pitcher so far in 2025. There’s a multitude of reasons for that, including his trip to the Dominican Winter League last offseason that allowed him to “restart” as a pitcher, going to a place where he didn’t know “anything about anything,” he said. A mechanical cue he picked up there -- making his delivery simpler -- has helped this year.
But the biggest difference is his new changeup. Specifically, a kick-change.
The pitch has been surging in baseball ever since Giants pitcher Hayden Birdsong introduced it a year ago. A Pitching Ninja video of Birdsong in 2024 was the first time Hoffmann says he saw the pitch and thought it was interesting, but he didn’t start to work on it until the offseason when he had more time to make adjustments. The modified changeup features a changeup-like grip and changeup-like spin but with last-second movement and is usually thrown harder.
The middle finger is usually spiked on a kick-change (although grips vary from pitcher to pitcher). Royals starter Kris Bubic is experimenting with something similar; sometimes he calls it a one-seam changeup.
Hoffmann worked with Driveline Baseball in the winter and decided to try the pitch during one of his throwing sessions. He quickly realized that it could elevate his game.
“I was like, ‘Hey, we got to do something different. You can’t keep doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result,’” Hoffmann said. “... Once you see the success of that, it brings up the confidence of everything else.”
The success of it jumps off the page. Comparing Hoffmann’s Triple-A numbers from 2024 (66 innings across 25 appearances) to this year (25 1/3 innings across 19 appearances), the changeup is about 1 mph faster this year but has gotten way more downward movement (or drop): 37 inches this year versus 28 inches last year. It’s getting a much better whiff rate (37.1% versus 23.9%) and way lower slugging percentage (.296 versus .591).
“Everybody adjusts to how the game goes, and it was like, ‘OK, nobody’s throwing this,’” Hoffmann said. “If I start throwing it, hitters haven’t seen it, right? There are a few guys in the Major Leagues who do it, and they do it extremely well. So it was kind of like, ‘Hey, this is what we’re going to do, and we’re going to expand the arsenal off of this.’
In Omaha this year, Hoffmann had a 2.84 ERA with 37 strikeouts and just nine walks. The kick-change helps his other pitches; he described Wednesday how much more confident he is in throwing his fastball because of it, and that pitch has also seen a tick more of velocity this year.
It also helps that Hoffmann has fully transitioned to a reliever after spending the last few years as a swingman. He can handle multiple innings out of the bullpen, but the new role has freed his mind.
“You’re not constantly thinking about, ‘OK, how do I do this first time through, second time through?’” Hoffmann said. “As soon as your name gets called, ‘Hey, you’re in the game.’ There’s nothing to think about. ... This is what I got, I’m going to do it, see you tomorrow.”