""We want a neutral ballpark where if you hit a ball well, it should be a home run," Royals general manager J.J. Picollo told ESPN. "The second they start feeling like they can't get the ball out of the ballpark, they start changing their swing. I watched it for years and years and years, and I just felt like this is the time to try to push it and see if everything we felt for however many years is accurate.""
"While the Royals will keep center field at 410 feet, they plan to taper in the fences starting in the power alleys, which will be shortened from 389 feet to 379, sources said. The fences will continue on that path, 9 to 10 feet shorter, nearly all the way to the corners, where the 330-foot foul poles will remain. The height of the fence will also be shortened from 10 feet to 8½."
"Kauffman has played as a slightly above-average offensive park because the size of the outfield -- which was second only to Coors Field -- promoted more doubles and triples. The distinct suppression of home runs, however, left the Royals concerned that hitters were changing their approaches on the road, consciously or subconsciously, and that altering the dimensions for the 81 games played at Kauffman without turning it into a bandbox would aid in Kansas City's efforts to build a perennial playoff contender."
The Royals will move the majority of Kauffman Stadium's outfield fence in by roughly 10 feet to shift the park from a home-run-suppressing environment toward league-average offense. Center field will remain 410 feet while the power alleys will be shortened from 389 to 379 feet and the fence will taper nearly to the 330-foot corners. Fence height will drop from 10 feet to 8½ feet. The analytics department sought a middle ground between a fly-ball dead zone and extreme homer parks to avoid turning the field into a bandbox and to influence hitter approach positively.
Read at ESPN.com
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