How 3-time World Series champion Will Smith became linchpin of Royals’ offseason

Before relief pitcher Will Smith sprouted into what he jokingly calls a “rabbit’s foot” good-luck charm, he long wondered if he was exactly the opposite: cursed never to play in any World Series, much less become the first player to win three in a row for three different franchises.

Before he earned his abiding sense of “why not us?” — as he’s touting in his return to the Royals entering opening day on Thursday — Smith had considered that he was the common denominator in a “why me?” sequence of exasperating almosts.

When the Royals traded him to Milwaukee for outfielder Nori Aoki after the 2013 season, after all, they immediately proceeded to the next two World Series and won it in 2015.

When he was traded to the San Francisco Giants in 2016, he figured they’d extend their 2010, 2012, 2014/even-year trend of winning the Series.

“I get there and I’m like, ‘Hey, this could be it,’” Smith recalled with a smile as he sat at his locker in the Royals’ spring training clubhouse.

But … nah.

“Knocked out in the first round by the Cubs,” he said, shaking his head, “the year that they won it.”

As he increasingly pondered the feeling of “maybe I’m not ever going to win one,” and that he was bound to keep being in the wrong place at the right time, it was reinforced in 2018: That Brewers franchise he was traded from (and might well have bolstered with a career-best 2.55 ERA and 14 saves that year) fell a game short of the World Series.

Then came 2020 with the Braves, who lost the NLCS to the Dodgers in Game 7.

Now, though, any cynical complex he might have developed has long since faded.

For a guy who only ever imagined or modestly hoped for winning one, the drought has become such a glut that he hardly can separate it all and has a hard time ranking the unique cluster.

But the bookends certainly loom largest.

The 2021 title with the Braves not only came with the magic of being his elusive first but also was magnified by being a Georgia native.

Then, as much as he helped Houston in 2022 with a 3.27 ERA in 24 appearances after being acquired from Atlanta at the trade deadline, he didn’t pitch in the postseason.

Meanwhile, with 22 saves and five postseason appearances in 2023, last season with the Rangers resonated in any number of ways for Smith — and perhaps the Royals.

Because that season embodies what the Royals now hope to replicate at least in some approximate form: Texas had been 68-94 in 2022 and didn’t qualify for the playoffs until Game 161 with a wild-card berth.

Now the guy who once doubted he would ever win one of these things reckons it’s never far-fetched.

“You never know what will happen,” he said. “All you’ve got to do is get in the dance. That’s all you’ve got to do.”

Simple as that may sound, it still would require a monumental jump for the Royals after they tied a franchise-worst record (56-106) last season.

But that helps explain why the hulking Smith, 6-foot-5, 255 pounds, embodies a jaw-dropping offseason.

At the Royals Rally in February, pitcher Brady Singer said, “I feel like we got almost a whole new team.”

At the epicenter of the club’s $100 million plus free-agent spending spree was Smith, a linchpin of it all in more ways than one.

He immediately figured to upgrade the bullpen and, naturally, inject a winning veteran presence into the chemistry of the clubhouse.

But his addition added some connective tissue, perhaps even made for a catalyst, toward several key signings that either were under negotiation or would soon ensue.

Days later, at a news conference introducing starting pitcher Seth Lugo, Royals general manager and executive vice-president J.J. Picollo said Smith had “jumpstarted” what was to come.

Not merely by being the first high-profile player to formally join up among a group that would include starting pitcher Michael Wacha, reliever Chris Stratton, outfielder Hunter Renfroe and Lugo, but also by lending his voice and clout to the proceedings.

“That’s what everybody says,” said Smith, downplaying the idea.

With Stratton sitting nearby and following along, Smith laughed and said, “I didn’t buy him a car or anything.”

As if rehearsed, Stratton grinned and instantly said, “Still waiting.”

Just as immediately, Smith shot back, “I’ll get you a Hot Wheel.”

Smith and Stratton had been teammates in San Francisco and again last year in Texas. And while Smith never before had met Lugo, at Picollo’s suggestion Smith (and Stratton) reached out to him to make the case.

When Lugo signed, the first to congratulate him was Wacha, with whom Lugo played in New York and San Diego.

“So I said, ‘You ought to come to Kansas City with me,’” Lugo recalled.

Next thing you know, Lugo said, “Wacha texted me he was on his way over.”

And on the ripples kept extending, including directly from Stratton to Renfroe, college teammates at Mississippi State.

All starting with Smith, whose signature on a one-year, $5 million contract came in December, shortly after the Royals left the winter meetings in Nashville disconsolate over their inability to bring to fruition the pivotal sorts of deals they’d sought.

So before he even got the chance to take on the on-field closing role projected for him, Smith helped close deals that figure to bolster everything around him as he seeks to demonstrate that he’s something more than just a good-luck charm.

It’s all a long way from his first stint with the Royals, with whom he made his first MLB appearance in 2012 (he got blasted for three home runs and five runs in 3 1⁄3 innings at Yankee Stadium).

That was just days before the release of Men In Black 3, featuring another Will Smith.

So The Star that night suggested he might wish to have that memory wiped away by one of the “neuralyzers” used in the movies series.

But Smith is only too happy to remember the night, saying it was still a proud moment to share with his parents.

“That was one of the few times I got my (butt) kicked on a field,” he said, “and I really didn’t care.”

Still, he’d come to wonder, “Am I going to stay up here?” as he went 6-9 with a 5.32 ERA that season and transitioned a year later to the bullpen.

Then came the trade in 2013, he said, “just as you could see (the Royals) starting to turn in the right direction” and the young budding stars starting to “morph into the players they turned out to be.”

Now he sees the same sort of turn bubbling up in 2024.

And he is grateful to be part of the fresh high hopes this time around.

“Why not us?” he said. “We could surprise some people. We could do some stuff.”