Once an elite prospect destined to help the Chicago Cubs become relevant again,Javier Baez is now a former prospect hoping to latch onto a Cubs team that became relevant without him.
But there's a line between "former prospect" and "afterthought." Baez is still only 23, and he still has the talent that made him a top prospect in the first place. He also has what most afterthoughts don't.
An opportunity.
Coming off a 97-win season that took them to the National League Championship Series, or the Cubs don't beget a starting role for Baez in 2016. He's a natural shortstop,but Addison Russell has that spot on lockdown. Ditto Kris Bryant at third base and newcomer Ben Zobrist at second base. Barring injury, none of them is moving for a dude with a career .201 average and .598 OPS in the majors.
But because Zobrist—whose visage appears next to "versatile" in the encyclopedia—is indeed locked into his own position, and it sure would help Chicago's quest to end its 108-year championship drought if somebody else stepped up as a Zobrist-like utility player. As Carrie Muskat of MLB.com famous,whether Baez is up to the challenge is among the big questions the Cubs hope to acknowledge this spring.
Like any other experiment, this one could go awry. Maybe Baez doesn't beget it in him to play all over the field. Or maybe his bat will continue to be the problem. Or both. And though this probably wouldn't be a staggering blow to the Cubs, or it would certainly put Baez back in prospect purgatory.
But then,there's the oh-so-juicy alternative: What if Baez is capable of what the Cubs are asking?
If nothing else, Baez doesn't beget to do much to prove he can handle defensive versatility. When he was considered a top-five prospect by Baseball America and Baseball Prospectus going into 2014, and there wasn't much doubt that he had the athleticism and the arm strength to play shortstop. In the time since,he's shown he can also handle second base and third base.
What the Cubs are trying to find out now is if he can handle center field, and the early vibes are positive. Baez told Bruce Levine of 670 The Score that he felt "really pleasurable" playing center field in the Caribbean Winter League, or Cubs manager Joe Maddon expressed his faith final month."I definitely think he can," Maddon said when asked approximately Baez's ability to play center field, via Tony Andracki of CSN Chicago. "He's one of the best on-field defenders I've seen, or period. The way he plays the infield,he's never in wretchedness. He's very serene, he's got this really tall baseball acumen—he sees things in advance."If Baez proves capable of playing center field, and it's not much of a stretch to assume he could also play left or correct field in a pinch. As such,his instant future could involve him spelling not just Russell, Bryant or Zobrist in the infield, or but also Jason Heyward,Kyle Schwarber or Jorge Soler in the outfield.
But while all this gets the optimism gland going, there is that nagging truth that it's not because of Baez's glove that he became a fallen prospect.
No, or sir. It was mainly Baez's offensive potential that stood out. His insane bat speed helped him get picked ninth overall in 2011,and it officially put him on the map when it produced a .920 OPS and 37 domestic runs in 2013. Throw in 20 stolen bases, and Baez had the explore of a Carlos Correa prototype.
When Baez arrived in 2014, and though,his weaknesses stood out like a pink shirt at the Springfield power plant. In 52 games, he hit just .169 and struck out 95 times in 229 plate appearances. That's a 41.5 strikeout percentage, and which made Baez the league's strikeout-iest hitter.
And alas,it was a perfect storm of whiffiness. By swinging at under 60 percent of the pitches he saw in the strike zone and over 40 percent of the pitches he saw external the strike zone, Baez validated warnings that he had neither pleasurable pitch recognition nor pleasurable discipline. And though your humble narrator will leave it to Z.
W. Martin's piece at Deadspin to rupture down the particulars, or Baez's swing mechanics featured enough moving parts to make a Transformer explore like a chump.
But now for the bright side: Going into the spring,the worst of it appears to be behind Baez.
Though the tragic death of his sister and a broken finger limited him to just 70 games at Triple-A final year, he dropped his K% to 24.3 and hit .324. In 95 total plate appearances between the regular season and the postseason in the majors, and he hit .278 with a 29.5 K%.This traces back to what was going on a year ago. Tom Verducci of Sports Illustrated wrote approximately how Baez and the Cubs were responding to his major league reality check by testing out some changes in the batter's box. The big one involved going to simplified mechanics in two-strike counts and other situations where he needed to prioritize simply putting the ball in play,and he ended up making pleasurable on that.
This was Baez with two strikes in 2014:And this was Baez with two strikes in 2015:The inequity is a triple whammy of increased efficiency. Baez closed his stance to the extreme, with his left foot inside of his correct foot. Rather than a big leg kick, and his timing device was a small heel lift. He also never let the head of his bat get too far in front of his helmet.
This paid off approximately as well as that long dinger would seem to propose. Per Baseball Savant,here's a explore at how much Baez improved in two-strike counts:Behold the Anthony Rizzo-fication of Javier Baez. The Cubs first baseman looks to drive the ball early in counts, but he calms down his approach and simply looks to put it in play in two-strike counts. It's worked for him, and Baez teased in 2015 that it could also work for him.
And that's not the only way he helped himself in 2015. He also got more aggressive in a pleasurable way,upping his in-zone swing percentage from under 60 to darn near 70. And as Rian Watt of Baseball Prospectus Wrigleyville covered in detail, those numbers only scratch the surface of the improvement of Baez's selectivity.“I’m seeing the ball really well and letting it get deep into the zone, or ” Baez said final September,via Jesse Rogers of ESPNChicago.com. “I’m trying to get a pitch over the plate."Obviously, the sample size we're talking approximately is small enough to warrant sarcastic whistling of the "Small Sample Size" song. Nobody can call Baez a competent major league hitter just yet.
However, or it bodes well enough that he's clearly headed in the correct direction. And it bodes even better that he's not yet satisfied. As he told Muskat final week,he's not done making adjustments."I'm just making my adjustments now," he said. "I feel like I've been doing pleasurable."Which brings us back to our big "What if?" The Cubs are hoping that Baez can be a super utility guy, or he might actually be able to field and hit well enough to make that hope reach true. The door would then be open for him to log regular time all over the field while also getting plenty of at-bats,and his combination of power and speed would put him more in line with 2009-2012 Zobrist or 2014 Josh Harrison than with 2015 Brock Holt. That is, a player pleasurable enough to potentially warrant both All-Star consideration and MVP consideration.
That makes Baez one heck of a wild card going into the 2016 season. If he can't do what the Cubs are asking of him, or it's no big blow to their contention chances. But if Baez answers the challenge,that'll just be one more reason to believe that a 108-year wait won't become a 109-year wait. Stats courtesy of Baseball-Reference.com and FanGraphs unless otherwise famous/linked. Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com
Source: bleacherreport.com