Seattle Mariners shortstop Jean Segura slides safely into third base ahead of a tag from Toronto Blue Jays third baseman Josh Donaldson in the fourth inning at the Rogers Centre, in Toronto, on May 10, 2018.Dan Hamilton/Reuters
Tune into any sports-talk radio station or tap your way into the countless baseball blogs and it seems as though the same programmer controls the content.
Everybody, it seems, has a take on Vladimir Guerrero Jr., the Toronto Blue Jays top prospect whose prodigious skills are drawing raves as he dismantles pitching staffs in Double A.
Many are of the belief that Guerrero, after a little more than 100 at-bats with the New Hampshire Fisher Cats, has already proved that he deserves his ticket into the big leagues with the spinning-their-wheels Blue Jays.
Heading into Thursday, Guerrero was hitting a lofty .387 to lead the Eastern League with both runs batted in, 35, and hits, 41.
His on-base-plus slugging percentage (OPS), an advanced metric that measures the ability of a player to get on base and hit for power, is 1.091. An OPS of around .900 is considered exceptional.
All this at the tender age of 19.
As a result, many are suggesting the Blue Jays would be better off with the imposing youngster in their lineup. How could he be any worse than the likes of Kendrys Morales, who sheepishly carted a career-worst 0-for-25 drought into Thursday night’s rubber game against the Seattle Mariners at Rogers Centre?
Toronto general manager Ross Atkins has certainly heard all the chatter regarding Guerrero, although he professes he tries to block it all out when diehard fans call radio shows to share their wealth of knowledge.
Atkins said the plan for Guerrero is simple – to try to cultivate all his considerable talents to the highest possible level to make sure that when that time does come for his advancement into the major leagues, he will have the best possible chance to succeed.
“How strong his foundation is as a professional athlete is what we’re focusing on so that when he does come here he will be as complete as possible to be elite,” Atkins said during a pregame interview inside the Toronto dugout.
Atkins would not say if he thought that moment would come this season. But he left the door open to the possibility.
“It wouldn’t make any sense for us to ever eliminate any opportunity to make our organization better,” he said. “And part of making our organization better is winning here.”
With a few more outings such as Thursday’s 9-3 savaging by the Mariners, which provided Seattle with a 2-1 series victory, Guerrero’s time could be sooner.
The Blue Jays, 20-18, are 8-12 over their past 20 outings and will welcome tough division rival Boston Red Sox to town for a three-game weekend set.
Seattle accomplished its rout against Toronto lefty J.A. Happ, who has been the Blue Jays best starter this season.
Happ never got on track and surrendered a grand slam to Seattle third baseman Kyle Seager in the first inning, his first of two in the game, where the Mariners sent nine batters to the plate for a 4-0 lead. Seager drove in five runs.
After their opening outburst, Seattle added singles over the next four innings to take command – seven of the runs chalked up to Happ, who was rocked for 10 hits over just 3 1/3 innings, by far his shortest outing on the season.
In fact, Happ has not departed this early in a game since Sept. 4, 2016, when he lasted all but 2 2/3 innings against the Tampa Bay Rays.
Toronto got a two-run home run by catcher Russell Martin, his fifth of the season.
Atkins said he knew Guerrero was good, but his consistently high level this season has been somewhat astonishing.
“Any time a player gets to the point where they’re performing at a clip where they go 1-for-4 and their OPS drops 100 points, that’s surprising,” Atkins said. “So we’re glad we have it, we’re glad he’s here.”
Guerrero is stilling learning the nuances of a new position at third base, the one area of his game that is still lagging. And don’t forget, the Blue Jays – for the time being, anyways – have that area pretty well covered at the big league level.
“He’s an exceptional hitter, an exceptional offensive player and that’s fun for him to work on,” Atkins said. “We would like to get his defence to the same level. It’s not quite as good as he is offensively.
“But because of his instincts, his work ethic and his open-mindedness to innovate and how he can become a better defender, we want to tap into that.”