#2
Dominic Smith, 1B
Biography: Born June 15, 1995 in Los Angeles, California, the Mets drafted Smith out of Junipero Serra High School with the 11th overall pick in the 2013 MLB Amateur Draft. Under Sandy Alderson, the Mets wanted to stock their minor league system with position players that were known to hit, and that is exactly what they got in Dominic Smith. As a 20-year-old, Smith has finished a full season playing in Single-A St. Lucie, and has shown he can play.
Scouting: Mets scout Tommy Tanous described Smith as being one of the best hitters in the 2013 draft, and quite advanced for someone coming out of high school. People around baseball were impressed with his maturity, and echoed Tanous’ thoughts about his hitting ability.
His fielding has also opened up eyes, as Smith used to play outfield and pitch in high school. He can throw around 90 MPH, and has some speed to play first base. Throughout his career in the minors, he has not had a fielding percentage below .980, which is pretty promising.
2015: Smith started the season in Single-A St. Lucie, and would play his entire campaign there. He hit .305 with 6 homers, 33 doubles and 79 RBIs. His ability to drive in that many runs in 118 games shows he knows what to do at the plate, and the amount of doubles shows there is some authority in his swing. As far as home run power, we have not seen enough of that yet, but he is still young and can add more power moving forward.
Smith also played in the Arizona Fall League, and hit .362 with an OBP of .483. He hit one homer with four doubles in 14 games.
Brian: “We get hung up sometimes on trying to find guys who are similar to others. To me it’s interesting how Smith is almost the complete opposite of Lucas Duda, the guy he may one day replace.”
David: “Smith started poorly and became the hottest hitter in all the minors. He’s still not showing the type of power that fans and scouts both want from him but he’s got time to add power to his plus plus contact tool.”
Rob: “The in-game power is finally starting to come around, though it’s still not quite where you’d like to see it at this point in Smith’s development. Still, he (probably) will start the 2016 season as a 20-year-old in AA where he’ll look to build on the success he saw in A+ that won him Florida State League MVP. AA will be a big jump and test for him, but I’m still bullish on his evental power potential.”
James: “Smith has been a solid player throughout the minor leagues. His defense is going to help out the entire infield, which helps out the pitching staff. If the power comes, Smith is going to be a fixture in the big leagues when he gets there.”
Yes, it looks like Dom is the best prospect on the immediate horizon.
I was most impressed by the way he recovered from a horrendous start to the season. His early numbers were disastrous. Just brutal. But slowly, steadily, he climbed out of that hole to complete an excellent season. I am hopeful.
I think that’s a great quality as well.
Nice fielder….good arm…. Doubles and RBI machine ….. So, that profiles as a Hernandez “type”…. I would really like that
He has that good an arm, and they took him from the outfield? Wow. The kid had a great year.
Smith logged time at that body building clinic that the Mets use, and it seems the results show in his numbers. That was the story with Wilmer as well, more in his play in the field than at the plate.
A few guys have turned their careers around with fitness conditioning; Brian Downing comes to mind, Mike Schmidt, to a lesser extent Gabe Kapler. The personal equation in evaluating a ballplayer is hard to read from our perspective, but it is nonetheless real.
Gabe Kapler worked out in front of a mirror a lot. He hardly turned his career around. Actually, I’ve long thought that David Wright has some of the same problems. Very muscle bound and stocky, thicker and slower, but where’s the power? Obviously, the back issue obscures the debate concerning DW, but I’ve long felt that he looks wrong to my eyes, that he should be doing more yoga and fewer bench presses.
I don’t recall Mike Schmidt ever turning his career around. Seems like he showed up in the early 70s and was almost instantly a force.
I know many weekend warriors who work out so hard. Just walk into the local YMCA, etc. So the idea that “fitness” is some kind of option at this level — or that a few weeks in the Mets camp is a big deal — is like wind over the water to me. There’s not a HS program that doesn’t require athletes to lift, run, and so on.
One would assume that these modern athletes are exercising. That said, I heard that Smith had a “soft” body when the Mets drafted him. Hopefully he’s on the right path now.
James, my nephew was the kicker in his 7th grade football team. Not even the punter, just kicker. They had to lift. I was pretty upset about that and let my sister and brother in-law know it. Seventh grader??
I agree that these guys need flexibility also.
Gabe Kapler was a low-round draft pick who had the great fortune of batting behind two guys (Dave Roberts and Robert Fick) who posted OBPs over .400 in the same season. That led to 147 RBIs in the minors, a virtually unheard of number in the late 20th Century.
He never had a 2.0 fWAR in the majors, a career that saw him play from 1998-2010. He may have been a super teammate. His ability to play all 3 OF positions was no doubt handy. But he was never remotely a great player. Maybe you can argue that weight training for him made the difference between being a minor league lifer and a major league journeyman. I won’t argue that.
But I’ll say that he got a reputation as a feared hitter because of his monster RBI year in 1998.
As for Mike Schmidt, he hit right away against the Mets. He hit 18 HR in 1973 and 5 of those were against the Mets. He had a .697 OPS overall but against the Mets that year, it was 1.032
That year he had a 30.7 K% and a .244 BABIP. The next year he had a 20.1 K% and a .311 BABIP. Maybe you can argue that weight lifting allowed the hits to fall in but I wouldn’t put a lot of weight on that argument. It certainly didn’t do anything for shaving 10% off his K-rate.
The one guy I wish would have participated in weight training was Wayne Garrett. He used to crush the ball and it would go to the warning track. He’s a guy who I could see some extra strength would have resulted in some extra power.
Wayne Garrett was under-rated, and today’s SABR environment would have helped raise his profile. He took walks but, it’s true, warning track power. He think he hit around 10-12 a year.
Kapler actually had 2-3 years where his numbers were good, then he became terrible. I’d contend that it’s very possible all the mirror-gazing did more harm than good.
I saw him play in 2014 and for a #1 pick I was not impressed with his play. He could not turn on the ball. He obviously has matured and is showing good signs. He is only a 20 years old and heading into AA. Now that is impressive.
Looks a lot more to me like Tony Gwynn than Lucas Duda. Now that would be nice on the right side of the IF with a (RHB) Joe Morgan (Dilson Herrera) along side.
How much power should he have shown by now? It sounds like there is some magical number he needed to hit to show that he had enough pop to be considered an elite prospect. It seems like whatever home run number we are looking for is way outclassed by his overall run production and stellar eye at the plate.