Phillies' Most Enigmatic Player is Someone You Wouldn't Expect
The Philadelphia Phillies' most confusing player is someone you wouldn't initially expect.
Video Transcript
So Justin Crawford is probably the most enigmatic Phillies player this season.
It sounds strange to say because he's a rookie, but we're heading into the year, the reason why the Phillies liked Crawford so much as a starting center fielder was because of his speed and his defense and his, his contact.
But he has not been great defensively this year, which is pretty surprising given how, how athletic he is.
Has sixteen stolen bases, which is decent, but you expect, you know, thirty or more from him.
And while he's had a good month of August with eight ninety OPS, he had a five eighty-nine OPS in July.
He's been really bad away from Citizens Bank Park this season.
And just on the season as a whole, you look at his, his overall numbers, you look at his peripherals, you know, his stat cast numbers, it doesn't look pretty at all.
Now, I do think that Crawford could be a part of the Phillies long term, but he may be best suited as a fourth outfielder, maybe even in one of the corners, because I'm not sure they can live with his lack of power, especially if he's not giving them elite defense in the outfield, which, you know, when he was in the minor leagues, he's a three twenty-two hitter, projected to be a, a very good defender.
And he, he, he has the tools, no question about it, but he hasn't shown it as much this year.
Just hitting a ton of ground balls, you know, and not making hard contact at all.
Most of his contact is, you know, is, is very weak contact.
Now, he's not striking out, which is really good.
That's great.
It's very impressive for a rookie, but his walk rate is very low.
Th-this may just be who Crawford is.
I know he's still very young.
He's twenty-two years old.
It's time for him to improve.
But for a Phillies team that's always in win now mode, they may have to weigh their options during the off-season and think, you know, "Is Crawford the best solution for us to start in the outfield next year, or do we need to get a more proven player and then put Crawford on the bench to serve as a fourth outfielder?"
