Padres position conundrum in left field: Jabari Blash or Melvin Upton Jr?

All I need is a chance. We’ve all thought it. We’ve all wanted to succeed and taste glory in our dreams. Maybe you can make a mean chicken marsala and want to open an italian restaurant. The kind where a little old lady greets you at the door and everyone who walks by calls her Mama, lovingly (I’ve been there, it’s a restaurant named Sorrento in Perth, Western Australia, go there, eat and smile, you won’t regret it). Maybe you can rock the piano and all you need is a minute of Steven Tyler’s time. Maybe you are a struggling third base prospect for the Pittsburgh Pirates in 2008 who wants to hit homers and be called Joey Bats someday. Maybe you are a 26 year old man from the Virgin Islands who wants to send pitchers mistakes deep into the night at Petco. If you are the last one, you are Jabari Blash and we want to see your dreams come true.

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Jabari Blash is on the fringe of making the Padres roster, and his slightly tweaked hamstring will likely help him as it gives the Padres front office options, including stashing him on the disabled list for a couple weeks. Then he would need some rehab time in the minors, which is capped at 20 days maximum, and the next thing you know, it’s mid-May or so if the tweaked hamstring is “stubborn” and needs more than 15 days to heal. Blash is a Rule 5 draftee, which means he needs to be offered back to his original team, the Seattle Mariners, if he doesn’t stay on the Padres 25 man roster or the DL for the entire season. This route gives the Padres a chance to first see what Melvin Upton and Travis Jankowski can accomplish given time in left field and spelling Jon Jay in center.

The real test will come there for the Padres. Melvin Upton is owed some amount of money that comes in LARGE duffel bags. Really large ($31.9 million over the next two years). So much money, I can’t even grasp the concept of how Frank Wren thought Upton was worth that in November of 2012 when he signed him to the contract the Padres inherited last year. Upton came over with Craig Kimbrel. I guess it was the year Nick Swisher, Michael Bourn and Josh Hamilton also broke the bank, so Upton wasn’t that bad of a deal in comparison. However, he now stands to not only eat up a chunk of the payroll but also playing time in left field; time better suited to finding out what Blash, and to some extent Jankowski as well can do.

Upton is a known quantity and he will deliver a certain level of play. Yes, he exceeded expectations in 2015 with a .259 batting average, nice defense in center, striking out only 27% of the time and a healthy WAR of 1.9. But that is about the ceiling for the Hampton Roads product at this point in his career. If you have a known quantity, and it is not enough to get you to the playoffs, which it is not, and there is little future value in showcasing this asset as he is mostly unmovable unless you package him with Tyson Ross, which they should not, then why not give innings and plate appearances to an asset that has room to grow? I’m going to make my case using Jose Bautista and Bernie Williams as examples as to why this strategy could be healthy for the Padres.

In August of 2008 Jose Bautista was hitting .242, had struck out 77 times and walked 38 times with 12 homers in 363 plate appearances when the Pirates cut bait on him and traded him to the Blue Jays. He fared worse for the Jays after the trade. In 2009 Joey Bats provided a similar season to 2008, ringing up 13 homers, striking out 85 times and walking 56 in 404 plate appearances. Nothing special and at 29 in danger of fading into waiver wire territory and the end of his big league dream. But, at the time the Blue Jays had Travis Snider giving so-so production in LF and the White Sox bailed out Toronto by selecting incumbent right fielder Alex Rios on waivers, clearing his salary and giving Joey Bats a chance. All he needed was a chance. Joey Bats hit 54 home runs in 2010 and is now a superstar in major league baseball. Travis Snider was going to provide Toronto with a known quantity of play in 2010, but for a Toronto team that won 75 games in 2009, the right call was to give Bautista a chance in 2010, and it resulted in huge numbers and the Blue Jays going from 75 wins to 85 wins.

In 1992 Bernie Williams had 8 home runs in 423 plate appearances at AAA Columbus for the Yankees top farm team. He had a nice .308 batting average to go with that, but he wasn’t knocking the ball out of the park every day. He had spent the last two years as the top prospect in the Yankees system though. But, the Yankees had Roberto Kelly patrolling center. Until opportunity opened up a spot for Bernie. Kelly got traded for Paul O’Neill in the offseason of 1992 and a chance was given to Bernie Williams. These were the Yankees, and in the 80’s and early 90’s they never gave rookies chances. But they knew Roberto Kelly had a ceiling, and it wasn’t going to get them to the playoffs. Bernie went on to collect four World Series rings, one at the expense of the Padres in 1998, two top ten MVP finishes and now has a plaque in Monument Park at Yankee Stadium. He got a chance.

Now, this is not to say that chances haven’t failed in the past, as for every Joey Bats or Bernie Williams, we can point to a Jedd Gyorko, who never really succeeded after his rookie year, or a Donovan Tate or Jon Knott or any other rookie who never successfully transitioned from the prospect list to the lineup card posted in Petco. But, the alternative is to have a guy who will only get you so far playing left field. Only so far, and no further.

Blash is projected by ZiPS (one of the many popular advanced projection tools that looks at past performance and trends based on age and numbers) to hit .238 and slug 21 homers in 2016 if given 442 plate appearances over 106 games. If he comes back in mid-May he will have missed roughly 45 games, leaving him 117 to get to that number. In 2009 Bautista hit .235 with 13 homers in 409 plate appearances. He was also 2 years older than Blash. I personally watched Blash in a spring training game against the Royals on March 28^th. He destroyed a Dillon Gee pitch. Unfortunately for Blash the left fielder was a step from the warning track and got in the way of the ball on its way to the fence. Blash has talent, currently sitting at #16 on the Padres top 30 prospects list. If given the chance he stands to outperform Upton and give the Padres a sorely needed power threat. Blash has hit 32, 18 and 25 home runs in the last three seasons in the minors. The last time the Padres had a 30 home run guy? 2012, Chase Headley.

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In the end, the Padres are probably going to give at bats to Upton, Jankowski and when he returns give Blash a few starts a week to see what he can do. They did this last year with Hedges and it resulted in a worn down Derek Norris and Hedges rotting on the bench wasting service time while playing roughly once every two weeks. If you want to develop talent, you have to invest time in them. Upton will give you adequate results, but for what? He’s not likely to blossom, although Bautista is an example of a player getting it an advanced age, so why not Upton? I just don’t see it, Upton doesn’t appear to have the drive of Bautista. Blash has the hunger, is physically imposing at 6’5” and a reported 235 and if given the chance, may show you something special and bring some oohs and ahhs to a quiet Petco Park this summer.