Quintin Berry just did something that no Tigers player has done since 1918: get a hit in 5 straight games to start his MLB career. He
went 3-4 with a walk in his 5th game to give him a stat line of .381/.458/.476/.935. Start him every day! Give him leftfield! Keep him in the
leadoff spot!
It's only been 5 games.
His BABIP is .533 and has a 77% ground ball rate. Those are unsustainable rates that happens when dealing with small sample sizes. I don't think anyone
believes that he was going to continue to hit .380 anyway, but a little perspective is nice. He's hit only 2 line drives according to FanGraphs. It's
hard to have a high batting average when all you are doing is hitting ground balls.
He's 27 years old and is just now getting his first taste of ML baseball. He didn't even touch AAA until last year, and that was only 4 games. His
career minor league batting line is .267/.358/.338/.697 with only 20 HR in over 3000 PA. He does have 261 SB, reaching 40+ SB in 3 separate years (he
also 3 for the Tigers). It's hard to get excited about a guy who has a higher OBP than his SLG. I get it, some players are late bloomers and Berry has
always had a decent OBP, and was hitting .270/.368/.321 at AAA Toledo before the Tigers called him up.
Quintin Berry should stick around for a while even when Austin Jackson comes back. But he shouldn't be handed an everyday job...yet. Brennan Boesch and
Delmon Young haven't exactly been having career years. Is Quintin Berry really better than both of them, though?
Don Kelly is batting .145/.234/.145/.445 and Ryan Raburn is batting .151/.215/.218/.434. Both are expendable at this point. Berry has given this
offense a spark
including a nice defensive catch
and the Tigers should ride that for as long as they can.
But it's only been 5 games.
A look at MLB with a focus on the Detroit Tigers.
I think you called this one pretty well. If he continues to strike out a lot we may not see him around very long.
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