ON CENTER STAGE
Great young players abound
LOS ANGELES» Carlos Correa is such a fresh face, his first major-league hit was assisted by technology.
When he made his debut for Houston on June 8, 2015, Correa hit a threehopper off White Sox ace Chris Sale and was called out by first-base umpire Larry Vanover. About a minute later, a replay umpire in New York overruled the call, and the 20-year-old had an infield single and his first RBI.
A new generation of ballplayers is featured in the World Series starting Tuesday night. Houston’s dynamic infield duo of Correa and the diminutive Jose Altuve sparks the top offense in the major leagues. The tantalizing trio of Cody Bellinger, Corey Seager and Chris Taylor has the Los Angeles Dodgers in the Series for the first time since 1988.
“Media day in Oklahoma City was about two people there, and now I’m here and getting ready for the World Series,” Bellinger said. “I could never imagine this.”
Altuve skipped Triple-A and made it to the major leagues on July 20, 2011. He singled off Washington’s Tyler Clippard that night in his debut.
Houston finished last in each of his first three seasons. Now Altuve is among four Astros remaining from the team that lost a club-record 111 games in 2013, joined by pitchers Dallas Keuchel and Brad Peacock along with utilityman Marwin Gonzalez.
At 27, he’s already a five-time allstar and three-time batting champion.
“I’m coming from a team that lost a hundred games in a row, three straight years,” Altuve said. “We made the playoffs in 2015. We didn’t make it last year, and after last year we were uncomfortable because we were watching the playoff games from home.”
Correa, the top pick in the 2012 amateur draft, was a first-time all-star this season, hitting 24 homers and driving in 84 runs despite a torn ligament in his left thumb that needed surgery, causing him to miss 42 games.
Bellinger, son of former Yankees infielder Clay Bellinger, started the season at Triple-A Oklahoma City and made his debut April 25 at San Francisco. He found out about his call-up at 2 a.m. after noticing he had four missed calls from Dodgers farm director Gabe Kapler.
At 21, Bellinger became the youngest position player in Dodgers history selected for the All-Star Game, set a National League rookie record with 39 homers and had 97 RBIs in 132 games. Now he’s talking to his dad about his three World Series appearances.
Seager, at 23 the youngest of three brothers who played pro ball, was a unanimous pick as NL rookie of the year in 2016 and repeated as an all-star this season. He became the first Dodgers player since Jackie Robinson in 1947-48 with 30 doubles or more in each of his first two seasons, and his 52 career home runs is already secondmost among Dodgers shortstop behind Pee Wee Reese’s 122. Seager missed the NL Championship Series after hurting his back on a slide into second base in Game 3 of the Division Series but is expected to be in the starting lineup for the opener against the Astros.
Seager thought back to watching on television as Derek Jeter led the New York Yankees to the 2009 title.
“It’s easy to fall in love with the guy, on and off the field what he did for that community, what he did for that culture, that team,” Seager said.
Taylor blossomed at 27 after 2½ unremarkable seasons with Seattle. Traded to the Dodgers in June 2016, he started the season at Triple-A, was called up April 19 and earned the leadoff spot in the batting order.