Jays think Morales can fill big shoes — size Double-E
DUNEDIN, FLA.— Quick question: Who was the Jays’ last full-time DH? Answer: Frank Thomas. That was a decade ago, 2007, and the Big Hurt crushed 29 home runs for Toronto, including the 500th of his career. A couple of weeks into 2008 it was, “What have you done for me lately?” with John Gibbons doing the asking in his maiden manager voyage. (Uh, hit a grand slam on April 6?) No matter. Gibbons benched Thomas on April 19 and the Jays released him the next day. Sour ending.
Designated hitter has come to mean something rather different in latter times, especially for the Jays, who’ve spread the bat-only exceptionalism around the roster, using it as a get-outof-fielding card for players in need of rest or those not quite fully recovered from injury rehab but hitting-able.
Fast forward 10 years from the Thomas era and Toronto once again has a retrostyle full-time — that is to say primarily — DH in Kendrys Morales. And the most that many Toronto ball fans know about the guy is that he’s not, alas and alack, Edwin Encarnacion.
The versatility of Encarnacion is gone too: 86 games as DH last year but 75 games starting at first base, where Double-E had become quite a decent defender and guardian of the sack.
But of course it’s Encarnacion’s mighty Louisville Slugger (or, sometimes, Marucci) that will be hugely missed, accounting as it did for 42 jacks and 127 RBIs in his swan-song season as a Jay. And if the Jays hadn’t signed Morales as a Plan B power hitter before Plan A was actually off the table, E.E. might still be in the Toronto fold rather than taking his bats, balls, dolls and dishes to Cleveland. None of which is Morales’ fault. “Encarnacion is a major player in the major leagues,” Morales was saying on Tuesday, before the Jays got their hats handed to them by Team Canada. “The only thing I can tell you is, I’m going to try my best to take his place.”
It’s a question the quiet-spoken (and unilingual Spanish-speaking, despite 10 years-plus living in the continental U.S.) Morales has fielded plenty in spring training: How you gonna fill Encarnacion’s cleats? The 33-year-old has been exceedingly patient in his reply, which has become all but canned now into the fourth week of spring training. “I don’t feel any pressure. Edwin is a great hitter. Edwin hits for power.
“Edwin did a very good job for the Jays. I am not Edwin.’’
He was, however, the most potent power bat in Kansas City last year, taking it yard on 30 occasions. When the Royals declined to pick up the club option over the winter, the Jays stepped up, signing the Cuban-born Morales to a three-year, $33-million contact as their un-Edwin DH-anddone specialist, making Toronto his fifth MLB employer since 2006. That’s a rather vagabond career for a player with mouth-watering offence and, entering his Jays phase, having compiled a .273 career average with a .331 on-base percentage and .465 slugging average, 162 home runs and 586 ribbies. Also, lest it be forgotten, a World Series ring in 2015, after defeating Toronto in the American League Championship Series.
“He’s great, professional, obviously been doing it for a long time,” observes Troy Tulowitzki of his new teammate. “It’s fun just to watch him go about his business, take BP, just to see how he’s been so successful for so long. And it’s easy to see.’’
An all-in Morales hasn’t grumbled about making a handful of long bus trips in the Grapefruit League, which he might have considered unworthy of his veteran status, and that impressed Gibbons. In Florida, Morales has gone 6-for-13 through six games at DH and zero anywhere else, for a .462 average. Hitting behind a torrid Jose Bautista, he’s also provided some protection for the franchise slugger, as Encarnacion did for five years. “Teams are always aware of who’s hitting on deck,’’ Gibbons noted. “That’s one of the benefits our team had the last couple of years. It’s been so thick top to bottom, so it’s tough to navigate our lineup. Another good hitter behind Jose — that’s dangerous.’’
Gibbons also claimed Tuesday: “We’re not locked in where everybody’s going to be yet.’’ As if Morales is destined for any spot other than cleanup. “But that’s probably what’s going to happen.
“It’s just spring training but watching Kendrys, I’ve seen enough of him. He’s not just a slugger. He’s a pretty good hitter. And he’s a switchhitter.’’
A lefty bat, as required, which the heavily right-tilting Jays have so desperately needed.
Know who else could have used Morales and his Popeye arms at the moment? Team Cuba. But of course Havana won’t allow defectors to play on their World Baseball Classic squad, which is why they’ll be hardpressed to get out of the first round, despite gifted Cubans playing ball in North America and a diplomatic thaw in relations with Washington and Fidel Castro dead.
“No, it’s not disappointing,” Morales insists. “I am Cuban, but if they don’t want me to play I have to respect their decision. I hope, in the future, there will be changes that help all the Cuban players here in the United States. But I don’t see anything happening abruptly.’’
The dream, or fantasy, is that Major League Baseball might some day extend all the way to Havana, Cuba just 90 miles across the water from Florida, so hardly a travel issue if baseball dips another toe into international franchising. “They have been talking about that for many years now,” Morales says, skeptically. “Every year they come out with a new version of it.’’
This is how desperate Morales was to play in North America: a dozen attempts at escaping before — three times tossed into jail for it — before making it to Florida on a raft in 2004, ultimately signed by the Angels, where he would have his breakout season with 34 home runs as a slugging first baseman. His daring journey across the ocean is not a subject he cares to revisit. “That happened many years ago. I really would like not to talk about it.”
He will, though, happily explain why Toronto feels like a good fit.
“I played for many years against Toronto. I’ve seen the way they play. I like the way they play. And I have seen the way they are off the field. I like that too.’’
Doubtless he’ll be just as fond of hitting-friendly Rogers Centre, after seasons spent clubbing balls in the vast acreage of Kauffman Stadium and Angel Stadium and Safeco Field. “The balls fly out of (Rogers), a great park for offence. I hope everything will play out pretty well there for me.”
Entering his 11th season — one whole year, 2011, lost to a broken ankle that had to be surgically repaired twice — Morales refuses to be cast as a poor man’s Edwin.
“I don’t think I have to prove anything to anybody. I have been in the big leagues for 10 years. All that is left for me is to keep on playing and doing the best that I can.”