RBI binge secures Matos NL Player of Week honors
The San Francisco Giants had an eventful off day Monday. Before the team left for Pittsburgh, outfielder Luis Matos was named National League Player of the Week. The 22-year-old outfielder earned recognition for turning into an RBI machine last week, etching his name into some of the more obscure corners of baseball’s record books.
Matos drove in 16 runs in seven days and followed a five-RBI game Friday night with a six-RBI game Saturday against the Colorado Rockies. In doing so, he became the youngest player in MLB history with at least five RBIs in back-to-back games and the fourth player in Giants history — joining Jack Clark (1982), Don Mueller (1951) and Bill Terry (1932) — to accomplish the feat.
Though the value attached to RBIs as a measure of performance has plummeted, Matos’ clutch hitting with runners on base last week injected some much-needed life into an offense that has been hindered by poor execution with runners in scoring position. It was behind Matos’ explosion that the Giants recorded their first series sweep and fueled their longest winning streak of the season, now four games.
President of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi has anointed Matos as Jung Hoo Lee’s replacement this season in the wake of the rookie Korean center fielder’s impending season-ending shoulder surgery, giving Matos an opportunity to cement his spot on the big-league roster. An NL Player of the Week honor is a good place to start.
Matos’ performance masks a tough reality about the state of the Giants’ outfield, thinned by injuries. After the Giants’ series-sweeping win versus the Rockies, utilityman Tyler Fitzgerald was optioned to Triple-A Sacramento. The team made no corresponding move, but this likely paves a path for recently acquired outfielder Ryan McKenna to join the major-league team.
McKenna, 27, was claimed off waivers from the Baltimore Orioles on Saturday. He would supplement an outfield without Lee for the season and Michael Conforto (hamstring) and Austin Slater (concussion) for the near future.
“Anytime you can add some depth and a guy that’s a good defender in all three of those spots — we still have guys on the IL — it adds to our depth,” manager Bob Melvin said on Sunday.
Matos and Heliot Ramos are making their cases to be lineup mainstays, even though both have had their fair share of defensive blips. Ramos has taken a few questionable routes, and Matos initially had trouble navigating center field. But both have injected offense into the lineup with some power and timely hitting while also making spectacular catches and assists that overshadow the blunders.
Still, the depth behind Matos, Ramos and Mike Yastrzemski is thin. Fitzgerald was the backup center fielder, and LaMonte Wade Jr., Blake Sabol and Jorge Soler are the only other players on the roster with outfield experience.
Drafted by the Orioles in 2015, McKenna couldn’t stick on what has become one of MLB’s most talentrich roster. He’d gone 3for-8 in nine games with the Orioles this season, but the organization designated him for assignment May 13 when Austin Hays returned from the injured list. In 291 games over four seasons with Baltimore, McKenna has hit .224/.302/.332 while playing all three outfield positions.