Baseball is hard. Predictions are pointless. No one knew that Jung-Hoo Lee, 26, would be out for the season with an injury, or that his team, the San Francisco Giants, would find a replacement so quickly.
Major League Baseball (MLB) is currently energized by the rise of the “divine outfielder,” a player who can make high-priced players look like dirt. Enter San Francisco's Luis Matos (22).
Matos was named the National League (NL0) Player of the Week after hitting .385 (10-for-26) with two home runs, 16 RBIs, three doubles, and a 1.115 on-base percentage (OPS) in six games last week. He had five and six RBIs in the second game of a three-game series against the Colorado Rockies on April 18, respectively. According to MLB.com, Matos is only the fourth player 22 years old or younger to have 11 RBI in two games since 1920.
Coincidentally, Matos is the replacement for Jung-Hoo Lee. Lee suffered a shoulder injury after colliding with the fence while fielding a line drive to right-center field from Jamer Candelario in the top of the first inning against the Cincinnati Reds on Dec. 13 and underwent surgery on Dec. 18, ending his rookie season. Matos started in center field, his last position, against the Los Angeles Dodgers on April 14 and hit a three-run home run. From that game, he went on a five-game hitting streak, erasing Lee's absence.
“That's the same number of RBIs Ronald Acuna Jr. has produced all season (11),” Yahoo wrote after Matos' second straight game with five or more RBIs. “The 16 RBIs Matos produced in 26 at-bats last week were more than Carlos Correa had in 159 at-bats (12),” the publication added.
Acuna Jr. is a hard-hitting slugger who was named NL Most Valuable Player (MVP) in the 2023 season. Correa is also one of the league's top center fielders, having signed a three-year, $153 million deal with Minnesota in March 2022. The two hitters have struggled this season, and Matos' breakout has been highlighted.
Born in 2002 in Venezuela, Matos comes from a “baseball family,” as his entire family played the game. He joined San Francisco in July 2018 via international signing. The signing bonus ($725,000) was quite large.
It wasn"t until the 2021 season that he started playing in the minor leagues. In 2022, he batted just .211 in High Single-A due 토토 to a thigh injury, but in 2023, he made his big league debut with a triple-digit batting average in Double-A and Triple-A.
In 2023, he was a backup outfielder. In 76 games and 253 at-bats, he batted .250, a mediocre performance. He briefly made the opening day roster in April, when Lee was acquired, but was sent back to the minors. In his first 31 games with the Triple-A Sacramento Rivercats, he batted just .218 with three home runs.
But Matos has been waiting in the wings since Lee's departure. Teammate and fellow prospect Casey Schmidt was impressed with his talent. His potential was finally unleashed.
It's hard to argue with Lee's position. Lee is the highest-paid player on the team at $113 million. Business logic dictates that Matos is the one who has to prove his worth with performance.
The hope is that the matured Matos and the “pride of Korean baseball,” Lee Jung-hoo, will be able to work together in the outfield and 토토사이트 추천 lead San Francisco to compete in the National League West, which is as tough as the AL East.
In addition to Lee and Matos, the Giants are loaded with early- to mid-20s prospects, including No. 1 prospect Marco Luciano (infield), catcher Patrick Bailey, who has turned into a starter, and Schmidt, who had the game-winning hit in Cincinnati on April 13, the day Lee left.
For some time, San Francisco has been trying to find the next generation of players to follow in the footsteps of the Brandon Belt-Buster Posey-Brandon Crawford trio of even-numbered World Series winners (2010-2012-2014), while also developing Austin Slater, Ramonte Wade Jr. and Mike Yastrzemski. Wade Jr. and Yastrzemski became 20+ home run hitters, but didn't quite reach the level expected. Now it's up to the next generation, including Jung-Hoo Lee.
