Cristian Santana explodes

Phil Gurnee ♦ June 29, 2017 ♦ 1 Comment

I’ve learned not to pay attention to what happens in the short season rookie leagues but sometimes a performance just can’t be ignored.  The Odgen season in the Pioneer League started on June 19th, and one hitter has caught my eye.

Cristian Santana is making a mockery of the Pioneer League pitching. The 20-year-old in his first nine games has twenty-one hits in his first thirty-six at-bats. Throw in six walks and you get a stat line of .583 / .628 / 1.028 / 1.656. He went hitless in his 2nd game but has collected at least two hits in the other eight games.

DATE        AB R H HR RBI BB SO 
06/20/2017   4 0 0 0   0  0  0 
06/21/2017   4 2 3 1   2  0  0 
06/22/2017   5 3 3 0   0  0  1 
06/23/2017   4 3 4 1   3  0  0 
06/24/2017   5 1 2 0   2  0  1 
06/26/2017   4 1 2 0   0  1  1 
06/27/2017   4 3 3 1   4  1  1 
06/28/2017   3 1 2 0   1  1  0 

This is what Fangraphs had to say about him at the start of the year:

Cristian Santana, 3B – Santana has the most entertaining set-up I’ve ever seen: he kicks his front leg out in front of his body and points the tip of the bat toward the first-base dugout. I imagine he won’t be doing that for long, so treasure it while you can. Aside from that quirk and the fact that Santana takes hyper-aggressive hacks that cause him to swing and miss a ton, I really like him. I like the body, the athleticism, the bat speed, current raw power, raw power projection, his plus arm and his natural defensive footwork over at third base. I just can’t see this guy hitting at all unless there are serious changes made to his approach.

Makes me wonder if they made those changes to his approach.