So, I'm a bit obsessive about things and I've been thinking a lot about Heyward as all this roster type stuff is sorta my jam. And after thinking about this for awhile, I think that Heyward has always been a CF that's been miscast as a RF.
Fangraphs even did an article back in 2014 asking why he wasn't a CF. And as obsessive as I am I kept turning this over and over in my mind trying to come up with a logical answer.
The easy out answer is he's just not good enough. But frankly I find it a rather lacking explanation. In all this talk about what's he worth and who he will sign with, I've seen a number of articles that put an 80 grade on his defense or in other words as good as you get scouting wise. And obviously all the gold gloves he has goes to show that. My next thought along these lines were that while he's great in RF he just might not have CF range.
However, if you look at the range portion of UZR, he's second only to Kiermaier this season. He was also first in that regard last year. He also has a top 10 arm and a top 10 fielding this past season among all OFs. It's also interesting to note that Almora who's largely considered a gold glove caliber CF defensively has a run grade of 50, an arm grade of 60 and a field grade of 65. So, clearly you don't have to be Billy Hamiltion out there to be a great CF.
I finally thought about how he was being discussed when being brought up through the minors. The thought was always that he would develop tremendous power. Supposedly Bobby Cox had said when he came up the ball came off his bat like it did Hank Aaron's. So, if you're using that sort of logic and you see a huge mountain of a man(6'5 245) a corner OF spot sort of makes sense. However, if you look at Heyward from a numbers perspective, he's basically a CF. I mean 10-15 HRs with 20-25 steals and superb OF defense is a CF. That got me to thinking maybe Heyward is just a case of baseball trying to make a square peg fit a round hole.
If you view Heyward purely as a CF, I feel like the narrative on him drastically changes. The whole "he's not enough of a power hitter for RF" argument is totally irrelevant. Only 12 CF last year posted a positive UZR. And of those 12, only Lorenzo Cain, Odubel Herrera, A.J. Pollock, Mike Trout, and Mookie Betts posted OBP over .320. From a hitting perspective, his 121 wRC+ is better than all but Cain, Trout, and Pollock. No one in baseball is going to compete with Trout really when you factor in he plays CF. It's also interesting to note the dbacks apparently wouldn't give up Pollock for Miller but instead gave up the #1 pick in this past draft, a top 75 pitcher and a really good young OF for Miller. That being said, he hit 20 HRs last season. Cain hit 16. Both stole more bases than Heyward. Heyward at least in RF put up a higher UZR than both. Cain was pretty close at 14.3 compared to the 20.2 Heyward put up in RF(plus the 2.3 in CF) while Pollock only put up 6.5.
Given all that, I wonder if all this talk of moving Soler was never part of the plan. Obviously it's tough to say how good defensively he will be in CF but then we asked the same question about Fowler prior to the season and he was average after having been below average prior. And other than potentially how you read the ball off the bat in CF vs RF I can't come up with a compelling argument as to why he wont be just as good in CF. He seems to have the range. I know some have also suggested CF might not be ideal because of the wear and tear he would take. Considering he has 2 opt-out clauses he may use, I'm not 100% sure that's a problem. I mean if he uses himself up defensively in CF and plays well enough to opt out, then he's not really your problem anymore.
I mean we'll see what Fowler gets but at an AAV of $23 mil/season if Fowler gets $17-18 mil think you can make a compelling argument that the difference in age and durability(Fowler often was hurt prior to 2015) along with Heyward's better defense is well worth $5 or so mil a season.
