The Angels have called up infield prospect David Fletcher, officially selecting his contract from Triple-A Salt Lake, the team announced. To clear a spot on the 40-man roster, the Angels moved Blake Wood from the 10-day DL to the 60-day DL. Jefry Marte has been placed on the 10-day DL with a sprained left wrist, thus opening a 25-man roster spot for Fletcher.
Angels fans have been anxiously awaiting the debut of Fletcher, who isn’t considered one of the organization’s elite prospects (No. 21, per MLB.com) but has laid waste to Triple-A pitchers thus far in 2018. The former sixth-round pick (2015) has slashed .350/.394/.559 with six homers, 25 doubles, five triples and seven steals (in nine tries) so far in the Triple-A season. Incredibly, he’s punched out just 21 times in 274 plate appearances.
As the Halos’ Triple-A affiliate tweeted over the weekend, the 24-year-old Fletcher was leading all of Minor League Baseball with 85 hits, 36 extra-base hits, 25 doubles and 138 total bases. That superlative production landed him on a recent edition of Jason Martinez’s Knocking Down the Door here at MLBTR.
Exactly where Fletcher lines up on the diamond in the big leagues remains to be seen. He’s split his time between the two middle infield positions in the minors thus far in 2018, and while Ian Kinsler slumped badly early in the season, he’s been swinging a much better bat of late. Kinsler has a .797 OPS over the past month, and in his past 13 games, he’s slashing a ridiculous .352/.397/.759 with six homers and four doubles in 58 plate appearances.
The Angels had to place Andrelton Simmons on the disabled list due to a freak ankle sprain recently — Simmons injured himself on the dugout steps — and Zack Cozart has shifted over to shortstop in the interim. It’s possible, then, that Fletcher could see some time at shortstop, with Cozart sliding back over to the hot corner on days when Fletcher is penciled in at short.
Finally
control your patience angel fans.You’ve all been so impatient and crowned fletch as the answer. We’ll see
Wait, Fletcher needs TJS see you in 2020
what?
Unnecessary comment
You again I was waiting for that lol
Long Duc Dong… they are going to wait 4 months then put him under the knife.
Lol
what we need is Fletcher to get consistent playing time. Kinsler is in the last year of his deal and Cozart is pretty versatile.
If Fletcher is the answer at 2B for the foreseeable future, that frees up resources for Eppler to spend elsewhere.
What we don’t need is the usual Scioscia only giving the rookie one day a week routine.
What we don’t need is the usual Scioscia only giving the rookie one day a week routine.
…the usual Scioscia only giving the rookie one day a week routine.
…giving the rookie one day a week routine.
…routine.
Tradition.
Hermosillo was called up to play right and did nothing for two weeks.
Bash has now been called up and has played every day in right.
Angel haters…know what your talking about when talking about how scioscia plays his rookies.
There isn’t a veteran currently holding down right field.
Sosh will play Kinsler and Cozart over a rookie no matter how bad they’re playing.
Look no further than how much playing time Raul Ibanez, Vernon Wells, Ernesto Frieri, even Steve Finley received when far better options were available.
Is Jabari even a rookie?
fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=sa858824&p… fringe five staple, remember that Mookie Betts was a fringe five staple as well. He probably won’t get to be that good.
He’s torn it up the last two spring trainings he got invited to, He’s great defensively and it seems his bat has finally came around. Hopefully he becomes a spark plug for the angels offense outside of trout and can bat lead off