When Danny Espinosa homered twice against the Phillies on May 31, he secured a spot in local baseball lore. His first homer off left-hander Cliff Lee in the third inning — his ninth of the year — tied him with Bernie Allen of the 1969 Senators for most home runs in a season by a Washington second baseman. His second homer off Lee in the sixth gave him the mark all to himself … with two-thirds of the season left to play.
Espinosa’s 2010 major league debut with the Nationals provided a fairly accurate preview of the future. In 28 games beginning September 1, he batted only .219 but had six home runs and 33 RBI. He slugged .447 — half of his 22 hits were for extra bases — and also struck out 30 times, a somewhat alarming rate.
Espinosa just turned 24 in April and his ascendancy through the Nationals’ farm system since he was drafted in the third round in 2008 has gone like clockwork: 19 games in short-season Single-A ball after the draft, a full season at high Single-A Potomac in 2009 where he first flashed a power stroke, and then last year.
He began 2010 in Double-A Harrisburg, and 99 games and 18 home runs later he went to Triple-A Syracuse, when he spent August showing a higher classification he was the real deal.
Oh, and by the way, he played a total of seven games at second base his final week in upstate New York before assuming the full-time position in the big leagues. Most scouts say he made the transition to the other side of the bag smoother than they’d ever seen it done. He’s made a number of plays in the field that make you wonder how he could’ve been any better at shortstop.
Now, it’s very easy to project Espinosa’s 2011 numbers to a full season of 30 home runs and 99 RBI, which would pretty much lock down the NL rookie of the year, though that’s wishful thinking. But should he even approach those numbers as a middle infielder, we should be prepared for the obvious comparisons to names to like Jeff Kent and Joe Morgan, which would be inappropriate after just a single full season in Washington.
By the way, when Bernie Allen hit those nine home runs for Ted Williams’ Senators in ’69, he was besting a mark that had stood since second baseman Jimmy Bloodworth hit eight in 1940. Bloodworth actually had 11 home runs for the season, but three of them came in games where he was playing first.
During a season that has seen more valleys than peaks in Washington’s offense, Espinosa’s run production has been a revelation. The batting average is a concern, but he was a .270 hitter in the minor leagues, and the Nationals believe he’ll be close to that mark within a couple of seasons, along with cutting down on the strikeouts.
It should be a while before the Nats need to concern themselves with re-tooling their middle infield.
Examiner columnist Phil Wood is a baseball historian and contributor to MASN’s Nats Xtra. Contact him at [email protected].
