Dodge Durango?
Not many teams have the ability to replace an everyday player with his conceptual clone, but the Padres could have done just that when Tony Gwynn Jr. went down with an injury. Luis Durango, a 24-year old switch hitter, had been tearing up Triple-A pitching and is starting to see some playing time in the bigs.
During his first stint in Triple-A, Durango adjusted well, keeping his walk rate north of 10%, managing his strikeouts and running all over the basepaths. He stole 34 bases in 423 trips to the plate, though he was thrown out 32% of the time, a rate that will raise some eyebrows. Thanks to a line drive rate of 20%, Durango ended up posting a .300/.378/.325 line, coming in at a wOBA of .329. While he’ll never be an offensive force, as a tablesetter, Durango has his uses.
Unfortunently, we don’t have much of a MLB sample to go on when it comes to Durango. He only have 48 plate appearances this year, and those have been spread over multiple stints and pinch-hit appearances. While a line drive rate of only 2.8% is sad, a consistently good LD% in the minors is a much better indicator.
Could Durango have a place on your roster next year? Possibly, but he needs to receive more playing time. Because of their impressive outfield depth, the Padres have been filling the center field vacancy with a variety of options, Durango being one of them.
When you have wheels like Durango’s (seriously, if you’ve never seen him fly, watch this), you are a threat to be a fantasy stud someday. Keep an eye on him this offseason, and snatch him up if he can steal (pun intended) playing time in San Diego. If you’re in a deeper NL-only keeper league, he’s a solid option to stash away for next year.
Zach is the creator and co-author of RotoGraphs' Roto Riteup series, and RotoGraphs' second-longest tenured writer. You can follow him on twitter.
It’ll be interesting to see what happens to Durango going forward. The second half of the year in Portland he was playing some left and losing some playing time to Cedric Hunter who was promoted from San Antonio halfway through the year, is two years younger and plays center just as well as Durango (if we trust RF).
That catch was not terribly impressive, nor did it give me a good impression of how fast he is.
Greetings from Los angeles! I’m bored to death at work so I decided to browse your blog on my iphone during lunch break. I really like the information you provide here and can’t wait to take a look when I get home. I’m surprised at how fast your blog loaded on my phone .. I’m not even using WIFI, just 3G .. Anyhow, fantastic site!
Hey! I could have sworn I’ve been to this blog before but after browsing through some of the post I realized it’s new to me. Nonetheless, I’m definitely glad I found it and I’ll be bookmarking and checking back frequently!
Have you ever thought about adding a little bit more than just your articles? I mean, what you say is fundamental and everything. But think of if you added some great pictures or videos to give your posts more, “pop”! Your content is excellent but with images and video clips, this site could certainly be one of the very best in its field. Fantastic blog!
Hello there! This is kind of off topic but I need some help from an established blog. Is it difficult to set up your own blog? I’m not very techincal but I can figure things out pretty quick. I’m thinking about setting up my own but I’m not sure where to start. Do you have any ideas or suggestions? With thanks
Do you have a spam problem on this blog; I also am a blogger, and I was curious about your situation; many of us have created some nice procedures and we are looking to exchange techniques with others, please shoot me an e-mail if interested.