Preston Tucker Can’t Hit From the Dugout

At every level, Preston Tucker has hit.

From winning Freshman Hitter of the Year at the University of Florida to setting school returns in total hits to leading the Houston Astros organization in hits during his first full minor league season to producing over half a rookie season in 2015, Tucker has hit everywhere he’s gone. At no stop in the minor leagues did he produce below-average results at the dish, and he’s consistently – and quickly – adjusted to each new level.

Each season, he’s begun the year repeating his prior level, then advanced. After his successful major-league debut, the pattern calls for Tucker to repeat with the Astros, then ascend to some yet-to-be-seen level beyond MLB, perhaps beyond baseball. But not even Tucker, who’s hit everywhere he’s gone despite middling prospect status, can hit from the bench.

Let’s rewind briefly and admit that Tucker is kind of boring. His name is Preston Tucker. His nickname is also Preston Tucker. He could change his name to Tucker Preston and nobody would notice. His favorite beverage is almost definitely two-percent milk. His scouting profile contains knocks that he’s too average in body. He’s not even the most interesting Astros prospect in his own family. There’s a heel turn in him somewhere – good luck finding a more Mean Street Posse, lacrosse-playing, prep-school name than Preston Tucker – but until he inverts the hair on his face, he remains fairly uninteresting.

Preston Tucker’s eyebrows make a pretty convincing Snidely Whiplash ‘stache. pic.twitter.com/TnwrBTW6En

— Productive Outs (@ProductiveOuts) September 23, 2015

Again, Tucker hits. His minor-league track record suggests a player who can hit for a bit of contact, take a walk, and flash appreciable power. He was primarily a pull hitter in his first half-season, consistent with his minor-league track record but with a similar nod for a little bit of opposite-field production down the line (and that one extremely long double to center).

Preston Tucker is being called up by the #Astros. He has a lot of MiLB hits. Here’s a spray chart of them since 2013 pic.twitter.com/1Hi7LYQSbX

— Daren Willman (@darenw) May 7, 2015

He also produced fairly solid exit velocities, ranking 75th among 345 hitters who had at least 100 at-bats of data, per Baseball Savant. The ball came off his bat at an average of 90.55 MPH, comparable to Jason Heyward, Todd Frazier, and Eric Hosmer. He also had the 16th-highest exit velocity on ground-balls, a potential harbinger of a better BABIP than the .274 he produced last year (which was his lowest at any stop). He had an average fly-ball distance of 290.83 feet, per Baseball Heatmaps, 68th among 284 qualified hitters, and he made slightly more hard contact than the league average despite producing too many infield flies.

And there was this, Tucker taking a 99.9-MPH Bruce Rondon fastball deep, the hardest pitch hit for a home run in baseball all season.
[gfy]SlowFortunateBongo[/gfy]
In other words, there’s a fair amount to like in the way he hit the ball, even if it would be nice to see someone with a 15.7-percent home run per-fly ball rate keep the ball off the ground a little more often, no matter how hard he’s hitting it.

Projection systems have been similarly encouraged, at least by the power potential. Steamer has him going for 11 home runs and 35 runs batted in over 282 plate appearances. ZiPS likes him for 10 and 34, respectively, if he saw that amount of time. Mike Podhorzer’s projections like him for roughly the same. Over a 500-PA season, that works out to somewhere in the neighborhood of 20 home runs and 62 RBI with a .250 average, which would have ranked him in the 60-70 range in the outfield a season ago.

Instead, he’s been ranked 119th at the position by Rotographs rankers, nowhere higher than 93rd (Paul Sporer), and he’s being drafted as the 110th outfielder off the board. Despite optimism surrounding his actual skill set, projections over 500 times up mean little if he’s not going to see anywhere close to that, as most expect, and there are obvious limiting factors to Tucker’s playing time.

For one, he hasn’t shown he can hit lefties, posting a wRC+ of 25 in 68 plate appearances against them in the majors last year. His minor-league splits are more encouraging in that regard, with a .321/.377/.512 triple-slash line without the platoon edge, actually better than his line against righties, per Minor League Central. That declined some in Triple-A last season (a .665 OPS), but there are at least signs he may be able to avoid a straight-platoon scenario if given the chance, or at least not require an immediate sub if a lefty comes into a game.

There’s also the matter of his middling defense. That’s maybe not a huge deal for a corner outfielder who has a bit of experience at first base and can DH in the American League, but it does serve to take away a reason he could otherwise push for playing time. In terms of first-base potential, he played 22 games there in the minors in 2014 and spent time at the position in college, so it might be tenable.

As it stands, he’d probably see the bulk of his time at DH, unless the Astros want to work Tyler White into a straight platoon (to start) at first. The Astros are weakest at first and DH, which means they could churn the positions (Jon Singleton, White, Tucker, Matt Duffy) until Evan Gattis is healthy and/or A.J. Reed is ready. Manager A.J. Hinch said this week he believed Tucker will make the team and has been clear that the Astros are going to rotate playing time a lot with so few traditional everyday guys, so there should be at-bats.

Just maybe not enough to matter. If we knew he had a substantial role beyond just cracking the roster, I like Tucker’s power profile enough to consider him a deep sleeper play. He’d be relevant – or at least worth keeping an eye on – with playing time, but nobody can hit from the dugout. Until then, he’s just the man and his dream.

Damn Colby Rasmus and his qualifying offer.