Philadelphia Phillies’ Maikel Franco is turning heads this spring
The Philadelphia Phillies hope Maikel Franco can become their heart-of-the-order threat of the future. The young third baseman is already playing the part this spring.
It’s hard to read too much into Spring Training statistics. However, one look at MLB’s spring leaderboard makes something abundantly clear. Philadelphia Phillies third basemen Maikel Franco is absolutely raking. In 17 games the 23-year-old is slashing .300/.340/.720 to go along with a league-leading 7 HR and 18 RBI.
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Last season the Phillies called up Franco in mid-May. At the time he was the team’s top prospect and he saw action in 80 games. His season was cut short when he was hit by a pitch in mid-August that resulted in a broken wrist. When he was able to play he hit .280/.343/.497. His 14 HR and 80 RBI in half of a season gave Phillies fans a lot of reasons for optimism. Franco’s hot start to the spring won’t do anything to reign in the high expectations that Philadelphia has for its young third basemen.
Franco was signed by the Phillies out of the Dominican Republic in 2010. He made his debut for their rookie league team later that year and initially struggled at the plate. Things slowly got more comfortable for Franco until he had a breakout 2013 as a member of Philadelphia’s High A and AA squads. Between both leagues he combined for 31 HR and 103 RBI.
That breakout year was enough to land Franco at #26 on MLB’s Top 100 Prospects list for 2014. During the same period of time Baseball America ranked him as the #1 prospect in the Phillies organization. Prior to last season Fangraphs rated him as the #38 prospect in baseball. There’s been a lot of hype surrounding Franco for several years, and a productive 2015 plus a hot spring give analysts reasons to believe that promise is coming to fruition.
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Philadelphia has lost at least 89 games in each of the past three seasons. Their rebuilding efforts are currently in full effect, and Franco figures to be a foundational piece when the Phillies return to contention. If this spring is any indication, Franco plans on being a fixture in the middle of the Phillies lineup for years to come.