These MLB players would be having great seasons if only their teams would let them on the field.
What do the Kansas City Royals have against Terrance Gore? Gore is a 28-year-old journeyman outfielder signed by the Royals as am MLB free agent in December.
So far in 2019 he’s hitting .438 with a .625 slugging average and 1.096 OPS, and doing so while drawing little more than the big league minimum. From the standpoint of the Royals’ front office, he is an ideal player: he costs little and produces a lot.
But Gore only produces when he plays, which isn’t very often. So far in 2019 he’s appeared in just 11 of Kansas City’s 25 games.
Gore isn’t the only MLB player this season who stands out in his occasional reprieves from the bench. In fact, virtually every big league club has at least one player whose All-Star level numbers are offset by lack of playing time.
Sometimes the problem is lack of reputation. Gore came to the Royals noted for two things: his blazing speed on the basepaths and his utter absence of batting credentials. In five prior seasons, four of them with the Royals, he had stolen 27 bases in 31 attempts, but had taken only 19 plate appearances, never more than five in a season. In fact prior to April 10 of this season, Gore had never actually started a ballgame.
Other productive MLB players suffer from lining up behind a far more highly paid – if less productive – name. Prior to the 2018 season, the White Sox signed Welington Castillo to a three-year, $22.5 million contract. Prior to this year they signed James McCann to back up Castillo for $2.5 million. McCann is batting .349 … when he plays, which so far has been less than half the time. Castillo is getting the bulk of the playing time and hitting .178.
And a few MLB players are duty-limited because the perception is that they are past the point of being productive on a more full-time basis. Howie Kendrick is off to a .343 start for the Washington Nationals. But Kendrick is 35 and viewed as purely a fill-in for Brian Dozier, who signed a $9 million deal this past winter. Dozier, by the way, is batting .183 in nearly twice Kendrick’s plate appearances.
Could you make an actual All Star team of these lightly used but productive players? Absolutely…and here it is.