Middle infield
Kendrick’s situation has already been outlined. In Toronto, Eric Sogard has a similar problem. Sogard is 33 and he carries the additional burden of having led a journeyman’s baseball life. So the Blue Jays installed 25-year-old Lourdes Gurriel as their second baseman and gave Freddy Galvis a two-year, $9.5 million contract to play shortstop.
So far Galvis has been worth the money. He’s batting .311. Gurriel is another story. Coming off a .281 rookie season with the Jays, he’s batting just .175. Sogard is hitting .367 with a .533 slugging average. Although he’s only played in seven of Toronto’s first 25 games, he has hit safely in all of them.
In Texas, Danny Santana faces the impossible task of playing behind Rougned Odor, a Ranger fixture until briefly sidelined by a knee injury. Into the breach stepped Santana, who in 11 starts since Odor’s injury is hitting .302. But Odor is expected to be activated this weekend, cutting substantially into Santana’s playing time. Given Odor’s .167 average before his injury, it will be interesting to see how the Rangers handle that.
Scott Kingery is in the opposite situation in Philadelphia. He has been on the team’ disabled list since mid-month. When healthy, Kingery is viewed as a utility backup, a status that enabled the Phillies to make use of him in 13 games prior to his injury, although only six of those were starts. In those six starts, Kingery batted .440 with two homers and six RBIs.