San Diego Padres: 2020 expectations for Fernando Tatis Jr.

How San Diego Padres star Fernando Tatis Jr. follow up his 2019 in the shortened 2020 season?

San Diego Padres star Fernando Tatis Jr. very well might be the most talented shortstop in all of baseball at just 21 years old. He showed just why in only 84 games in 2019.

Tatis put up a .317 AVG, 22 HRs, .969 OPS, .398 wOBA, 16 SB, and 3.6 fWAR. Those are some insane numbers for someone’s first 84 games.

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We will still not yet be able to see a full season from Tatis in 2020 obviously, but it does give us a chance to see if 2019 is something he can replicate. If he were to play all 60 games, he’d still be short of 162 games for his career. While this season could give an indication as to what type of player he truly is, it is certainly not a season to overreact to.

While I’m not sure that Tatis would have kept his production for the entire season last year, I certainly think he’s capable of that level of play in the future.

What are the expectations for San Diego Padres infielder Fernando Tatis Jr. offensively?

His stats certainly were a bit better than he might actually have been. His .398 wOBA was in the top 4% of the MLB, his xwOBA (expected wOBA) was at .345. This difference was the largest difference in a hitter’s favor in the entire MLB at .053. This doesn’t mean he was just completely lucky as many great hitters have positive differences between wOBA and xwOBA.

Nolan Arenado, Trevor Story, Ale Bregman, Ketel Marte, Kris Bryant, and Xander Bogaerts were all top 15 in the difference, so he’s not the only elite hitter to outplay themselves a bit maybe. Because he does of the largest difference between actual and expected stats, I’d expect his actual numbers to come down just a bit in 2020.

One thing about Tatis is that while he did struggle with strikeouts when he does hit the ball he crushes it. His barrel% of 13.2% was in the 91st percentile and his K% was in the bottom 7% of the league at 29.6%.

The key for Tatis in the future is going to be cutting down on the whiffs and strikeouts. He’s going to need to do that by learning to hit the breaking ball. He hit .253 with a 52.5 Whiff% against breaking balls compared to hitting .378 with just a 23.7 Whiff% against fastballs.

Looking at these numbers I’d expect pitching staff to continually feed him breaking balls. 2019 was a smaller sample size so this giant gap is likely to get smaller but there still an elite hitting ability against the fastball with large struggles against the breaking ball.

This is a problem I’d expect Tatis to improve on and one thing that makes me think this is that he just needs better pitch recognition which will gradually improve. I say this because when he was able to see the breaking ball and make contact his exit velocity (88.9 MPH) was just about the same as against the fastball (90.2 MPH). He continually hit the ball hard.

What are expectations for San Diego Padres stud Fernando Tatis Jr. defensively?

Now the other aspects that make Tatis so talented and exciting are his speed and fielding ability. He is an exceptional base runner with a sprint speed of 29.3 ft/s ranking in the top 5% of the MLB. He was on pace for over 30 SB before getting injured and put up a very good 3.0 BsR.

The defense is the area I expect to see the most improvement in 2020 from Tatis. He has evident athletic ability and a terrific arm, yet he struggled at SS in 2019. Tatis totaled -3 DRS (Defensive Runs Saved) and a -5.3 UZR (Ultimate Zone Rating).

Watching Tatis play you’d most likely think he’s an amazing fielder as he gets a ton of web gems, but he still needs more consistency. This was mostly due to his electric arm which is really a good asset because it’s so strong, he just needs to contain it. Out of 18 errors, 14 were throwing errors. This is something that Tatis will continue to get better with, and with his elite athletic ability, he will most likely be an elite fielder in the future.

Overall in 2020, while his offensive numbers may come down some I’d still expect him to be one of the elite offensive shortstops. His defense should make large improvements as he learns to harness his arm and his tremendous speed will continue to make him one of the most exciting players to watch in the future.