Toronto Blue Jays: Vladimir Guerrero Jr. getting ripped in off-season

Toronto Blue Jays infielder Vladimir Guerrero Jr. hasn’t quite lived up to the expectations he had coming into the league, but he’s looking to change that.

The Toronto Blue Jays have one of the best young cores in Major League Baseball, and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. is a big part of that. He rocketed through the minor leagues, absolutely dominating at every level.

However, since coming into the league, he hasn’t quite hit as well as people expected. That’s not to say he’s been bad. He’s posted an above average OPS in each year. But the Blue Jays probably expected a little bit more from the consensus number one prospect in 2019.

And there are signs that he could evolve into the player everyone expected him to be. In 2020, he had an average exit velocity of 92.5 mph and a hard hit rate of 50.8%. Both placed him in the top 7% of the league and good things are bound to happen when you hit the ball that hard.

But Guerrero Jr. isn’t waiting around for the numbers to come along. He’s putting in work this off-season to assure that he’ll be a huge weapon for the Blue Jays in 2021.

According to Hector Gomes, Guerrero Jr. has lost 32 pounds already this off-season. And as you can see from this picture, Guerrero Jr. is looking awfully trim. As if I wasn’t self-conscious enough after seeing CC Sabathia‘s weight loss transformation.

The point is that I need to get to the gym and Guerrero Jr. is on his way to becoming an even more dangerous hitter. His turning into the hitter that baseball fans dreamed of is going to make the Toronto Blue Jays a legitimate threat in the AL East. Especially if they can lock down a spot in the expanded playoffs again in 2021.

Baseball fans deserve the Vladimir Guerrero Jr. that made minor league pitching look like they belonged in a rec league. And if skinny Vlad becomes that hitter, Major League pitching is in big trouble.