If you hit it in the air, he will come.
In the bottom of the eighth inning of a 6-2 game, St. Louis Cardinals outfielder Harrison Bader sprinted in from center field towards the infield to make a sprawling catch. The game was in hand, but the young centerfielder didn't care. No outs would be left behind on his watch. The crowd roared with anticipation as he made his trek from starting point to sliding location, like they would when a home run is launched, or a catcher guns a baseball down to second base.
Here's the thing about Bader and great catches. They are becoming very frequent, like something the Cardinals could charge with admission. Get your popcorn, peanuts, crackerjacks and Harrison Bader web gem here!
Since leaving part-time work behind with the Tommy Pham trade, Bader has ascended to the top of the Gold Glove leaderboard, Rookie of The Year sweepstakes and into the watchful eye of highlight reel fanatics, all the while making every single fly ball hit to center field a must-watch event.
How good has he been out there? Have you heard of OAA? It translates to Outs Above Average, a Statcast range-based metric that measures how many outs an outfielder saves. In other words, how many catches does a guy make that he had no business even attempting? Bader has 17, which ties him with Cincinnati Reds centerfielder Billy Hamilton for the league lead-but remember this: Bader has played a lot less innings than Hamilton. 375 innings less to be exact, but the two are tied in the unbelievable catches department.
Statcast also has a star rating system that ranks an outfielder's catches like you would a restaurant or movie. There's five star and even one star, with the latter being a catch that even mediocre outfielders can still make. Five stars is the toughest, and so far in 2018, Bader has registered six 5-star catches in 18 attempts for a conversion percentage of 46%. Basically, half the time he runs after the impossible dream out there, he ends up with it in his glove. Amazing only begins to describe it.
The thing that separates him from Hamilton and other rookie outfielders is the ability to hit some. Overall on the season, Bader is slashing .286/.356/.448 with an OPS+ of 118, which is well above the average of 100. The nine home runs, 12 doubles, and two triples are nice, but don't sleep on the 12 stolen bases in 14 attempts. Bader can slug, run, field, and puts unwanted pressure on opposing pitchers and infielders. If he hits it on the ground, you have to be on your A-game or else it's a fail from the first step. There's something unique about being successful at every facet of the game. It's called greatness.
In a short period of time, around three weeks, Bader has gone from a compelling fourth outfielder with starter capabilities to a guy who currently owns a 3.8 WAR via Baseball Reference and sits comfortably in two season-end award categories. I mean, they have to invent a new award to give to Bader. If teammate Marcell Ozuna took home the Gold Glove in 2017, Bader deserves the Super-Duper Gold Glove. He's something else. a talent that experts are only beginning to quantify.
Figuring out how good Bader can be isn't a new game. The 24-year-old Bronxville, New York native was drafted in the third round and wasn't really observed as a game-changing talent. Sure, he was looked upon in the Cardinals organization as a top 5 prospect, but that's essentially slotting a player into a probable spot of value, not a fair assessment of his projection. Bader has defied the critics and lazy eyes around the league this summer.
In a nutshell, Bader is the outfielder the Cardinals have been looking for. Someone with a glove game that reminds you of Jim Edmonds, saving runs and cutting down runners. Overall, Bader has saved the Cardinals 21 runs on defense, including six assists from the field on runners that dared to test him. When was the last time the Cardinals grew an outfielder like that from their own system? He may have put on a red jacket on Saturday afternoon, carrying the name of Lankford. Something tells me Bader can be even better though, and his bat proves the point.
In order to really mean something in this league, though, a man has to be able to hit-and with extended playing time, Bader has done just that. He can hit a home run, beat out a grounder, or lace a ball into the corner. Put it all together with a personality that sits on the plus side, and the Cardinals have found a gem on the cheap in Bader.
If Pham made Dexter Fowler move to right field, Bader made it possible for Pham to move to Tampa Bay and Fowler to find the platoon status. Big-time talent has a way of moving predestined pieces around to different areas. On one hand, you could argue even the Cardinals didn't know what they had in Bader. The other states that it was all a matter of time and that Bader's young age made it possible.
Just think about this: what if he had made it into center field earlier this season? How many more runs, and games, would have been saved? That's a common question for the 2018 Cardinals, a team that has went from rags to riches in a month.
Bader has been a huge part of the comeback, making highlight reel plays in center field and spraying baseballs around stadiums all the while batting seventh in the lineup. He's still a secret weapon at the moment, breaking out slowly with each game.
Not bad for a 100th overall pick out of Florida who looked like he was buried behind five outfielders this past spring. Bader is proof that performance, not sheer talent, paves the way for a player's success. It's a model that President of Baseball Operations John Mozeliak has molded over the past decade. Play and perform, and the job is yours.
When I asked Bader years ago about having the opportunity to make something of himself in the big leagues, all he could talk about was improving in areas he knew were holding him back, such as hitting a curveball. That's a skill he is still perfecting and working on, judging by his 78 strikeouts. Then again, Bader has time to get that worked out. He's a starter now. Humble and hungry, which is the best kind of young talent.
Really though, how good is Bader? Only time will tell, but right now he is one of the best young outfielders in the game. At long last, a homegrown stud for the Cardinals.
