The Best Center Fielder You've Never Heard Of
Yordany Ramirez dazzled everywhere he played
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Marquis Grissom, Andruw Jones, Yordany Ramirez, Torii Hunter, Jim Edmonds.
That group accounts for 31 Gold Gloves, awarded for excellence in center field. Those players appeared on All-Star rosters 16 times. They combined to hit 1,407 home runs over 8,744 games.
Yet one of them never appeared in a Major League game.
Why is he here?
The cafeteria in the Padres Spring Training complex during the first decade of the 2000s was a multipurpose space that played host to regular meetings throughout camp. (That doesn’t mean I didn’t look forward to two meals a day there.) Much in the way that nourishing top prospects with post-game meals of pepperoni pizza and PB&J fell out of favor, dining facilities have become more carefully imagined gathering areas recently, befitting lean proteins, organic vegetables and high-powered juicers.
One day in March 2007, in advance of a 1:05 pm first pitch in Peoria, Arizona, I sat down for lunch with Rick Renteria. At the time, Renteria was the manager of the High-A Lake Elsinore Storm. He was at the beginning of a climb that would see him promoted to Triple-A manager, then onto the Padres Major League coaching staff, and ultimately to the position of Major League manager with both the Cubs and the White Sox.
But on this day, Renteria was thinking about his center fielder from the previous season in Lake Elsinore, prospect Yordany Ramirez.
Renteria spoke about defensive plays he witnessed Ramirez make in center field. He discussed potential, building trust with the player, and the adjustments that Ramirez would have to make to succeed.
More than any of the specific stories, it was Renteria’s passion that was unforgettable. Renteria was so joyful that he looked to become a bit teary, almost overcome by a love for what he was doing and whom he was talking about. I remember feeling momentarily uncomfortable, sensing that I was surrendering to the moment and on the verge of tearing up.
When I recently reminded Renteria of this conversation, he replied with a list of the top three center fielders he had ever seen or played against.
Andruw Jones, Marquis Grissom, Yordany Ramirez.
He also included Hunter and Edmonds, rounding out the top five and, perhaps, leaving some room for debate as to the final rankings.
Searching for someone to validate Renteria’s claims, I reached out to Tim Stauffer, the former Padres pitcher who was teammates with Ramirez in Triple-A Portland in 2007.
The stories flowed easily for Stauffer, who remembered what was essentially his introduction to Ramirez in the field. “I think I was charting the game,” Stauffer says, which means he was in street clothes in the stands at the time. “We had heard about his athleticism a little bit, but I hadn’t really seen him. I just remember this ball that was hit in the gap… It’s for sure a triple, and then you see he’s closing ground. Then he leaps and it was a full-body layout. It just didn’t look like anything you’ve seen before. You know, it’s not like a dive and a fall — it was almost like flying in the air. And he caught it.
“You don’t see that kind of stuff happen in Triple-A ever… You don't see that. That was probably the best outfield baseball play I’ve ever seen live.”
I believe that catch can be seen in the video below, just after another amazing play from Ramirez.
Stauffer and I caught up on a recent evening after he and I had both gotten our kids to bed. There’s truly nothing like stories of baseball heroics spoken in the hushed tones of two fathers who understand the importance of sleeping children remaining that way.
Still, there were more stories.
“I think it was probably a couple of days later,” Stauffer continues, “we’re out throwing, and I think he threw a ball out of the stadium. He didn’t even look like he was trying. The arm he had was incredible.”
In fact, when it became clear that his bat was not going to play at the big league level, the Astros put him on the mound. Unfortunately, pitching didn’t pan out either, and Ramirez remains one of the greatest defensive center fielders that nobody ever knew.
So much about opportunity in baseball — and life — is being in the right place at the right time. Plate discipline was a constant issue for Ramirez, but playing in a time before quantifiable defensive metrics hurt him as well. I can’t help but think that today the Rays, or perhaps the A’s, would find enough value in the defense (coupled with the attractive cost of a player at the Major League minimum) to give him a chance.
Of course, 15 years ago, the issue of tanking didn’t exist either. A player of Ramirez’s defensive abilities might have gotten a few hundred at bats last year with a handful of teams who weren’t concerned about winning. And then who knows what could have happened?
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I wonder where Ramirez is now…