We’re witnessing baseball-crushing, hair-flipping, hip-wiggling excellence. We’re breathing in the rarest of professional athletes who can excel without arrogance, transcend without smugness and solve an exasperating game with the ease of a kid racing around a sandlot.
He slams the brakes on your day. He dares you to walk away from the TV, even for a second. He reimagines baseball, in spite of history books filled with Babe Ruth, Ken Griffey Jr., and yes, even San Diego sons Ted Williams and Tony Gwynn.
The fact Fernando Tatis Jr. is doing what he’s doing for the Padres, at age 21, is causing us to reconsider what’s possible while spurring America to take full and undivided notice.
Tatis is the reigning National League player of the week and subject of an ESPN.com cover story that explores whether he can become the face of the game. He’s the first shortstop in history to hit 30 home runs in his first 100 games. In that same span, as pointed out by Padres radio broadcaster Jesse Agler, he has piled up more home runs, RBI and hits with a higher average and OPS (on base plus slugging) than Mike Trout and Mickey Mantle.
Eye-popping stats tell only part of story of the 6-foot-3 supernova.
“He has this aura about him that draws people to him,” Padres manager Jayce Tingler said. “I don’t know if it’s the smile, if it’s the hair, if it’s the dance moves, if it’s everything. I’ve got kids. They’re drawn to watching him. They’re drawn to his energy.”
Consider this: Tatis barely has played games into the triple digits, yet stars in a national commercial for BMW.
The Padres confirmed Tatis-related merchandise is their No. 1 seller in store and online. An Instagram post in late July of Tatis essentially winking has been viewed more than 112,000 times. It bewilders to think he could grow into the salve for an entire game bruised by labor unrest and COVID-19.
He is what’s right, at a time when so much is wrong.
“There’s no question, he’s the face of this franchise,” Padres first baseman and World Series winner Eric Hosmer said in the ESPN.com piece. “And I think he’s gonna be the face of this game very, very soon.”
That comes from one of three Tatis teammates making at least $20 million per 162-game season.
“Those are powerful words,” Tingler said.
The stage clearly has been yielded. This is not Manny Machado’s team, despite the dried ink on a $300 million deal. This team is not following the lead of Hosmer, former American League rookie of the year Wil Myers or All-Star closer Kirby Yates.
The giggling kid in the dreadlocks and perma-smile cowers at nothing — and embraces everything. Tatis talked about a dream of earning a statue at Petco Park, alongside Gwynn and Trevor Hoffman — while becoming the “Dominican Derek Jeter.”
“Every time I get to the park and the game is about to start, I tell myself, it’s time to make history,” he said.
He already is.
Padres’ Tatis Jr. and manager Tingler on winning NL Player of the Week & getting national attention
Just two players have had more home runs in their first 100 games, with Tatis trailing Mark McGwire (37) and Pete Alonso (33). Only Yankees slugger Aaron Judge, the U-T’s Kevin Acee reported, amassed a higher OPS in that time during the modern era.
Among players who logged at least 400 plate appearances through their age 21 season, Tatis ranks fourth all-time with a 1.010 OPS. Ahead of him, a who’s who: Williams, Jimmie Foxx and Albert Pujols.
Entering Tuesday, Tatis leads baseball in WAR — the sabermetric gold-standard known as Wins Above Replacement.
Yet it’s not simply the avalanche of numbers, including consecutive games when Tatis hit leadoff homers against the Diamondbacks requiring a total of three pitches. He does things you don’t see or haven’t seen.
Last season, he scored from third on a pop-up to second base … twice … in eight days. On July 27 against the Diamondbacks, Tatis essentially hit a ground ball that first hopped at the edge of infield dirt and rolled all the way to the fence before an outfielder could corral it for a bases-clearing triple.
Braves pitcher Mike Soroka caught Tatis on a pickoff throw to first, as out as out gets, until he uncorked a “Matrix”-style slide into first base. Soroka just slumped over at the waist in disbelief.
A headline on Deadspin began, “Fernando Tatis Jr. Bends Fabric of Space and time.”
","theme.00000166-300c-ddc8-a177-f44f8d870000.:core:enhancement:Enhancement.hbs.alignment":null,"theme.00000166-300c-ddc8-a177-f44f8d870000.:core:enhancement:Enhancement.hbs._template":null,"_id":"00000173-df87-dde7-ad7b-ffa77bab0001","_type":"035d81d3-5be2-3ed2-bc8a-6da208e0d9e2"}”>“We knew he wasn’t going to be a very well-kept secret for long,” Padres Executive Chairman Ron Fowler said. “He’s larger than life.”
That becomes the great problem-to-have for the Padres, as they consider how to dig through the couch cushions to keep him. The commitment to three players alone (Machado, Hosmer and Myers) is $70 million annually.
“There are a lot of internal discussions. The question is when,” Fowler said. “If the COVID year hadn’t happened, maybe we would be further along in trying to get something done. (General Manager) A.J. (Preller) is very focused on it.
“We want him to be a Padre long term. Wanting and being able to do it are two different things. But we’re focused on getting it done and that’s one of our priorities. We need to sit down and figure out how to do it.
“It’s not like we haven’t had considerable discussion on it.”
The head-shaking trade that brought Tatis to the Padres could haunt the Chicago White Sox for a generation. San Diego shipped aging pitcher James Shields to the White Sox for pitcher Erik Johnson and Tatis.
The MLB.com story outlining the swap mentioned Tatis last and never brought him up again. Johnson has been out of baseball since the end of 2016 and Shields since 2018.
“I think we might have won that trade,” Fowler said with a laugh.
The numbers Tatis has generated in the health pandemic-abbreviated season are MVP worthy and MVP-leading. No player in history has been named a league MVP during his age-21 season. Vida Blue, Johnny Bench and Stan Musial accomplished it as 22-year-olds.
There he is again, expanding what we believe is possible.
“The one thing I know about this game, you get punched in the stomach,” Tingler said. “So it’s incredibly challenging. To see Tatis get off to the start he has … make no mistake about it, what he’s doing is not easy.”
It’s hard to tell.
