Cleveland Indians: Debating Yandy Diaz vs. Giovanny Urshela

Giovanny Urshela

Giovanny Urshela has been up to the big leagues once, for about half the season in 2015. Knowing that he was not ready in 2016 on the offensive side, the Tribe let him mature in Triple-A for the entire year.

In 117 games and almost 500 plate appearances, Urshela batted .274 with eight home runs, 54 RBI and no stolen bases. He only struck out 11.8 percent of the time, though his walk rate was also really low. This is about on par with his Triple-A stats from 2014 and 2015.

What that means is that he did not do well enough. He’s a much better defender than Diaz, but he has not shown that he will hit any better than .230 in the bigs. The question is, does that matter?

With a top seven in the lineup that should all be plus in offensive WAR, Urshela could have batted eighth and done what people who bat eighth do: not a whole lot. He would have played great defense and been a good clubhouse presence.

Even though I understand going with Diaz, I do not agree with making this offensive move when Diaz is going to slot in at seventh or eighth in the lineup. This will be his first time in the big leagues, and if he happens to struggle at third, his offense might struggle. Will Diaz be better offensively and provide more value than Urshela would defensively?

Even if Diaz takes off, he is not getting past sixth. He will sit behind Carlos Santana, Michael Brantley, Edwin Encarnacion, Francisco Lindor, Jose Ramirez, and probably Yan Gomes. He might even be behind Tyler Naquin and Lonnie Chisenhall, depending on how they do to start the season.

So what’s the point in going with Diaz? Maybe Francona saw something we did not. Maybe Urshela’s batting is worse than we thought or his defense has regressed. But after a 2016 that was built on pitching and defense, it seems odd to go with this move, even if it’s temporary.

Hopefully this was a good move, but I would not be surprised to see Urshela up sooner than later.

-Duane Rohrbacher