With Nyjer Morgan on the DL and Carlos Gomez struggling at the plate, manager Ron Roenicke has decided to play Mark Kotsay in center field.
Unfortunately for us, this experiment went well in its first iteration. He was 3-for-4 with 2 RBI. He was pulled in the 9th inning in favor of Gomez defensively. This bought him another chance. In the second attempt, he was 0-for-4. He was in CF for about 6 innings before he moved to right when Braun got injured.
Maybe the experiment is over, as Gomez is back in center for tonight's matchup with the Rockies.
Gomez has looked lost at the plate, swinging wildly at pretty much anything thrown in his general direction. However, his batting average is just .30 or so points behind Kotsay. What we lose in that little bit of difference in batting average is more than made up for by Gomez's plus defense.
There's just no reason to have slow, old Kotsay in the lineup.
And is there no one on the coaching staff that can get through to Carlos Gomez? Maybe I'm naive, but can plate discipline be such a foreign concept to a major league batter?
Gomez is worse than an eager puppy on the playing field and it comes out especially when he's on offense. He had made stupid mistakes hitting and while running the bases, but those problems don't seem to manifest when he's on defense.
