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When Joey Gallo ripped a 460-foot home run off Twins lefty Adalberto Mejia, it was his fourth in his last three games and team-leading 29th of the season. His tape-measure blasts have obviously created a huge buzz both in the real and fantasy baseball communities and the fact that he’s just 23-years old and still a few years away from reaching his physical prime has owners salivating. There is no need to debate whether his power is for real. It is. Very much so. But with a .205/.319/.550 slash line and a 38.5-percent strikeout rate, the real question is can he develop into a more well-rounded player or is he nothing more than the Billy Hamilton of home runs?
No fantasy owner is delusional enough to believe that Gallo will ever be a .300 hitter. If one exists, enjoy his or her annual donation your league. The abundance of strikeouts and insanely low contact rates will never allow for it to happen. His plate discipline has shown slight improvement this season, but not even remotely enough to move the needle with regard to his batting average or on-base percentage. Yes, he’s a born masher, but right now he’s of the sink or swim varietal and while he’s a big help in the home run and RBI categories, he’s doing enough damage to your rate stats to offset his counting-stat contributions.
In this day and age, we’ve grown to accept the low averages so long as they come with 40 home runs and 100 RBI, but as we look to him for future seasons, there is concern that, without serious improvements, he may not be able to maintain his numbers with any real level of consistency. We’ve seen some mashers do it in the past, but we’ve also seen a number of one-trick power-ponies fizzle out after just a few short seasons. Is Gallo the next Adam Dunn or is he simply the next Chris Davis?
Since those are the two most common comparisons, let’s take a look at their numbers through the first three years of their big-league careers:
| PA | HR | RBI | BA | OBP | K% | BB% | |
| Year 1 | 123 | 6 | 14 | 0.204 | 0.301 | 46.3% | 12.2% |
| Year 2 | 30 | 1 | 1 | 0.040 | 0.200 | 63.3% | 16.7% |
| Year 3 | 98 | 29 | 55 | 0.205 | 0.319 | 38.5% | 12.9% |
| PA | HR | RBI | BA | OBP | K% | BB% | |
| Year 1 | 286 | 19 | 43 | 0.262 | 0.371 | 25.9% | 13.3% |
| Year 2 | 676 | 26 | 71 | 0.249 | 0.400 | 25.1% | 18.9% |
| Year 3 | 469 | 27 | 57 | 0.215 | 0.354 | 26.9% | 15.8% |
| PA | HR | RBI | BA | OBP | K% | BB% | |
| Year 1 | 317 | 17 | 55 | 0.285 | 0.331 | 27.8% | 6.3% |
| Year 2 | 419 | 21 | 59 | 0.238 | 0.284 | 35.8% | 5.7% |
| Year 3 | 136 | 1 | 4 | 0.192 | 0.279 | 29.4% | 11.0% |
Of the three, it’s easy to see that Dunn was the more consistent performer. His power showed it was developing and while his strikeout rate remained relatively the same, he provided some hope of a tolerable batting average with strong on-base skills. After his first three seasons, he went on to post seven-straight seasons of 38 or more home runs which included five-straight 40-homer seasons. His strikeout and walk rates remained fairly consistent and he never posted an OBP lower than .365 in that span.
Davis showed some power improvements from Year 1 to Year 2, but his walk rate was below-average and his strikeouts grew more abundant. Despite an improved walk rate, his third year was so bad, he spent the majority of his time down in Triple-A. His minor league numbers were decent, but all it showed was that he had nothing left to prove at that level and if there wasn’t any big league success, his days as a major-leaguer were numbered.
He continued to struggle in Year 4, but finally broke out in Year 5 with 33 home runs and a .270 average. His strikeout rate at this point was upwards of 30-percent and while he subsequently posted a career-best 53 home runs and a .286 average in Year 6, believing that he could consistently produce at that level was highly in question. You can blame injuries for his struggles in the follow-up season but even in the two years that followed, the power numbers, the batting average and the strikeout rate all took a turn for the worst.
Which now brings us to Gallo. His first call-up to the majors was marred by an obscene 46.3-percent strikeout rate and Year 2 was so bad, the Rangers left him sitting in the minors hoping to see some sort of improvement on his plate discipline. His walk rate remained solid, but a 34.6-percent K-rate at Triple-A left little hope that things were really clicking for him at the plate. This season, we’re seeing more or less of the same. The power and a slew of injuries to Adrian Beltre and the outfielders afforded him the opportunity to stay up with the big club, but the diminished walk rate and a strikeout rate close to 40-percent makes you wonder that, if the team were at full health, would we even be seeing a home run total like we have right now?
The problem, and the reason his ability to consistently produce is in question is that his approach at the plate is still ugly, at best. While his overall contact rate has increased, it’s still well below league average and he continues to hack away at pitches outside the zone. His swinging-strike rate has ever-so-slightly improved over his three seasons, but with a mark near 20-percent, he still swings and misses at an alarming rate. Dunn owned a career swinging-strike rate of 11.8-percent while Davis’ career mark sits at 15.7-percent, so it’s easy to see which player Gallo emulates most at this time.
Now again, this isn’t to say that Gallo couldn’t do more work to improve his overall plate discipline numbers, but the track record to do so hasn’t been there at any level. He hasn’t even shown month-to-month improvements this season. While he may rake 40 bombs, he’s not going to do it with a batting average higher than .220 and the prospect of him consistently reaching that power plateau over the next few seasons seems like a longshot, at best. He’s still young enough to change his ways, but once improvements in one area usually come at the expense of another. Maybe the Rangers are willing to tolerate the .220 average and 40-percent strikeout rate if they come with 40 bombs this season, but they had no problems letting it go with Davis as they knew the consistency just wasn’t there.
For: Duran