Consistency is the key element that 23-year-old prospect Yunel Escobar possesses in his quest to fulfill a major league dream that began nearly 21 months ago when he defected from Cuba to be eligible for the 2005 Major League Draft.
“He has been consistent the whole season,” hitting instructor for the AA Mississippi Braves Phillip Wellman said. “It’s very rare and odd that he hasn’t struggled because most guys at this level are going to go up and down and make some adjustments. Escobar hasn’t.”
Escobar’s bigger learning curve will come off of the field. Yunel is currently taking English classes to become more acclimated with American culture. Improving his very limited English will be an important part of his development as a player and a person living in the U.S., but won’t stifle his quest to make it to the major leagues.
“I think you’ll find, over the years, that there is some correlation between players that move up pretty quickly and those that have the desire to pick up the language and culture.” Wellman said. “However, as long as they are good enough to play, it won’t matter.”
His consistency is in the numbers, as he is hitting a steady average of .283, with 19 doubles, two homeruns, and 38 RBIs. While they aren’t earth-shattering numbers,
“I think he is ahead of a lot of guys,” Wellman said. “If he can maintain this kind of consistency, we are going to have to push him on to Triple-A.”
We see Escobar as having an outside chance of hitting the majors in the latter part of 2007 if he can turn it on in Spring and the beginning of the season, or if he makes a particularly strong showing in Fall/Winter ball. He grabs the last rung of the MLN FAB50 Baseball 2006 ladder at 50.
