There is a slightly dated quote from a baseball executive regarding a diminutive second baseman that rings so clearly today that it almost hurts the ears.
“He’s an anomaly,” the exec told the New York Times. “He’s tough to explain, other than the fact he works as hard or harder than anyone, he’s got freakish hand-eye skills, he loves baseball and he wants to be great.”
That describes the Braves’ Ozzie Albies as accurately as a police sketch.
Hard working? Almost overly so if you ask Braves hitting coach Kevin Seitzer. “He analyzes his swing daily – I would almost say too much, but because he does it the right way, it’s a good thing.”
Abnormal ability to see ball/hit ball, to instantly send various urgent messages to his hands? Check.
“His hands are like lightning,” Braves manager Brian Snitker said.
As fitting as it was, that old quote up top, however, belonged to a Houston Astros executive of four years ago, speaking of a younger Jose Altuve. Because both are relative garden gnomes in the forest – and because both seem to possess so much disproportionate pop – the comparisons are inevitable. Just 21, Albies has found himself in the company of one of baseball’s better players of any size. While not sitting at the same table with Altuve, he at least has entered the same room.
Oh, yeah, the loves-baseball-and-wants-to-be-great thing fits, too. Fits far better than the batting helmet that flies off Albies’ head like a hubcap off a careening getaway car every time he’s running the bases.
According to the inexact measures of an official team roster, the 5-foot-8, 165-pound Albies should tower, relatively, over the 5-6, 165-pound Altuve. The actual difference, as far as Albies remembers from when they met, is practically unnoticeable. They can be very much alike, down to the number of letters and lilt of their surnames.
“I’ve heard those (comparisons). It’s for the size that’s why. Obviously, I want to be as good as him. Or better than him,” said Albies, who even for a shorter fellow seems to think there is no ceiling he can’t reach.
Yes, yes, it is early.
Of course, as a young player still discovering his norm, Albies can’t continue to lead baseball in extra-base hits and lead the Braves in home runs (five, as of mid-week, nearly 30 percent of the team total), can he? “We’ll see,” first-baseman Freddie Freeman said Tuesday. He’s the one who is supposed to be the biggest of the boppers. “He might go off. That’s fine with me. What he’s doing at the top of the lineup is big for us.”
All we need to know right now to appreciate the out-sized nature of these first weeks of Albies’ first full season in the majors is this: The 5-8 Brave had more home runs through the first 17 games of the season than either the 6-7 Aaron Judge or 6-6 Giancarlo Stanton of the Yankees.
“It’s a foreign concept to anybody that someone that little in baseball or basketball or almost any sport can do what they can do. It amazes us,” said the shortstop with whom Albies is meant to form a foundational relationship, Dansby Swanson.
Even though he goes back with Albies to minor league days, Swanson still does not exempt himself from the class of admiring witnesses.
“Every day, I’m still blown away a little bit, what he’s able to do,” Swanson said. “He definitely plays bigger than himself. He never ceases to amaze us. And we sort of feed off each other.”
It is no surprise that a compact, quick, close-to-the-ground infielder can play some stunning defense.
It’s the power that just does not match with the source. Bigger and stronger always is the trend in any sport. And what little we may know of physics would lead us to believe that height and weight equals leverage.
Or, as Freeman puts it, “Obviously, usually the bigger the man the farther (the ball) goes.
“But it doesn’t work like that for Ozzie.”
Albies, while possessing a physique as hard jade, said he does not do extraordinary work in the weight room. Just the basics of conditioning, he insists.
Vertically shorting him a bit, nature has compensated Albies nicely.
“Ozzie is a stroooong petite man,” Freeman said while laughing.
“His forearms and his grip are very strong and that’s what you need in hitting. Strong core, too,” Freeman said. “If you have those three things, you can usually hit a ball pretty far. And he has all those.”
And it’s not like Albies displays the Napoleonic tendencies of the little man who feels the need to prove big things. If he plays with that kind of grudge, he doesn’t talk about it. But then, a Curacaoan of many languages but few words, Albies expands on few subjects.
He’ll tell you of no slight in his past that has fueled him. Always the youngest on any team he’s been on (that includes the Braves today), and often the smallest, he came to accept that was just the way of his world.
His late father was shorter than Albies, but did not infuse his son with the need to seek vengeance against a taller world.
“He just told me to play hard every day when I go out there. He always told me never give up, just keep going hard,” Albies said.
“Size doesn’t matter. Just play the game.”
So, how does he do it, how does he generate the kind of power to lead a team in homers, no matter the sample size?
Albies offers few answers. “I don’t know. Seeing the ball. Put a barrel on it. That’s it.”
Seitzer, the professor of hitting, is a bit more informative.
“He is especially God-gifted with hands that are real special,” the Braves hitting coach said. “The quicker hands, the stronger hands that guys have, the better they are getting the bat head through the zone.
“He gets every part of his body into his swing. He uses his legs. You hear power comes from the legs, and that’s true. But it’s a combination of the legs and using the hands the right way.
“Staying closed with his front shoulder, staying short with his path, he generates a lot of leverage. That’s key for guys who hit the ball hard and far.”
Just to be clear, none of this means that Albies’ identity is that of a masher. This week in the Braves’ clubhouse, Albies was wearing one of his new favorite T-shirts. It portrayed him legging out another double - his eight led the league at mid-week - batting helmet virtually ejected from his head. All taking place beneath the claim: “The Most Exciting 10 Seconds in Baseball.”
The Braves have fun with Albies and his loose lid – a member of the Braves’ media-relations department has even begun keeping an unofficial stat for flying-helmet moments (it stood at 21 by the end of the last Philadelphia series).
Albies seem to enjoy it, too. Asked why he can’t keep the thing on his head, he just smiles and says, “I’m just too fast, I guess. (The helmet) can’t keep up with me.”
There’s a certain vision Albies has of himself and it’s not that of a home-run threat.
“I know I’m not the power guy,” he said. “Just trying to put the ball in play, put the ball in the gap and run. I’m a speed guy.”
Exactly the words the Braves long to hear. The last thing this team wants is for any power surge to fry Albies’ circuits.
“As soon as little guys start thinking power, usually everything goes in the toilet. He’s a gap-to-gap guy,” Seitzer said.
When asked before the start of the season by the front office what he thought about Albies’ potential home-run production, Seitzer put it at the 12- to 15-a-season level. (Altuve has twice hit 24 homers in a season).
Important to remember that power is only one component of a plus-sized talent. Whether Albies is in a home-run trot or full-out sprint to second, batting helmet lost in his slipstream, there has been one constant thus far in his career. Like the old hitting coach said, “It’s been fun watching him play.”
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