Remember when Matt Kemp was one of the best hitters in baseball? From 2011 through 2014, Kemp batted .300/.366/.524 for a 147 OPS+, with the best season in the mix coming by way of a 172 OPS+ and a second-place finish for the National League MVP. Then, Kemp was traded to the Padres, where his bat was just ... fine. And fine wasn’t going to cut it given his horrid defense.
Matt Kemp had 5 hits, is awesome again
Tuesday’s Say Hey, Baseball wants to point out that Matt Kemp remembered how to hit like Matt Kemp.
Photo by Jayne Kamin-Oncea/Getty Images
The Padres dumped him on the Braves, where things briefly got better, but not by much. Atlanta traded him back to the Dodgers this winter, back where it all began, and Kemp picked right up where he left off: by being awesome at the plate yet again.
Kemp had five hits, including a three-run homer, in a Monday night game against the Pirates. That wasn’t the start of his excellence at the plate this season, but it gives us a natural point in time to go, “Hey, did you notice Matt Kemp rules?” Kemp is now batting .323/.359/.565 with 15 homers and a 149 OPS+. There have been no questions in public about his effort, his conditioning is top-notch once more, and the results, well, you can see them in that batting line.
He’s leading the Dodgers in OPS+, and is second in homers behind Cody Bellinger. The timing for Kemp’s resurgence couldn’t be better, as the Dodgers are without star shortstop Corey Seager for the rest of 2018 after undergoing Tommy John surgery: Kemp isn’t making the Dodgers better than they were in 2017, but thriving when Seager isn’t there to replicate his 2017 has been huge for Los Angeles, and is one of the reasons they sit just 1.5 games back of the D-Backs in the NL West.
Kemp still isn’t a perfect player by any means, and at 33 years old, he isn’t about to get any better on defense. However, he’s in left field, instead of in center or right. His bat is once again a threat, meaning he can still be an above-average presence even with his glove. That’s a significant difference from where he was at this time a year ago, when he was one of the worst regular players in MLB.
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- And here’s another potentially sketchy Dodgers’ story: either they’re manipulating Walker Buehler’s service time in-season, or they handled his injury about as incompetently as you can.
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- Beyond the Box Score has strong words about the Angels’ chances at the postseason.
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- Hardball Times has a look at a way MLB could diversify their hiring.
- Sheryl Ring wrote about if Chris Bosio has any chance of winning a wrongful termination suit against the Tigers.
- Baseball Prospectus wonders how Jon Gray went from Rockies ace to Triple-A in a matter of months.
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