Los Angeles Dodgers designated hitter Josue De Paula did not register a hit in his MLB debut against the Miami Marlins, but he looked every bit the prized prospect.
De Paula did get on base during his debut, drawing a walk that underpins his ability to be patient at the plate.
During his first two at-bats, he was able to generate full counts. In his first one, De Paula eventually got ahold of a hanging slider that came inside on him, but he was too early, and it was a pop-up.
He was late to the fastball on a few counts, resulting in some foul balls, but the swing choice was quite quality.
His second plate appearance resulted in a walk, which was a great display of discipline to avoid swinging at tantalizing off-speed pitches.
For his third at-bat, he got a hold of a fastball, but this time he was a touch early in terms of his swing, and it did not go for a hit.
De Paula’s final one was a ground ball down the first-base line, which Kyle Stowers managed to get, and the young Dodger missed out on his first hit.
On all three batted balls, De Paula had a fast swing, which, according to Baseball Savant’s metrics, is more than 75 miles per hour.
He had the quickest swing at 84.7 MPH in the game, with the other two being 75.5 MPH and 75 MPH.
Dave Roberts’ assessment of De Paula
The Dodgers skipper Dave Roberts, after the game, said that he feels good about De Paula’s debut and believes his first hit will come soon.
“I thought coming into tonight he was going to conduct good at-bats. I felt he wasn’t going to be overwhelmed by the moment, and that’s exactly what we saw,” Roberts explained.
“We saw a good walk, some hard contact, and he hung in there against the left-hander to hit a ball hard down the line first baseman makes a good play, but he’ll be in there tomorrow and the next day, and he’ll get his first one soon enough.”
The Dodgers value a hitter who can draw competitive at-bats while making hard, launched contact.
De Paula showed everything that the Dodgers tend to look for, and if he strings together a good amount of games like this, the outfield will force him into the batting order even when Shohei Ohtani comes back.
