Narciso Crook has been crushing the ball lately, and he continued doing just that on Sunday for the Louisville Bats. The Reds prospect homered for the 4th time in his last five games for the Triple-A squad.
Narciso Crook feels like he should be older than he is. He was drafted way back in 2013 out of a junior college. That was seven minor league seasons ago. But Crook just turned 24-years-old earlier this month. When he was drafted he was just 17-years-old. It’s been a slow rise through the system for the outfielder. In 2018 he began to show some of the hitting ability, and tools that has always been there but hadn’t always translated onto the field. After beginning the year in Dayton he quickly moved up to Daytona. And at the midseason point was moved up to Double-A Pensacola where he hit .286/.362/.379 in 63 games.
When 2019 started, the then 23-year-old headed back to Double-A, but this time in the new home of the Reds affiliate, joining the Chattanooga Lookouts. In 24 games there he hit .296/.342/.437. He’s spent another 48 games with Louisville this season in Triple-A. And that’s where he’s taken that next step. With the help of his recent home run binge, he’s now hitting .307/.367/.577 with the Bats.
Michael Siani’s turnaround over the last two months
Over the first 38 games of the season Michael Siani was struggling at the plate. And when I say struggling, I mean he was really, really struggling. The left-handed hitter was hitting .168/.279/.252 through May 22nd. He had walked 18 times in that span, good for an 11% walk rate. But he had also struck out in 23% of his plate appearances. Couple that with hitting for very little power, and the then 19-year-old was just having a rough go of it at the plate for the Dayton Dragons.
On May 23rd he broke out of a week-long slump, and from that day forward he hasn’t looked back. He’s played in 47 games since the start of that day and he’s hit .324/.388/.412 in that span. The power output isn’t much different than the earlier stretch. But he’s made a pretty big difference in how much contact he’s making. Michael Siani has struck out just 31 times in the 203 plate appearances in this stretch of games – that’s 15%, a significant drop off from the 23% it was through May 22nd.
That turn around has brought his season line up to .255/.339/.342 through 85 games. That’s about league average for the Midwest League. The line for the league this season is .239/.323/.358 in 2019. When looking at his season line, things still don’t look great – but keep an eye on this the rest of the season. He’s been a very different hitter for more than half of the season now. The adjustments have been there and the numbers are starting to reflect that.