I mentioned Elly De La Cruz as a comp. He did not do that well last year despite all the SportCenter highlights. This year his hitting has blossomed. It’s an adjustment for almost all the prospects. If he’s still hitting like this next year at this time then worry.
For his blossom, he's still striking out 31% of the time. Swing and miss is always going to be a part of DLC's game. Likewise, I would expect it to be part of Wood's game. He's simply too tall to have a Juan Soto-esq K rate.
Any hype for Wood was built up in Triple A, but I just think a lot of folks arent aware of how hitter friendly Triple A has become. There simply isnt the velo nor the breaking stuff there. Anyone who has MLB ready breaking stuff/velo is going to get pushed to the majors, simply to not waste bullets in the minors. I highly recommend you all read the Athletic article on this issue:
https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5481059/2024/05/09/mlb-top-hitting-prospects-majors/The bottom line is that for issues like learning to deal with high velo and hard breaking stuff, Double A is simply closer to the majors than Triple A. If you're a pitcher in Triple A, its because your stuff isn't good enough to play on its own and you need to learn to paint the corners.
On top of that, Triple A has been the testing ground for ABS. Every game has had some variation of ABS use. Hitters are getting a different zone than the major leagues. Specifically, its tighter. And more specifically, its tighter on the corners at the bottom of the zone. Essentially, the ABS zone looks more like a rounded rectangle than a hard one. So Wood has spent the last three months very patiently developing his own strike zone, and getting reward for it. That zone is now much more random (in comparison to ABS) and he is learning to deal with it.
So, Wood is not only dealing with a ton of velo and way nastier breaking stuff than he ever has before, but he's doing it while trying to re-learn the strikezone, with an approach that he developed on his own that prioritized patience over free swining. I don't understand why everyone is saying they were disappointed. He's doing better than Langford, Jackson, or Chorio.
