Kristie Ackert of the Daily News says Travis d’Arnaud has quite an impressive resume. He was a first-round pick by the Phillies, and he’s twice been used as a trading chip for a Cy Young winner. He has all the glowing scouting reports and made all the blue-chip prospect lists. However, it’s time for him to go from prospect to productive major leaguer and nobody knows that better than him.
“It’s cool and all to have that prospect label and everything, but I’d really rather just be known as a good player,” d’Arnaud said. “I am ready for that.”
D’Arnaud is one of the key critical elements to this five year rebuild plan that Sandy Alderson initiated as soon as he arrived.
Along with Wheeler, Travis is the poster boy for the Alderson Era and in his interview with Ackert, he understands that it’s time for him to perform and start living up to years of prospect hype. He heads into camp with all of that in mind.
He didn’t exactly hit the ground running offensively and batted .202/.86/.263 with three doubles, a home run and five RBI in 112 plate appearances, while striking out 21 times.
In three days d’Arnaud turns 25 and yet years of injuries and setbacks still have him at the beginning of his learning curve in the majors.
“I still have a lot to learn, I still have a lot of work to do to get better,” said d’Arnaud, “but I also have a lot of ideas of how I want to go about getting my work done and how I want to handle things. I was lucky last year, I got to spend a lot of time with John Buck and I learned a lot and I’ve kind of structured things from that.”
On the plus side, TDA has gained the trust and respect of his pitchers for his ability to frame pitches and get a strike call on balls that are low in the zone.
Terry Collins told TC Palm that when he came up last season, he worked hard each and every game to make sure that he and the pitchers could work together and have confidence in him.
D’Arnaud is still considered the best catching prospect in the majors, but now I want to see him translate that into becoming a potential top ten catcher in the majors.
