They span an age and experience spectrum high-Single A players can bring to a roster, at least when they’re as talented as Roberto Campos and Jace Jung.
Campos is 19 years old and plays mostly center field for the West Michigan Whitecaps. When he signed a Tigers contract four years ago, he won what then was the highest bonus the Tigers had ever paid an international teen: $2.8 million.
He’s showing why fat investments are made in certain players, even adolescents.
Jung is 22 and was last year’s first-round Tigers draft pick, a 12th overall choice, from Texas Tech who had in his left-handed bat the kind of distilled skills the Tigers thought would make him an eventual big-league pitch-basher.
Hitting wasn’t so much the question. His natural position, reputed to be second base, was more of a concern — until, that is, heavy reforms were made that now are showing up, game by game.
They are two players who hint at delivering major horsepower, maybe by next year in the case of Jung, to a Tigers roster perpetually hunting for help on offense.
Campos, a 6-foot-3, 200-pound, right-handed batter, has hitting numbers that don’t overwhelm, or excite: .257 batting average, .314 on-base, .440 slugging, .754 OPS. Rather, the stats reinforce this is a teenage talent in bloom.
Jung’s work, particularly with respect to his .384 on-base average, points to wisdom gained from being three years older. College baseball taught him much of what Campos now is learning. He is batting .255 with four homers (Campos has three) and an .820 OPS.
His overseers, Whitecaps manager Brayan Pena and Tigers development chief Ryan Garko, talked about each of their farmhands during Sunday phone conversations.
Campos last year at low-Single A specialized in hitting ground balls with 105-mph exit velocity. This season, there’s been subtle work aimed at putting some loft on his swing:
“We’re really happy with the results, and how he’s maturing, starting to grow into his body and into some of that man strength,” Garko said. “When you move to that level (high A), there’s always a question of how you handle the physicality of that level in terms of playing against older player.
“The staff has done a great job, Pena and all of them, in really helping him understand the ‘why’ behind things. He just needs more at-bats, and as he gets more at-bats, learning how to hit the ball in the air, to work counts, and to game-plan.
“Kenny Graham (Tigers player-development director) talked in December about some slight movement-focus that could get him on plane a little sooner. He could get too steep at times. It was kind of Hitting 101, but for Campos, it was a big thing.
“All he needs now is at-bats.”
Pena said of Campos, “What’s impressed me most is how he has been able to make adjustments and understand what pitchers are trying to do with him.
“He’s not panicking. He’s 19, and we have to make sure he gets experience and gets his at-bats. But Garko and Kenny Graham, they have a goal with him — to continue to hit the ball hard and create some ISO (extra-base power).
“We’re very happy with the way he’s adjusting to this league, understanding pitches he can do damage with. That’s why we move him around the lineup a little bit: We hit him leadoff, hit him third, fifth, maybe fourth — we want him to understand the damage he’s going to be able to do as a hitter. We’re very comfortable with that.
“At the same time, he has to know there are certain pitches he can’t do damage to,” said Pena, speaking of a player who has 10 walks and 27 strikeouts in 28 games compared with Jung’s 22 walks and 30 whiffs in 29 games. “So, we have to get him disciplined enough to create that ISO. I’m very excited, man, about his future.”
Garko understands Jung is a different player altogether. He is nearly three years older than Campos. He is a left-handed batter and infielder, a 6-foot, 205-pound slasher whose roster-value will rise — if he can stick at second base.
“Actually, all of us are really happy with his production and work around the bag (second base), and his arm-strength at the bag,” Garko said. “He has this drive to be a really good professional second-baseman. And he’s really engaged with the staff to help him there.
“He’s going to hit,” Garko said. “Last year was a nice taste (.706 in 30 games at West Michigan after he was drafted in July). This spring, he’s fought through the cold weather, and now it’s warming up and you’re seeing the power.
“He really controls the strike zone, which I think we knew he’d do, and now he’s starting to drive some pitches.”
In both cases, Garko credits Pena for being a unique combination of psychologist and coach in teaching and coaxing players through a pivotal period in farm-team schooling.
Players at high-A aren’t to be confused with back-field grunts. But often, they aren’t yet ready for graduation to Double A, which tends to be viewed as a waiting-room to the big leagues.
That is, if talent and tutoring have meshed to make a high-A prospect a player with MLB credentials.
“We remind our (high-A) players what a great career Brayan had,” said Garko, speaking of Pena and his 12 big-league seasons as a catcher, one of which (2013) was spent with the Tigers.
“He played a long time, and he played for some great managers (Bobby Cox, Jim Leyland). And, as a human being his care-level is off the charts. He’s really good.”
It’s a delicate dance, one Pena has been choreographing with Campos as a player who probably someday settles into a MLB corner-outfield spot. For now, his basic-training in center continues.
“One of the things he did that, for us, was very important is that he went back home (Dominican Republic) during the offseason and worked on our plan for him,” Pena said of Campos. “It was a plan for getting stronger, to move better, a lot of things Garko and everyone made for him.
“He’s fielding well. In fact, we’re super-excited about the way he’s handled center field. The tools are there. He can run well, he moves well, which is why we’re playing him in different positions (23 games in center, five in right field).
“It says how much we care about his ability. We’re just trying to create a big-leaguer.”
Lynn Henning is a freelance writer and retired Detroit News sports reporter.