“Your 2023 Joe Bauman Home Run Award Winner: Shay Whitcomb.”
That is the social media post the Space Cowboys shared last September.
The Joe Bauman Award — which is given to the player with the most home runs in all of minor league baseball — was given to Astros prospect Shay Whitcomb, who led all of minor league baseball in homers in 2023 with 35 long balls in 133 games, including 23 homers in 87 games at Triple-A.
Despite that success, there were still things Whitcomb needed to work on. The infielder struck out 31.1% of the time and drew walks at a 6.1% rate in Triple-A in 2023. For Whitcomb, this was something he knew he needed to improve on. Chasing the Joe Bauman Award, though, didn’t help those numbers.
“As the numbers [home runs] grew, I was maybe getting a little greedy towards the end and kind of swinging at everything,” Whitcomb said.
Whitcomb has made a drastic improvement in walks. In 2023, he had only 24 walks in 392 plate appearances in Triple-A. This season, his walk rate is up to 11.0%, as he has drawn 20 walks in 181 plate appearances.
“I think it just comes down to every year learning and seeing what needs to be fixed and how you can get a couple percent better,” Whitcomb said. “That was one of the main things this year, just simplifying down swing movements and mechanics to allow myself to see the ball a little bit better.”
His strikeout rate is also down to a career best 22.1%, down from 31.1% last year. His career low before this season was 28.3% in 2021 in Single-A. That is a huge improvement, especially for a player coming off a year where he led minor league baseball in homers.
“Just fine tuning here and there,” Whitcomb said. “At this stage of my career, I don’t think there’s any big changes that need to be made besides fine tuning little areas right now.”
Even though he has cut his strikeout rate down, he hasn’t lost power. He has 10 doubles, two triples and nine homers already this season. His ISO (Isolated Power) is sitting at .258, which is higher than it was last year in Triple-A when he had a .210 ISO.
Often we hear about swing decisions. That part alone can be one of the biggest changes a player can make, ensuring he is swinging at the right pitches in the zone and laying off the ones that he won’t be able to do damage on.
“Better swing decisions meant that I actually have more opportunities and more pitches to see in the zone when I’m not swinging and missing at pitches away and striking out,” Whitcomb said.
One spot Whitcomb is doing more damage this year is with two strikes. It’s pretty obvious, but if a hitter can learn to hit with two strikes, his strikeout percentage is going to go down.
“I think it goes into the general approach of seeing the ball deep and minimizing my swing movements and my loads so that I can make better decisions,” Whitcomb said on his two-strike approach.
After his monster 2023 season, teams knew Whitcomb had the offensive potential to play at the higher level, but along with cutting down on the strikeouts, he wanted to work on his defense.
This past offseason, Whitcomb worked with Astros infield coordinator Mike Ramazzotti. Being that Whitcomb was a former player at UC San Diego and Ramazzotti was a former coach there, they were able to use the facilities when they had the opportunity. Ramazotti knew an area he needed to focus on.
“Majority of his errors were throwing errors,” Ramazzotti said. “We didn’t do anything groundbreaking or ultra innovative besides just getting more balls in the air.”
But it is not only the coaches that help the players. While Ramazzotti and the Triple-A staff have put in a ton of work, some of the best mentorship Whitcomb received was from other players.
“He learns from other guys just as much as he learns from the coaches,” Ramazzotti said. “Like in 2022 spending the season with [Grae] Kessinger at Corpus… he’s told me was it was an incredible change in his career.”
That kind of “mentorship”, if you want to call it that, can be invaluable for young players like Whitcomb.
“I think that as you grow and mature as an infielder, you know the ways you’ve learned from a young age and until someone else shows you how to field a ground ball differently or what to think about when you approach it,” Whitcomb said. “You get to see a different side of the game that you’ve never seen before.”
The improvement has been constant for Whitcomb, something you want to see from a prospect in the system.
“I think it’s really been like a slow gradual growth and progression,” Ramazzotti said. “More so off of just his own understanding of what he’s good at.”
Ramazzotti has been able to work with Whitcomb over the last couple seasons and has seen that growth and progression first hand and what he has improved on.
“I think it’s been his decision, making on understanding the speed of ball, what bounces do and how to attack those bounces,” Ramazzotti said. “How to attack the specific ground ball and his arm has gradually gotten stronger.”
Ramazzotti said a lot of young players tend to predetermine exactly how they are going to field a ball too early, which prevents their ability to adjust later on. This is something Whitcomb has continued to improve on and just acting on instincts rather than planning out an attack.
In Spring Training 2023, Whitcomb didn’t receive a major league invite, but he was still able to open some eyes with his play coming over from mini-camp to help the big league club.
“He opened some eyes over there just with his ability to make some routine plays and he made a couple of good plays,” Ramazzotti said. “People always underestimate the player’s ability to make the routine play and how much of an impact that has on the game.”
Whitcomb received an invite to big league Spring Training in 2024, the first one of his career, a great opportunity for a young player to really watch and learn from the veterans.
“Just being around really good players, being in big league camp this year and being around [Jeremy] Peña and [Jose] Altuve and [Alex] Bregman every day, it was really helpful,” Whitcomb said.
This season, Whitcomb has played at shortstop, second base and third base, showing off his versatility — something we have seen from Astros prospects before.
“If a guy can play multiple positions, ultimately increases their value,” Ramazzotti said. “Because you never know who is going to come or go.”
Players are constantly looking to improve. Looking for ways to get a little bit better every year.
“Every year, I try and refine little parts of my game, hoping that the finished result is something special,” Whitcomb added.
Given his improvements on offense and defense, his versatility on the infield and the constant need for depth, Whitcomb could be a player we see get a chance with the big league club sooner rather than later. Hitting .310 with 10 doubles, two triples, nine homers and a .971 OPS in 42 Triple-A games this season is something special.
“He’s playing confident defense and that’s something that is definitely preached and has been preached for as long as I know,” Ramazzotti said.
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