The Cleveland Guardians have established regulars in left and center field.
Steven Kwan is a perfectly capable leadoff man with Gold Glove defense and contributions on the basepaths, while Lane Thomas took a while to take off, but is now firmly entrenched as a middle-of-the-order contributor.
Right field, however, has been more of an issue for the Guards.
The team has tried Jhonkensy Noel, Will Brennan, Daniel Schneemann, and others there and none of them has been able to run away with the job.
They have all had their moments, but as far as taking over right field, it hasn’t happened yet.
Noel has some significant potential as we saw last year.
He finished his regular season with a 131 wRC+ in Triple-A and a 118 mark in the majors.
He needs to cut down on his strikeouts (31.8 percent in MLB) in order to reach his potential, but it’s important to say that even if he faded in the regular season, he was an above-average hitter in the majors over 198 plate appearances.
With 31 regular season homers between the two levels and one of the most important dingers in recent Guardians history in October, there is no doubt he has game-changing power.
2024 was about showing the world what he is capable of doing.
Well, 2025 requires him to take the next step, and will be more about showing that he can do it consistently on an everyday basis.
He needs to reduce his strikeouts in order to put more balls into play, because his batted ball profile, exit velocities and ability to barrel the baseball almost guarantee good results with a decent contact rate.
On upside alone, Noel has what it takes to become Cleveland’s right fielder.
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