On the surface, Kyle Tucker has struggled at the plate when only accounting for his batting average (.200, 3-15), but he has demonstrated great patience at the plate.<\/p>\n
Tucker has only appeared in eight games so far this spring, as he missed a generous amount of time to tend to his wife for the birth of their newborn son. He demonstrated his \u201cdad strength\u201d on Friday by launching his first home run in a Dodgers uniform, but his value hasn\u2019t come from his bat; it\u2019s from his vision.<\/p>\n
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Tucker has walked six times compared to only two strikeouts. Combine those free passes with a hit by pitch, and Tucker has reached base in nearly half of his 22 plate appearances, good for a .455 on-base percentage. And that is exactly what Dave Roberts expects out of Tucker; to get on base at a consistent rate and set the table for the rest of the star hitters to follow, writes Bill Plunkett of the Orange County Register<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cFor me, I just see him as a guy if he gets on base, however he gets on base, that\u2019s the biggest \u2013 that\u2019s something we\u2019re looking for and something we\u2019re counting on,\u201d Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said of the role he envisions for Kyle Tucker. \u201cHaving Mookie (Betts) and Freddie (Freeman) behind him and Will (Smith) \u2013 if he\u2019s a guy who gets on base at a high, high clip, then everything else will kind of fall into place.\u201d<\/p>\n Links<\/p>\n Although Kik\u00e9 Hern\u00e1ndez was unable to participate in this year\u2019s World Baseball Classic for Team Puerto Rico, he remarked on participating in the tournament is more significant than playing in the World Series, per Jack Vita of the Los Angeles Times<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cI said it feels bigger,\u201d Hern\u00e1ndez said. \u201cI didn\u2019t say it\u2019s bigger. Atmosphere, crowd, you\u2019re representing your country. You\u2019re not representing a city. You don\u2019t always choose who you play for. Sometimes that\u2019s out of your control and you know, when you\u2019re representing your country, you\u2019re playing along with your homies. Sometimes you\u2019re playing along with people that you grew up with. Your people back home are rooting for you, at times.\u201d<\/p>\n