Why Astros top prospect Drew Gilberts struggles could be just what he needed

Publish date: 2024-07-04

CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — Failure exposed the fine line Drew Gilbert toed throughout his collegiate career. Three seasons at Tennessee turned him into a villain, the type of player his Volunteer teammates loved and all others loathed. Sparkplug may be the most polite way to profile Gilbert, the diminutive and dynamic center fielder now atop the Astros’ prospect rankings.

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Energy is one of Gilbert’s greatest strengths. He’s always played with palpable swagger, the sort that invigorates his own dugout and infuriates opponents. His walk-off grand slam against Wright State in the 2021 NCAA Regionals was accompanied by an absurd bat flip and a saunter down the first-base line. A year later, in his final collegiate series, Gilbert got ejected in the middle of a plate appearance during Tennessee’s super-regional loss against Notre Dame.

Both moments grew Gilbert’s reputation around the sport. The Astros took him with the 28th pick in the 2022 draft and assigned him to their spring training complex in Florida. As draft classes gathered across the country, he still remained a topic.

“After I got drafted and got to camp, everyone was like ‘How is it playing with Drew Gilbert? I feel like I wouldn’t like playing with him,’” said Angels reliever Ben Joyce, Gilbert’s teammate at Tennessee and fellow 2022 draftee.

“He just wasn’t like that at all. And people really couldn’t believe that, just the way he played — with getting ejected, almost getting in fights and all the stuff he did. But he’s an awesome guy to play with.”

Wild success grew Gilbert’s confidence. A first dose of failure forced him to rediscover it. The Astros don’t want to change Gilbert, their top prospect and heir apparent in center field. He reached this point by being himself, which means bat flips, braggadocio and everything in between. Harnessing Gilbert’s emotions and energy is a more practical goal. A monthlong slump upon arriving in Double A gave Gilbert the dose of reality he required to buy into that approach.

“To be honest with you, he’s learned how to fail and (is) understanding that you’re never failing backward, you’re failing forward in our game,” Double-A Corpus Christi hitting coach Bobby Bell said. “He’s very hard on himself. He is a very energetic young man. He’s still learning the professional way of going about at-bats and dealing with failures.

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“Honestly, he’s calmed down a lot,” Bell continued. “We tell him, ‘We don’t want you to lose that fire. We don’t want to take it away with you. We want you to learn how to channel it the right way.’”

Coaches said Gilbert is a player who can’t be confined for long stretches. He has too much energy and needs every avenue to exhaust it.

“He’s hilarious, man,” Hooks manager Joe Thon said. “He gets so locked in. You can see his funny antics. But then all of a sudden, he’ll lock it in very quickly. Not really normal. It’s like he gets a switch and he’s back to locked in. He’s just quirky, man. Big, big competitor. He wants to win. He wants to win his at-bats. Loves the guys. Backs them up. He’s just a ball of energy.”

Gilbert earned an early-May promotion to Double A after slashing .361/.421/.686 in 95 plate appearances at High-A Asheville. The swift ascent prompted wonder if Gilbert could emerge as a legitimate major-league option later in the season, especially given how bullish general manager Dana Brown appears on him.

In mid-May, Gilbert’s left elbow began to hurt. Both he and Thon suspected an increase in Gilbert’s defensive workload contributed to the soreness. Gilbert, who throws and hits left-handed, acknowledged he never threw this much at Tennessee.

Gilbert said he never received an MRI and did not consider the injury anything serious. The Astros described it as “left elbow discomfort” and limited Gilbert to being a designated hitter while it subsided.

Gilbert went 7-for-66 during the 19-game stretch when he served as a DH. He had never failed for such an extended period. His demeanor after questionable calls or poor outcomes became an issue, Bell said. Without playing outfield, Gilbert had nowhere to channel his anger and no way to forget about his frustration from unproductive at-bats.

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“He wears his emotions on his sleeve,” Bell said. “We’ve showed examples of how to harness the energy and how the way he dealt with situations could harm another player, if not himself. It’s a constant learning (experience) how to deal with the energy. I think the biggest issue for him that got him in trouble early was he got slightly injured. He was just beating himself up over at-bats because he was DHing.”

Gilbert got into bad habits he could not break. He overswung on pitches he could not drive, resulting in weak ground balls to his pull side. He went in too steep on some of his swings and generated pop-ups. His plate discipline remained intact — Gilbert worked 17 walks and struck out 19 times during the slump — but quality contact eluded him. Gilbert stands just 5-foot-9, but benefits from keeping his barrel on-plane longer than most and having quick rotations.

“His on-plane efficiency is unbelievable,” Bell said. “That’s the biggest thing I like about him mechanically. Physically, even though he’s a little guy, the way he can turn the barrel fast. His lever gets a little long at times, but his ability to turn fast out of it and keep it on a plane is a gift.”

Those gifts have many expecting great things from him despite his relative inexperience. In spring training, Brown found the 22-year-old outfielder on a back field and challenged him to win the center field job out of camp. The request itself felt unrealistic, but did demonstrate the potential Brown believes Gilbert possesses.

“The biggest thing I take away from that interaction is that a guy like that believes in me. I truly appreciate that from him,” Gilbert said. “Don’t get me wrong, sure, it gives me confidence. But I think if that wasn’t my mindset in a sense that — you know, everyone’s trying to make the big leagues. Yeah, it was cool. But at the end of the day, if I don’t do something about it, it doesn’t matter.”

Brown meant well with his motivational spring training meeting, but Bell wondered whether it added more pressure on a prospect already dealing with so much. Gilbert is the crown jewel of an otherwise gutted farm system. First-round picks always carry heavier burdens to prove themselves, too.

DREW.

B3 | AMA 0 CC 1 pic.twitter.com/ndrAzjB9ZB

— Corpus Christi Hooks (@cchooks) June 25, 2023

Gilbert is still paving his path. He was cleared to play the outfield last week. When he did, Bell and the team’s coaches noticed Gilbert hitting more line drives and going gap to gap. His endless supply of energy was evenly distributed, perhaps the end of the first true test in Gilbert’s baseball life. Sunday, he hit a home run, his first this month.

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“It will be good for me when I look back on my career. I was going to fail at some point, right? It wasn’t just going to be perfect my whole life,” Gilbert said. “I think it’s good for me. I’m a high-energy player and I’m kind of learning how to control that when things aren’t going too well. That’s a big thing. We talk about being a professional. It’s a job at the end of the day and it’s about problem-solving. So, yeah, things aren’t going too well potentially. But how do I fix that and turn around as best I can?”

(Photo of Gilbert during spring training: Reinhold Matay / USA Today)

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