Dalton Speeding retains a couple of baseball gloves on the highest shelf of his nook locker within the Dodger Stadium clubhouse. None of them is a catcher’s mitt.
Which appears important since Speeding is a catcher.
However in faculty at Louisville and within the Cape Cod Summer season League, he performed extra video games at first base and within the outfield than behind the plate. So he nonetheless runs out with a fielder’s glove throughout batting apply, simply in case.
“I’ll shag during BP, just kind of to take the shakiness, just to be as comfortable as possible if I have to go out there,” he stated.
“It’s good to have that skill, to bounce over there and play. But the biggest thing moving forward is catching.”
Utilizing Speeding as something apart from Will Smith’s backup behind the plate would qualify as a “break glass in case of emergency move” for supervisor Dave Roberts, though he has performed Speeding for 13 innings at first base and tabbed him as the subsequent man up when he feared Freddie Freeman would miss time after being hit on the left wrist final month.
“He can handle first base,” Roberts stated. “I don’t feel good with him in left field, but he’s done it.
“Right now the main thing is to spell Will; continue to be good behind the plate.”
Few groups cherish utility greater than the Dodgers, who’ve used 5 gamers in at the least three completely different positions this season. Nevertheless, catchers — even backup catchers — are usually valued extra for his or her distinctive abilities at calling video games, blocking 100-mph pitches within the dust and throwing out would-be base stealers than for his or her versatility.
That’s why Smith, the Dodgers’ beginning catcher and a three-time Nationwide League All-Star, has performed simply 3 2/3 innings anyplace else within the area in seven main league seasons. Speeding expects the identical.
“The main focus is catching. It’s been catching since I showed up,” he stated. “When they made the decision to bring me up in May, it was kind of: ‘Hey, we want this guy to catch. Learn the position. Learn these guys as much as possible.’
“I like to keep it in my back pocket that I can play other positions. But I would say the main reason is still to catch.”
And hit, because the Dodgers additionally see worth in Speeding’s bat. A left-handed hitter with pop, Speeding was slashing .308/.424/.514 when he was known as up from triple-A Oklahoma Metropolis in Might.
“The bat got him here,” Roberts stated. “The performance got him here.”
How lengthy it retains him right here is unsure. Speeding, who has at all times been a starter, is having hassle adjusting to restricted at-bats, hitting .186 with greater than twice as many strikeouts as hits in 37 video games.
However then this isn’t the primary time he’s adopted Smith since each catchers performed faculty baseball at Louisville and in Cape Cod League. Smith, 30, who was born in Louisville, was undrafted out of highschool however turned a first-round decide of the Dodgers three years later, signing for a $1.775-million bonus. He made his massive league debut in 2019, the identical 12 months Speeding graduated highschool.
Speeding, 24, from Tennessee, was a second-round decide in 2022, getting slightly below $2 million to signal with the Dodgers.
“He’s older than me by a few years, but we crossed paths a good bit,” stated Speeding, who shares an agent with Smith. “It’s similar paths. That’s kind of what just allows the Dodgers to know what they’re getting.
“He helps out a lot, and it makes my job a lot easier. Seeing him do what he does every day and kind of just running things off of each other and just trying to learn as much as possible.”
It some methods, then, Speeding finds himself within the good place. Regardless of which glove he makes use of.
