A deluxe season for Gavin Lux

by Cary Osborne

Double-A Texas League All-Star. Playing in the All-Star Futures Game. A promotion to Triple-A Oklahoma City and hitting .531 with a 1.640 OPS in his first 15 games there. Dodgers’ №2 prospect Gavin Lux’s first 3 1/2 months this season have been remarkable.

“It’s about as good as you could hope for.” says Dodger director of player development Will Rhymes. “Each level he goes up he just seems to get better, which is not easy to do. … He has followed up last year, which was a tremendous step forward for him, with another great campaign so far and growing into more power. At this point, it’s hard to put a limit on his ceiling.”

For nearly the entire span of his four professional seasons, Lux — a positive, upbeat, phenomenally talented baseball player — has consistently produced and been one of the brightest jewels in the Dodgers’ heavily studded farm system crown. He has produced so consistently, it’s difficult to spot adversity.

But it has happened — twice — and each time has made him better.

The latest occurrence happened at the beginning of the year in the biggest spot of his professional career.

For the first time in Lux’s run as a professional ballplayer, he received a non-roster invite to Major League Spring Training camp in 2019 — a significant endorsement for a prospect.

The purpose was clear. Lux, no matter how he performed, wasn’t going to win a spot on the Dodgers’ Opening Day roster. The 2018 Dodgers Branch Rickey Minor League Player of the Year was at Camelback Ranch to learn and experience what it’s like to be a big leaguer — another step in his rapid development.

Traditionally, prospects at big league camp hang out together, have their lockers in a row together and try their best to stay out of the veterans’ way.

Lux had some issues finding consistency with his throwing in games from his shortstop position, and at one point it was a topic of conversation where manager Dave Roberts was asked about it by reporters. The veteran manager said he was confident Lux would fix it.

“I struggled throwing and that was more mentally than physically,” Lux recalls. “I think it was a learning experience. Just more of that feeling that, OK, I feel like I can play with these guys. I belong. But yeah, it was a learning experience, and I’m happy I went through that and met a lot of those guys and became familiar with all those guys in that clubhouse.”

Those veterans who he was supposed to clear a path for made it known that they wanted him to succeed. Lux says fellow shortstop Corey Seager, third baseman Justin Turner and outfielder/first baseman Joc Pederson lent their support. Lux recalls asking Seager if he had ever gone through the same throwing struggles, to which the veteran told him he had. Seager gave him a tip: Throw the ball firm to the first baseman like you’re throwing it through the bottom of his chin.

“Getting that support from guys who a couple years ago you grew up watching and saying, ‘Wow, I want to be like these guys one day,’ it definitely put me in a better mindset for sure,” Lux says. “It carries more weight when it comes from a big league guy you look up to. They don’t have to do that. For me, that was almost like a turning point. OK, everyone understands people go through this. It happens. Go play and have fun. I think it made a world of difference.”

Though it doesn’t paint the entire picture on Lux’s fielding, as of the first week in July, he was on pace to having the best fielding percentage of his career from the shortstop position.

Lux says he’s both positive and self-critical. Of all the areas where he continues to look for improvement, consistency is at the top. “Especially on defense,” he says.

The other challenging time for the 2016 first-round pick was the first half of 2017 — his first full pro season. He was with the Low-A Great Lakes Loons, and on July 17, after his 69th game that season, he was batting .204 with a .607 OPS.

“When you’re hitting .200 at the All-Star Break, everyone in their mind would say, ‘OK, maybe I’m not that good,” Lux says.

In his final 42 games that season, he batted .308 with an .831 OPS.

“Everybody goes through struggles at some point. Having that happen early on was kind of a blessing,” he says. “I kind of learned how to fail and deal with it. At the time, I was not a real happy camper. But I’m glad it happened.

There are two areas that have been particularly eyebrow-raising of late in Lux’s development.

In 2018, he hit 15 home runs between High-A Rancho Cucamonga and Double-A Tulsa. He has 20 homers between Tulsa and Triple-A Oklahoma City this season — including six in his last five games.

Lux is visibly more muscular this year, but beyond the muscle, the shortstop says the increase in power has a better correlation to him having a better gameplan at the plate and knowing what pitches he can do the most damage on.

The left-handed hitter had a .328 average and .865 OPS against left-handers in 63 plate appearances this year.

Between 2017 and 2018, he batted .191 with a .512 OPS against lefties in 222 plate appearances. The more reps against lefties, he says, have helped his improvement. But so have his own adjustments. Lux recognized that he was back-eye dominant, so he opened up his stance against left-handers and moved his head to get a better view.

Everything about Lux seems to be trending up.

Last season, he spent the first four months of the season in Rancho before an August promotion to Tulsa. He batted a combined .324/.399/.514/.913.

He started this year in Tulsa and batted .313/.375/.521/.896 before a June 23 promotion to Triple-A.

Lux says he was pretty nervous for his first game in Oklahoma City. He was in the leadoff spot for the OKC Dodgers and in his first at-bat, he singled. The nerves subsided. He went 3-for-5 in his Triple-A debut. The next day he was selected to play in the Futures Game. Two days later, he had four hits and a home run.

He is 34-for-64 in OKC with six homers and a .531/.577/1.063/1.640 slash line in 15 games. He hit two homers and drove in five runs on Wednesday.

It has been one eventful season — one with opportunity still ahead. But Lux has some favorite moments so far.

“Obviously the big league Spring Training was huge for me,” he says. But the Futures Game also was a lot of hard work and sacrifice that other people have helped me with. That was one of my goals. Every minor league baseball player, that’s something everyone wants to do one day. Just being able to play in the Futures Game, it’s pretty cool for me.”

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