So, the Cubs finally moved up the one guy their fans had actually heard of last week. Javier Baez, who was rated the No. 8 prospect in all of minor league baseball by most scouting services, finally got called into his AAA manager's tiny office in Iowa City and given his ticket to join the big club. In his first game last Tuesday, he was inserted into the No. 2 spot in the Cubs’ batting order, and his first game was not really anything to write home about. He went 0 for 5 with three strike outs, but no one will remember much about that because of what happened in the 12th. In his sixth plate appearance, Baez launched a towering, majestic home run to the right-center field shrubbery at Coors Field that gave the Cubs a 6-5 lead and eventually a win over the Colorado Rockies. Two days later, in the final game of the series, he hit two more home runs. For those of you scoring at home that's three homers in three games. And the legend was born...or was it? In the week since he was moved up, Baez is 8 for 29 (.276) at the plate. He has three homers and has driven in six. But the number that has Cubs fans’ underwear in a knot is the number 12. Baez had struck out 12 times in 29 at-bats with the big club heading into Monday's series opener with Milwaukee. That's a lot! But I would remind Cubs faithful of a few things: • Baez has been a slow starter at every level along the way. He was batting under .230 in June with the I-Cubs, before going on a torrid hitting streak in July. He finished his time in AAA at .260 with 23 home runs and 80 RBI. • He's learning a new position. The kid is a shortstop, but the Cubs have shown a commitment to Starlin Castro. So he's been working on coming up at second base. He makes the turn about as well as you can and he has a cannon attached to his right shoulder. • There is no pressure on him right now. Frankly, the only pressure on him is the pressure die-harders have put on him to become their "Moses" and lead them to the promised land. Example: He has two strikes and no one out in a game against Tampa Bay over the weekend. A professional hitter shortens his swing and rolls it to the right side to move the runner over. Baez took a mighty swing, and whiffed. NOW, is the time to let him do that. I saw these kind of comments on Facebook and Twitter: "Doesn't seem coachable", "Only out to hit home runs" etc. Relax ... give the boy a chance. I might be worried about him too, but he hits the ball to all fields (two of this three homers are to right-center). His mistakes are mistakes of effort, and who can get mad about THAT? You can see why he's rated so high and why Cubs brass loves him. But for Cubs fans they want him to be Ryne Sandberg ... NOW!!!! I guess waiting over 100 years for a championship will do that to you.
