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2024 SnakePit Awards: Performance of the Year – Pavin Smith goes off

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MLB: SEP 08 Diamondbacks at Astros
Photo by Leslie Plaza Johnson/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

Hard to imagine a more emphatic statement!

Pavin Smith has never been the recipient of fan adulation. There’s a sense that he has underperformed what might be expected of a player who was taken with the seventh overall pick in the 2017 draft, and received a signing bonus of more than five million dollars. It could have been worse. Among the players picked ahead of Smith, were Brendan McKay, who due to injury has a total of 46 innings of work anywhere since 2019, and Austin Beck, who has posted a .693 OPS in the minors. Before this year, Smith felt like he could be little better. Through the 2023 season, he had played over three hundred major-league games, but had an OPS of only .698.

But let’s play the old, Player A, Player B game. Here are the numbers for two first basemen through the end of their age 27 seasons:
Player A: .240/.319/.379 = .698 OPS, -0.4 bWAR
Player B: .170/.263/.420 = .683 OPS, -0.3 bWAR
Obvious who Player A is: Mr. Smith. But Player B? That would be the man Smith might be replacing at first-base next year, Christian Walker. Admittedly, in Walker’s case, it was a lack of opportunity – he didn’t even have a hundred major-league PAs to that point. But he hadn’t exactly done anything to force the issue either. Then, he hit 29 home-runs the following year, and the rest is team history, including three Gold Gloves.

2024 certainly proved an impressive campaign for Pavin. Over sixty games, he hit .270/.348/.547 for an .896 OPS, or a 145 OPS+. despite a .280 BABIP. But nobody could have seen what would unfold on that September night in Houston. Especially on national television, and going up against opposition starter Justin Verlander. That’s a man with three Cy Youngs, an MVP and a Rookie of the Year on his mantelpiece, the most recent award coming just a couple of years ago. Over 522 previous career starts before that evening, how many had led to Verlander allowing eight-plus earned runs over three or fewer innings? That would be one, back in 2013 when he was with the Texas Rangers.

Add another to the list, though it began with a hitless first inning for Arizona. That was simply because Smith hadn’t come to the plate yet. After singles by Jake McCarthy and Eugenio Suarez, Pavin came up and jumped on a 2-0 pitch from Verlander, keeping it just fair enough down the right-field line to clang off the foul pole there (above), and give the D-backs a three-run lead. He then walked to the plate in the next inning, with the same two men on base, plus Josh Bell. Smith went the other way on a 2-2 pitch, and knocked it over the fence in left-field for a grand-slam (below). With one out in the top of the third, Pavin already had seven RBI on the night, matching the total for his previous 23 games combined.

Smith had never even had a TWO-homer contest in his 344 MLB appearances to that point. But he wasn’t finished yet, oh no. He led off the fifth, with Verlander already showered, dried and dressed. Naturally enough, he went deep once again (below). It was his hardest-hit ball off the night, with an exit velocity of 112.1 mph, and an estimated distance of 393 feet. It made him the 13th player in franchise history with a 3+ home-run night (Steve Finley and Luis Gonzalez each did it twice), and set up a potential feat never achieved in the majors, and only twice in professional baseball. After a grand-slam, three-run homer and solo shot, Smith needed a two-run homer to perform the “home-run cycle”.

He even had a chance to do it, coming up in the seventh with Suarez on base. To the Astros’ credit, they challenged him, and Smith went down swinging, though added a walk to his line in the ninth. But three home-runs and eight RBI was still the kind of night which many great hitters go their entire career without experiencing. He said afterward, “It’s one of those nights where you’re kind of in a zone… Once I was able to put a good swing on the first at-bat, it gave me confidence for the rest of the game.” No kidding. Smith ended the year with an OPS+ of 145, and a good chance to factor significantly into the team’s plans going forward. According to this Tweet, he also has an in with Mrs. Justin Verlander….

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