Aristides Aquino, though 31 career MLB plate appearances, has accounted for 0.9 fWAR. He’s hit seven home runs (three of them yesterday). He’s 25 years old.
Is he the next big thing?
Probably not.
But he might at least continue to be a thing.
Aquino was, prior to this season, basically a non-prospect. It’s hard to find anything written about him as a minor leaguer, and his .306 OBP in AA last year was fine, as it came as part of a 111 wRC+, but it wasn’t good.
But this year, something changed. Aquino started to rake.
He’d had some good years before. In 2014, he put up a 127 wRC+ in rookie ball. In 2016, he managed a 143 in the metric at high-A. But his 2017 was bad (93 wRC+, fine for a major league shortstop but not for a AA outfielder trying to make the MLB), and while his aforementioned 2018 was fine, it wasn’t good enough to draw much notice. The Reds did bring Aquino up for one at-bat in August of last year, having first added him to the 40-man roster in November 2016 (presumably to protect him from the Rule 5 Draft), but he struck out in that at-bat.
In other words, he entered this year a player in which the Reds saw some potential because of his raw physical tools (he’s fast, he has a cannon of an arm, and—as has been ruthlessly demonstrated—he can hit for power), but he wasn’t a core piece of their future. He was, like so many others, a lottery ticket, and it was only a matter of time before he found himself designated for assignment to clear room for someone else on the 40-man.
But, as was said, he started to rake this year. In AAA, over 323 PA’s, he posted a .356 OBP. He slugged 28 home runs. His wRC+ was, as in that strong 2016 at high-A, a 143. And as August dawned, the Reds called him up from Louisville. In his first two games, he failed to reach base, but last Saturday against Atlanta, he hit a three-run homer, singled, and walked. The next day, he singled and scored as a pinch-hitter. Tuesday, he homered again. And then the Cubs came to town and Aquino started to feast, with five home runs in the first three games of the four-game set. Today, he’s batting cleanup for Cincinnati as they continue their quest to edge their way into the wild card race (FanGraphs has them 7.6% likely to make the playoffs—not impossible odds, but improbable).
What becomes of Aquino is anybody’s guess. Plenty of players have figured something out, surprised, and become serviceable major leaguers, if not actively good ones. But there are also those who sizzle for a few weeks, never to be heard from again, like Chris Shelton, who hit five home runs in the 2006 Tigers’ first four games, tripled twice in the fifth, and finished the year with only 1.1 fWAR, destined to garner only 145 more PA’s at the MLB level (Shelton isn’t the perfect example of such a flash in the pan—he had a pretty good 2005, with 18 homers and a 132 wRC+. But he was the first who came to mind.).
But whatever happens from here, Aquino is very much present in the National League playoff race. And his presence is being felt.
