San Diego Padres first baseman Brett Wallace continued his tremendous pinch-hitting season Tuesday, driving in the winning run with an RBI ground out to give the team a 2-1 victory over the Colorado Rockies.
Wallace has been one of the best pinch-hitters in baseball since his call-up from Triple-A El Paso on June 19. He’s batted .378 with a .465 on-base percentage, three homers and 11 RBI in 43 pinch-hit appearances. Overall, he is hitting .344 with four homers and 14 RBI.
His game-winning hit Tuesday night wasn’t pretty, but it was still impressive considering he had a tough assignment coming off the bench to face a pitcher especially tough on lefty batters.
“Credit Wallace. That is a tough assignment for Wallace sitting on the bench all night,” Rockies manager Walt Weiss said to Padres.com after the game.
Wallace was drafted by the St. Louis Cardinals with the No. 13 overall pick in the 2008 MLB First-Year Player Draft, but has bounced around with six different teams. He has struck out more, and homered less, than what scouts anticipated when he was a highly-touted prospect out of Arizona State.
His last major league action came in 2013 with the Houston Astros when he hit a career-high 13 homers, but also struck out 104 times compared to 18 walks. He has improved that ratio drastically this year, striking out 19 times with seven walks.
“I think a lot of the things I’ve been through have helped me get to a place where I understand who I am and what I need to do to get ready and what mentality to have when I get up to the plate,” Wallace said to the San Diego Union Tribune last Sunday.
If Wallace is able to hit two more pinch-hit home runs, he will tie Jerry Turner’s club record of five set back in 1978.
