With Ender Inciarte suffering a back ailment in Tuesday’s game against St. Louis and likely needing an IL stint, the Braves are electing to call up perhaps the hottest hitter in all of minor league baseball, as proposed just on Sunday on this very website.
The Player
Austin Riley, 3B
Age: 22
Bats: R
OFR Prospect Rank: 3
2019 Level: AAA Gwinnett
The Results
2019 (AAA): .299/.377/.681 | 160 wRC+| 15 HR | 0 SB | 11.1% BB | 19.1% K
The History
Riley was a 1st-round supplemental draft pick in 2015, a pick that the Braves acquired in the Craig Kimbrel trade. A two-way star at DeSoto Central High School, a Mississippi suburb of Memphis, most teams were scouting Riley as a pitcher, but the Braves liked his raw power and drafted him as a third baseman. Strong performances in the rookie leagues (.304/.389/.544 with 12 HR) and then in instructionalals lead the Braves to assign Riley to class A Rome to start 2016. Riley struggled in the first months of the season, but Riley dramatically improved his production in the second half of the season. Riley hit 15 of his 22 home runs after July 1 and raked to a .282/.347/.568 clip to help propel Rome to the South Atlantic League playoffs. Riley added two more homers in the playoffs and knocked in 8 runs. After the season, Riley was named the #13 prospect in the South Atlantic League.
Riley was assigned to high-A Florida to start 2017, and once again had a slow start to the season at the plate, though not as slow as in Rome and it didn’t last as long in the pitcher-friendly league. Riley’s power stayed consistent, and he had 12 homers through mid-July. Riley had a six-game hitting streak starting July 4 and that seemed to be the sign the Braves were looking for to promote him to AA Mississippi. Riley scuffled the rest of July but took off when the calendar flipped to August, hitting .373/.450/.636 the rest of the way. His hot hitting carried over into the Arizona Fall League, where he hit .300/.364/.657 with 6 homers in 17 games, just one home run behind league leader and teammate Ronald Acuna.
Last season Riley spent the month of April abusing Southern League hitters to a .333/.394/.677 clip and was quickly moved up to AAA Gwinnett. While still productive as a Striper, higher-level pitching and velocities exploited a somewhat inefficient swing path, and his strike-out rate rose to nearly 30% after steady improvement in that area since his time in Rome. Riley also experienced his first physical setback, spraining his right knee on a defensive play. Riley missed most of the month of June, and he took that time to work with coaches on a plan to get his swing mechanically sound enough to handle improved velocity.
That plan has helped bear fruit recently, and over his last month of play he has hit .340/.424/.806 with 13 home runs in 27 games played. His strikeout rate has dropped to just over 19% on the season, and he has only struck out 18 times in his last 118 plate appearances.
The Report
Riley is a big, strong man (listed as 6′-3″ and 220 pounds but would be surprised if that’s accurate) who leverages that into nearly every swing. Over the past three seasons however, Riley has worked very hard to be a complete hitter, and is exceptionally dangerous in RBI opportunities with his ability to read and react to off-speed and a willingness to go with those pitches. Since his knee injury, Riley has worked meticulously on re-working his bat plane to keep the barrel in the zone longer, which has paid dividends in allowing his strong hands and wrists to adjust to velocity and movement. The result has been an offensive explosion that would have likely forced the Braves to bring Riley up even if the Inciarte injury hadn’t created the opportunity.
Playing third base for Rome in 2016, Riley demonstrated good hands and a monster arm born from high school pitching, but very poor range. To his credit, Riley spent that offseason on conditioning that helped remake his body, improve his reactions, and forging himself into an improved defender. Riley now is an above-average defender at third base, and demonstrates enough athleticism to be optimistic about a move to left field in order to get his bat in the line-up. Riley only started working in the outfield regularly in spring training, and even then only appeared in two games this spring. Riley has worked four out of his last six games with Gwinnett in left field, too short of a sample to draw conclusions, but he hasn’t embarrassed himself in his chances.
What’s Next
My first extensive look at Riley was in 2016 for Rome. While his raw power was undeniable, I honestly was quite pessimistic about his chances of making a significant major league impact because of his poor hit tool and poor defense at third base, writing in my first OFR Top Prospects list “there’s still a good bit of risk with Riley as there’s not many players that make it in the majors with slow bat speed, and if he has to move off third base that bat will have to carry him.” Seeing him in July for Florida the following year, I was gobsmacked at how improved his overall game was, both at the plate and at third base.
It is rejuvenating to see hard work rewarded, and now Austin Riley has the opportunity to make his mark with the team that saw a power-hitting third baseman in a large-bodied hard-throwing high school closer. A strong start to his major league career should cement Riley in the Atlanta line-up for the foreseeable future, with a move back to third base when incumbent Josh Donaldson leaves via free agency after this season. If Tuesday ends up being Riley’s final AAA game, he ended his tenure in “grand” fashion, swatting a home run of the 4-RBI variety in an 11-3 rout of Buffalo.
Austin Riley and the @GoStripers are in Charlotte today.
Austin Riley hit this baseball back to Gwinnett.
Estimated 492-foot homer 💪 pic.twitter.com/FXleLyLZRF
— FOX Sports: Braves (@FOXSportsBraves) May 1, 2019
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