The Nationals had a big storyline in Pittsburgh Monday night, as Dylan Crews was in the lineup against former LSU teammate Paul Skenes – meaning the top two picks in the 2022 Draft were going head to head for the first time at the MLB level.
But it’s Crews’ outfield mate, James Wood, who is drawing rave reviews so far this season with his play, and Mark Zuckerman, who covers the Nats for MASN, believes we’re seeing the evolution of a young star right before our eyes.
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“I don't know if we know that quite yet. He certainly has some of the skills that you'd look for in, in a player of that kind of caliber, but what I think is fascinating is that I don't think he does compare to any one individual player. I think he's kind of a unicorn because of his physicality and his size,” Zuckerman said. “At 6-foot-7, to run as well as he does and hit the ball as hard as he does, he’s kind of like Aaron Judge in terms of the size of the body, but he's a better runner, and more of a complete game, and he hits the ball the way Soto does as far as that left-handed opposite field power. It’s almost like this amalgamation of several different star players, and he's got little bits of each of them, and he may be that unicorn. But, there’s still a long way for him to go to fully establish himself, and his defense is probably the one downside, as we haven’t really seen a whole lot of improvement there.”
Take a listen to Zuckerman’s entire visit with BMitch & Finlay, which also goes into other budding young stars developing and more, above!