Austin Hedges has spent most of his career surviving with his glove, his voice and his presence behind the plate. This season, though, the Guardians are getting something extra from him: real offense.
That showed up again Wednesday in Cleveland’s 9-4 win over the Texas Rangers, when Hedges launched his second home run of the season and also picked up an RBI with a safety squeeze bunt earlier in the game. He crossed the plate on the homer without needing any guidance around the bases, a sharp contrast to the shouting match he had just a few days earlier with former teammate Josh Naylor.
During that exchange, Naylor said Hedges needed directions to get to first base and called him a "F****** loser." Hedges fired back, "Nobody likes you, literally nobody likes you" to finish the confrontation.
For much of Hedges’ career, that kind of jab would have landed because it was rooted in the numbers. He built his reputation as a defense-first catcher, one who gave Cleveland and his previous teams elite work behind the plate but almost nothing at the plate. That’s no longer the full story.
Since early September of last season, Hedges has turned into a legitimately useful hitter while still bringing the defensive value everyone already knew about. He’s hitting .270 with a .714 OPS this season, a huge jump from the .185 average and .556 OPS he carried into the year as his career numbers. The bat still isn’t the headline act, but it has become a real part of his game.
"The whole world knows he's one of the best, if not the best, defensive catcher in the game," said David Fry of Hedges. "But what he's done working on his swing, working on an approach ... has been huge."
Hedges is in his 12th MLB season, and the offensive progress didn’t arrive easily. He said the improvement started after Sept. 1 of last season, after years of grinding through failed experiments and long stretches with little to show for it.
"There's nothing I've worked harder at in my entire life," Hedges said. "I've just worked and worked and worked and I've wanted to give up a lot, and it's not been easy and it's not been pretty for about a decade. But the one thing I am proud of is that I just haven't stopped working, and it's still a work in progress."
That work has changed the shape of his career. Hedges spent years making himself indispensable in other ways, leaning on defense and clubhouse leadership when the offense wasn’t there. Now he’s not only still doing those things, he’s posting the best offensive season of his career and carrying an OPS that is outpacing Josh Naylor’s .689.
However long this version lasts, it gives Hedges a different kind of staying power.
"I still have tons of room to get better," Hedges said. "I'd love to play this game until I can't walk anymore."
In Other News...
National Verdict On Guardians Says Everything About Their Season So Far
A national midseason glance at the Guardians ended up matching the feeling around the club pretty well: the run prevention has carried them, the bullpen has been sharp, and the whole operation has stayed on track despite stretches where the offense has not looked nearly as steady. Bleacher Reports Tim Kelly handed Cleveland an A grade at the halfway point, a nod to a team that has leaned hard on pitching depth and a late-inning relief group that has helped make close games feel manageable.
The bigger question now is whether that profile can hold if the bats do not come around soon enough. Kelly pointed to Stephen Vogts impact as a major reason the Guardians have stayed competitive, but the margin for error in the division is still thin, and the club will need to find some offense before the trade deadline if it wants to keep pushing beyond simply hanging around the race. [Read more 🡒]
Two Guardians Prospects Just Put Clevelands Pipeline Back In The Spotlight
The Guardians player-development operation is getting another national showcase next month, with a pair of young talents earning spots on the American League roster for the 2024 MLB Futures Game during All-Star Week. It is the kind of recognition that tends to follow a system that keeps producing, and Clevelands farm has once again put itself in the conversation with prospects who have climbed quickly enough to draw leaguewide attention.
Ralphy Velazquez has surged this season all the way to Columbus and now sits atop MLB Pipelines first-base rankings, while Cooper Ingle has turned a strong run in the International League into a place on the big-league roster. Together, they give the Guardians more evidence that the next wave is arriving, even if the bigger question is how soon that pipeline starts feeding the major-league club in a more permanent way. [Read more 🡒]