Pittsburgh Pirates: Bryan Reynolds Makes MLB History

The Pittsburgh Pirates have started to rely on some of their younger players.  One player, in particular, has really done well and has set a record.

The Pittsburgh Pirates acquired outfielder Bryan Reynolds from the San Francisco Giants as the centerpiece of the Andrew McCutchen trade.  At the time, Reynolds ranked as a top five prospect in the Giants system and ended up being a top 10 prospect in the Pittsburgh Pirates system.  There was a high expectation for the former second-round pick out of Vanderbilt.

So far Reynolds has not disappointed the Pittsburgh Pirates.  He is off to a tremendous start to his big league career, safely hitting in his first nine games.  Overall, he is batting .414/.433/.724 with an OPS+ of 205.  His biggest moments so far has been his go-ahead home run against Texas two days ago, and yesterday when he had a bases-clearing double.  The switch hitter has also only struck out six times in his nine games, but he has only walked one time.  In total, he has four runs batted in already.

Reynolds has shown an aggressive approach since being called up.  He has gone up to the plate thinking one thing, hit the ball hard.  It has shown.  Reynolds now has an impressive six doubles already through his first nine games.  What is really impressive is that no other player has done this in nearly 100 hundred years.  According to Alex Stumpf, one of the Authors of Pirates Guide 2019 and an analytics writer on multiple sites, tweeted out:

Bryan Reynolds has doubled six times in his first 9 major league games. Per the Play Index, the only one other player in MLB history to do that is named…George Washington (1935).

Now obviously this is a small sample size and things will likely not continue the way they are for Reynolds.  However, Reynolds has proved to be ready for the big leagues.  He is 24 years of age and crushed Double-A and Triple-A pitching over the last year.  When the team has their regular outfielders back it will be tough for the Bucs to send down their young up and coming talent.