About the time Major League Baseball was finalizing the starting lineups for the All-Star game, Cincinnati Reds rookie sensation Elly De La Cruz was asked again about the Home Run Derby.
De La Cruz, whose second big-league hit was a 458-foot home run, still had not been invited, he said, and still was unsure how he felt about going to Seattle for the popular event on July 10.
But if he does get invited, former Derby champ Todd Frazier has a few words of advice:
Don’t do it.
“I think it would be pretty cool, but at the same time I don’t know as a youngster like that, jumping into it a couple months after you just got called up is (good),” said Frazier, the two-time Reds All-Star who won the 2015 All-Star Home Run Derby at Great American Ball Park.
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“I was exhausted afterwards,” he said, “and I could never find my niche after I won it. I struggled the second half of the year — not because of my swing; my swing’s going to be the same no matter what.”
Frazier, who followed his hot first half with a .220 second half that included just a .664 OPS, just points to what the Derby takes out of a player, especially if he advances past the first or second round. Especially if he’s young and less prepared for that.
Kris Bryant of the Chicago Cubs mentioned the same fatigue factor after participating in the 2015 Derby as a rookie with Frazier. Bryant was just 8-for-60 with a .517 OPS and 25 strikeouts in his first 17 games after the event before bouncing back to win Rookie of the Year.
“I think it’d be pretty cool,” Frazier said. “But I just don’t think this might be the year for it, since the team is doing well, too.
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“All-Star game, yeah, but Home Run Derby — if you want excitement, yeah, put him on there,” he added. “But if I were him I would tread lightly doing it.”
This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Todd Frazier says Home Run Derby bad idea for Reds’ Elly De La Cruz