Manuel has also revealed how he plans to give Reyes more responsibility and a greater leadership role this season.
Reyes has been criticized at times for immaturity or lack of focus, but either despite that or because of it, Manuel believes Reyes is ready for a bigger leadership mantle.
"No question," Manuel said. "He has to be. I consider him to be coming into [a leader], yes. No question. I think that's the next level for him, is to add responsibility to him. That to me is maturation.
"You can be 50 years old and have no responsibility so you never mature. But if you have some responsibilities, then the maturation process takes over. And I think the more responsibility he has, obviously the more maturity he has, the better player he becomes."
To that end, Manuel plans to have Reyes handle the entire infield's defensive responsibilities, not just those of the shortstop. That might involve where players are positioned or alerting teammates to defensive calls. In essence, Reyes could essentially become some type of defensive infield captain.
3 comments:
That's interesting, b/c D Wright is on the infield too. Wright is typically pretty willing to subordinate his ego (think offering to move to LF to accomdate A Rod), but Reyes is his peer. Wonder if that's going to ruffle his feathers a bit...
I agree, but probably the fact that Wright's contract is more than twice the size of Reyes' will help soothe any negative feelings he might otherwise have. Plus, I think he'll recognize that Manuel has few tools available to him to reign in Reyes, and this might be one.
Finally, it could work to Wright's benefit in that it will force Reyes to have more accountability and defend his decisions at post-game press conferences. Too often last year Wright was the only one present, while Reyes and Beltran and Delgado stayed away. Now, Reyes will have to participate.
That's all well and good. But if Jose gets a job, he needs to do the job. It's bad enough when I have to see him sulk after he f's up his own plays. Now am I gonna have to see the same thing after Castillo f's up in the field?
I'm fine with it, so long as Jose takes accountability.
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