Phillies

ZOMG Dom Brown

By Kyle Scott

Published: Mar 2nd, 2011 · 11:53 AM EST

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This screen grab was taken from the MLB Network, which did a segment this morning on Domonic Brown's new stance– ya know, the one with lowered hands. Most of his teammates were watching:

Awkward indeed.

The only real question mark for the Phillies going into the season is their right field situation. You knew that. Dom Brown has lowered his hands in his stance, in order to get to the ball more quickly. You knew that. Dom Brown is expected to partially fill Jayson Werth's shoes in right field. You knew that.

Here's what you may not know.

Since being called up last July, Dom Brown is 15-for-106 in game action, which includes the regular season (13-for-62), the playoffs (0-for-3), winter ball (2-for-29), and spring training (0-for-12). In that time span, he has struck out 40 times. That leaves him with a .141 cumulative average and a 37% strikeout rate. Truth. It doesn't mean Brown won't be a star or an every day player in the future, but it's a limited sample size that severely questions whether or not he can win the starting job from Ben Francisco anytime soon.

Everybody has an opinion. David Murphy of the Daily News says we should leave him alone because, afterall, he's just a kid. Well, he's also projected to be the starting right fielder for a World Series contender.

It's not a perfect comparison, but the situation feels similar to what we were told about Kevin Kolb. He was supposed to be good, but every time we saw him he just looked average- at best. Brown, on the other hand, raked for two seasons in the minors, but, besides one monster, toolsy homerun, has shown us very little against big league pitching. Not to mention the fact that he looks like a horse with a glove on in the outfield.

He's still extremely talented, however; and has more pressure on him than most players at this stage of their career. He will likely turn out to be a fine player, but until the Dom Brown hit tracker registers at least a one this spring, be prepared for a lot more Ben Fran in your life.