Yasiel Puig

Yasiel Puig Valdés
(Wild Horse)

Bats Right, Throws Right
Height 6' 3", Weight 215 lb.

Debut June 3, 2013

Born December 7, 1990 in Cienfuegos, Cuba

Biographical Information[edit]

Yasiel Puig starred for Cuba in the 2008 World Junior Championship, making the All-Star outfield. In the Bronze Medal game, he went 3 for 4 with 3 runs to lead Cuba past Australia. Puig debuted in the Cuban Serie Nacional with Cienfuegos in 2008-2009. As a rookie, the teenager hit .276/.321/.425 and was 8-for-10 in steal attempts. He had 11 assists in 70 games in the outfield. Despite that performance, he did not play in 2009-2010.

In 2010-2011, he hit .330/.431/.581 with 17 homers, 47 RBI and 78 runs in 89 games for Cienfuegos. He also had 15 outfield assists. He was 9th in the league in runs, tied Jorge Jhonson for third in triples (6) and tied Giorvis Duvergel for 7th in intentional walks (12). In the Cuban All-Star Game that season, he drove in 5 runs for the Occidentales, but they still lost to the Orientales. He was then barred from taking part in the league in 2011-2012 as a disciplinary measure for having attempted to leave the island without permission.

Undeterred, however, Puig defected from Cuba in May of 2012 and managed to establish residence in Mexico, making him a highly sought-after free agent. With a deadline capping bonuses for international signings about to come into effect on July 2nd, the Los Angeles Dodgers opened their pocketbooks to ink the young outfielder, shelling out a reported $42 million over 7 years. The deal was announced on June 28th, days before the deadline kicked in, and before Puig had been able to obtain a U.S. work visa, forcing him to remain in Mexico for a time before being able to join his new organization. It was later revealed that he had been forced to deal with some rather unsavory characters to leave Cuba, as a small-time Miami-based crook invested $250,000 to underwrite his departure, in return for a 20% cut of Yasiel's future earnings. The smugglers who arranged his trip tried to ransom him for additional money, keeping him locked up in a seedy motel near Cancun until he managed to come up with additional funds. They were later arrested and convicted of charges of human trafficking. He finally made his pro debut with the AZL Dodgers in early August. He hit .400 in 9 games and got a quick promotion to the Class A Rancho Cucamonga Quakes, where he hit .327 in 14 games.

Puig was invited to the Dodgers' 2013 spring training as a non-roster player, and was sensational, as he hit .526 and slugged .842 in the Cactus League, prompting comparisons to Bo Jackson and Matt Kemp and putting pressure on the team brass to have him open the season in Los Angeles. In the end the Dodgers elected to send him to the AA Chattanooga Lookouts, considering that it would be better for him to get a few more professional at-bats rather than sit on the bench in a crowded Dodgers outfield. Unfortunately, he got himself in trouble in Chattanooga, but not on the field: in the early hours of April 28th, he was arrested on charges of reckless driving, speeding and driving without proof of insurance and was taken to Hamilton County jail, being released a few hours later on his own recognizance. He was hitting .333 with 3 homers at the time. He was driving at nearly twice the speed limit - 97 mph in a 50 mph zone - but at least he was sober, since he was the designated driver for a group of friends who had gone out partying. He was still hitting .313/.383/.599 after 40 games when GM Ned Colletti announced that he was being called up to L.A. "reluctantly". The team brass would have liked to see him continue his minor league apprenticeship, but with OFs Matt Kemp on the disabled list and Carl Crawford nursing a sore hamstring, there was a desperate need for outfield help on the big league club.

He was thus called up on June 3rd and made his debut as the Dodgers' starting rightfielder and lead-off hitter against the San Diego Padres that day. He did not waste any time in recording his first big league hit, as he singled off Eric Stults to lead off the bottom of the 1st, part of going 2 for 4 at the plate; he also showed that there was more to his game than just hitting, as he caught a line drive by Kyle Blanks in the 9th inning, then made a strong throw to 1B Adrian Gonzalez to double off Chris Denorfia, thus ending the game, which the Dodgers won, 2-1. If his first day in the Show was good, his second was the stuff legends are made of. On June 4th, he went 3 for 5 with a double and a pair of homers and drove in 5 runs to lead the Dodgers to a 9-7 win over the Padres. He hit a three-run homer off Clayton Richard for his first big league long ball in the 5th, then hit a two-run shot to the opposite field off Tyson Ross in the 6th. He was the first Dodger ever to have a multi-homer game in his first two games, the first with a five-RBI game in his first two since Spider Jorgensen had six in his second game in 1947, and the first to start off with two multi-hit games since pitcher Larry Miller in 1964. After going 0 for 4 in his third game, he wrote more headlines on June 6th, when his 8th-inning grand slam off the Atlanta Braves' Cory Gearrin was the key hit in a 5-0 Dodgers' win. He homered again the next day against the Braves' Paul Maholm as the Dodgers won again, 2-1. That made him the second player to have four homers in his first five games; Mike Jacobs had set the record by homering four times in his first four games in 2005. His 10 RBI in 5 games tied him for the record with Danny Espinosa (2010) and Jack Merson (1951). He finished his first week by going 2-for-4 and 3-for-5 in his sixth and seven games, giving him a .464 average and the title of National League Player of the Week. On June 11th, he was at the center of hostilities in a 5-3 win over the Arizona Diamondbacks: he was hit in the head by a Ian Kennedy fastball in the 6th inning, and lay on the ground for a while, his nose bleeding, but he stayed in the game. Andre Ethier followed with a two-run homer, tying the game at 2, but it was not enough punishment apparently, as Zack Greinke immediately threw a pitch at D-Backs catcher Miguel Montero when he led off the 7th; both benches and bullpens emptied, but no punches were thrown. However, when Arizona kept the war going by throwing near Greinke's head in the bottom of the inning, punches were exchanged, with even coaches going at each other. When order was restored, Puig had been ejected from the game. On June 24th, he hit his 7th homer, and then drove in the winning run with a single in the 8th inning as the Dodgers defeated the San Francisco Giants, 3-1. After 20 games, he was hitting .442 with the 7 homers and 14 RBI. He went 4-for-5 in a 6-1 win over the Philadelphia Phillies on June 30th to finish the month with 44 hits, the second-most ever for a player in his first month: Joe DiMaggio had 48 hits in his first month with the New York Yankees in May of 1936. He had the highest average ever for a player in his first calendar month with 60+ AB since at least 1900. When the National League handed out its monthly awards for June, Puig took home both the league's Player of the Month and its Rookie of the Month awards. He was nominated as one of five players on the ballot for the NL Final Man Vote for the 2013 All-Star Game, a decision that generated a lot of passionate controversy, with some writers arguing that it was a travesty that a player with barely a month of experience should be considered for the mid-summer classic, and others stating that Puig was the most exciting player in baseball and deserved to be honored among its stars. In the end, Freddie Freeman won the vote and Puig was not at the game. On July 28th, he added another exploit to his growing list: his first walk-off homer. In typical fashion, it came in extra innings, against Curtis Partch of the Cincinnati Reds, and broke a scoreless tie in the 11th to give L.A. a 1-0 win. He finished the year with a batting line of .319/.391/.534 in 104 games, good for an OPS+ of 160. Had he qualified, he would have tied Freddie Freeman and Yadier Molina for 3rd in the league in average and been 9th in OBP. He was tied for 6th with 11 HBP and his 8 assists tied Chris Denorfia for 5th among the loop's right fielders. He had 21 doubles and 19 homers, was named to the 2013 Topps All-Star Rookie Team and finished second behind fellow Cuban and P Jose Fernandez in the NL Rookie of the Year vote. In the postseason, he went 8 for 17 (.471) and scored 5 runs as the Dodgers defeated the Atlanta Braves in the NLDS, then went 5 for 22 (.227) as the St. Louis Cardinals disposed of the Dodgers in the 2013 NLCS.

On December 28th, Puig was arrested for the second time in less than a year on reckless driving charges after he was caught speeding at 110 mph in a 70 mph zone by the Florida Highway Patrol. The Dodgers stated they were "very disappointed" with his behavior. Puig announced a few days later that would give up driving for a while and had hired a cousin to serve as his driver. He had the honor of being the first batter of the 2014 major league season, leading off the opening game played in Sydney, Australia on March 22nd. He was assigned the role in spite of barely hitting .150 that spring, and a number of observers wondered if the fact that the Dodgers wanted him to take more pitches had not messed up his instinctual and unorthodox approach at the plate. He continued to struggle in his first game, going 0 for 5 with three strikeouts. In the second game, however, batting second behind Dee Gordon, he went 3 for 5, scored a run and drove in two but also made a couple of baserunning mistakes; the Dodgers won both games though. More unprofessional behavior followed on April 4th, when he was scratched from the line-up in the Dodgers' home opener because he had arrived late to the ballpark. He apologized. claiming he had failed to understand when pre-game drills would start for the afternoon contest. On May 1st, he had a four-hit game in the first game of a doubleheader sweep over the Minnesota Twins, part of a string of reaching base in 9 consecutive plate appearances. He put together the longest hitting streak of his career that month, 16 games, during which he also hit with power: part of the streak included an eight-game sequence in which he had at least an extra-base hit and an RBI, a team record. He went on to be named the ML's Player of the Month for May, after batting .398/.492/.731 for the month, with 8 homers and 25 RBIs. He was named to the All-Star team for the first time that year and also participated in the Home Run Derby, although he did not manage to hit a single long ball. On July 25th, he tied a Dodgers team record by hitting three triples in an 8-1 win over the Giants; he also added a double, and his 11 total bases on the day were one shy of the team record held by Kevin Elster. On August 24th, he made one of his typical blunders born of an over-enthusiastic style of play that gives managers gray hair when he tried to score from second base on a ground ball to third while the New York Mets were busy turning a double play; 1B Lucas Duda then saw him make the ill-advised move towards home and threw to C Travis d'Arnaud to retire the outfielder by a comfortable margin, completing a triple play. For all those occasional lapses in judgment, he remained one of the most dangerous and exciting hitters in the majors, however. he finished the season with a .296 average, 16 homers and 69 RBIs in 148 games, then went 3 for 12 with a triple as the Dodgers lost to the St. Louis Cardinals in the Division Series.

He went on the disabled list with a pulled hamstring on April 25, 2015, then reinjured the hamstring while on a rehabilitation assignment with the Rancho Cucamonga Quakes on May 8th. He ended up missing 39 games before returning on June 6th. He contributed immediately upon his return, with an RBI double off Jaime Garcia in a 2-0 win over the St. Louis Cardinals in his first game back. On June 10th, he reminded everyone of what a superlative talent he was by getting 4 hits, including a homer, and a walk in a 7-6 win over the Arizona Diamondbacks. However, he did not put up superlative numbers that season, and on August 28th, he went back to the DL, again because of a hamstring problem. Altogether, he played 79 games, during which he hit .255 with 11 homers and 38 RBIs. In the postseason, he went 0 for 6 as the Dodgers were eliminated by the New York Mets in the Division Series. Trouble continued after the season, while speculation about a potential trade away from L.A. was swirling, as he got into a fight with his sister and a bar bouncer in Miami, FL the night before Thanksgiving, ending up with a swollen eye and facial bruises. There were conflicting reports whether Puig had hit his sister or not, and he was facing potential discipline from MLB which had vowed to crack down on incidents of family violence. In the end, however, MLB judged that the evidence given by witnesses and that obtained from video footage did not show conclusively that Puig was guilty of assault, and he escaped punishment.

He returned to the Dodgers in 2016, but gone were the days when he was the talk of baseball. He played regularly in right field during the first half, missing three weeks in June with a hamstring injury, but the Dodgers were not thrilled with his production. There were also questions about his attitude, as there had been various instances when he had shown up late for batting practice and team meetings. At the end of July, he was hitting .260 with 7 homers and 34 RBIs in 81 games, good for an OPS+ of only 93. There was speculation that he could be used as trade bait at the trading deadline, but that did not happen; instead, after the Dodgers acquired Josh Reddick from the Oakland Athletics, he was sent down to the Oklahoma City Dodgers, the first time he would actually play at AAA since he had gone straight from AA to the majors in 2013, and his only minor league action since had been a pair of rehabilitation assignments at Rancho Cucamonga. On August 30th, he was placed on revocable waivers and claimed by a team that remained unidentified for the time being, while the Dodgers were seeing whether they could work out a trade. The Dodgers insisted that Puig had not had any behavior problems in AAA, but if that was the case, it was not clear why they were trying to unload him when he could be added back to the active roster as soon as teams became allowed to carry extra players on September 1st. But there was no trade, and Puig was indeed called up on September 1st. In his first game back the next day, he was in the starting line-up and collected a pair of hits in a 4-2 loss to the San Diego Padres. On September 10th, he made a tremendous diving catch in the 7th inning, depriving Martin Prado of the Miami Marlins of a potential extra-base hit and preserving a perfect game bid by Rich Hill. In 104 games, he hit .263 with 11 homers and 45 RBIs for an OPS+ of 99. In the postseason, he was 0 for 5 in the NLDS against the Washington Nationals; he did better in the NLCS as he was 4 for 14 in L.A.'s loss to the Chicago Cubs.

By the middle of June in 2017, Puig had been healthy, logging 62 games as the Dodgers' regular right fielder, but was hitting just .240 with 10 homers and 33 RBIs when he was involved in yet another troubling incident on June 13th. In a game against the Cleveland Indians, he flashed an obscene gesture at Indians fans in Progressive Field while rounding the bases after hitting a home run. The Dodgers were not amused and Major League Baseball issued him a one-game suspension. he played 152 games that season, hitting .263 with 28 homers and 74 RBIs. Both figures were personal bests, and there was a sense, especially during the second half, that he was more concentrated on going about his business, although he still displayed child-like enthusiasm on occasions, sometimes angering teammates and opponents. he had a solid postseason, going 5 for 11 (.455) in the Dodgers' sweep of the Arizona Diamondbacks in the Division Series and 7-for-18 (.389) in their defeat of the Cubs in the NLCS. He did not do as well in the World Series, with just 4 hits in 27 at-bats, but two of these were homers. The Dodgers lost to the Houston Astros in seven games.

He continued to hit well, if not spectacularly so, in the first half of the 2018 season, playing 76 games while hitting .265 with 11 homers and 35 RBIs. His biggest quality was his ability to stay in the line-up day after day when the team was wracked by injuries, pushing it back in the standings. On July 8th, however, he hit a three-run homer off Andrew Heaney of the Los Angeles Angels in the 2nd inning, but then had to leave the game in the 5th when he injured a muscle on a swing and miss, with Joc Pederson completing his at-bat. He was immediately placed on the disabled list with a pulled oblique muscle. He returned on July 28th and on September 14-15 he had great back-to-back games in a key late-season series against the St. Louis Cardinals with both teams fighting to get into the postseason. In the first game, he homered twice while going 3-for-4 in a 3-0 win, and the next day he had a three-homer game and drove in 7 runs to lead the Dodgers to a 17-4 win. That win put L.A. a half game ahead of the Colorado Rockies in the NL West. He finished the season at .267 with 23 homers and 63 RBIs in 125 games. He also did well in the postseason, hitting .333 in both the NLDS and NLCS. He was also adequate in the World Series, when most of the Dodgers' hitters were stymied by the Boston Red Sox's pitchers, as he went 5 for 20 with a homer and 4 RBIs.

There had been rumors over the years that Puig was on the trading block, because of some frustration over his inability to become the superstar player he had seemed destined to be, but he had remained a fixture in the Dodgers' outfield for his first six seasons. However, the trade did come on December 21, 2018, as he and three teammates were sent to the Cincinnati Reds in a deal destined to clear salary and roster space for the Dodgers, with the likely aim of signing free agent OF Bryce Harper. Puig, OF Matt Kemp, P Alex Wood and C Kyle Farmer were dealt to the Reds in return for P Homer Bailey, who was immediately released by the Dodgers, and prospects Josiah Gray and Jeter Downs. He started off the 2019 season very slowly, like the rest of the team, as he went 4 for 30 (.133) over his first 9 games. On April 7th, however, he endeared himself to his fans and teammates by taking on the entire Pittsburgh Pirates team basically by himself when he confronted them over a pitch by Chris Archer obviously thrown at Derek Dietrich in the 4th inning. It was obvious because in his first at-bat of the game, Dietrich had hit a long homer to right and had stood to admire its trajectory, something Archer had clearly not appreciated. When the dust settled, he, P Amir Garrett and Manager David Bell were all ejected for the Reds, and Ps Keone Kela and Felipe Vazquez for the Bucs. Puig received a two-game suspension, while Archer was suspended for five games and Bell for one. It took him a while to hit his first long ball of the year, as he had to wait until April 14th, when he went deep against Giovanny Gallegos of the St. Louis Cardinals in the second of two games played at Estadio de Beisbol Monterrey. The next day, in his return to Dodger Stadium, he homered off Clayton Kershaw in the 1st inning. The Reds lost both of these games, however. He hit .252 with 22 homers and 61 RBIs in 100 games for the Reds, then on July 30th was one of the centerpieces of a major three-team trade that sent him to the Cleveland Indians, with P Trevor Bauer going to the Reds. Others involved included OF Franmil Reyes, who went from the San Diego Padres to Cleveland, and OF prospect Taylor Trammell who moved from Cincinnati to San Diego. He ended his sojourn in the Queen City in typical fashion, taking part in a bench-clearing brawl and being ejected in a game with the Pirates minutes after the trade was announced. The brawl was clearly a coda to the one he had been at the center of back in early April.

Puig was a free agent during the winter of 2019-20, and was not signed by the time spring training ground to a halt in the middle of March, 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic, though rumor had it that an unidentified team had sometime during the winter offered him a one-year contract at $10 million. On July 14th, with "summer camps" having started, it was announced that he was about to sign with the Atlanta Braves, who had lost their starting right fielder Nick Markakis after he had decided to sit out the season. However, the deal fell through a few days later when Puig tested positive for COVID-19. As a result, it was Puig who sat out the season (Markakis went back on his decision after a brief time out) and did not appear in any games. Following the season, he changed agents and put out feelers to various teams indicated his interest in playing in 2021. He also decided to play winter ball with the Toros del Este in the Dominican League. However, following the 2020 World Series, a woman who did not want to be identified sued him for sexual battery, assault, intentional infliction of emotional distress, negligence and false imprisonment, the alleged incident having taken place at a Los Angeles Lakers game in 2018. Puig decided to fight the lawsuit, but as a result no team would sign him for the 2021 season, and when it became clear that fall that the issue would not reach trial until the spring of 2022 at the earliest, he agreed to settle the case, while maintaining that the incident was consensual. In the meantime, he spent the season in the Mexican League, hitting .312 with 10 homers in 62 games for the Aguila de Veracruz.

In 2022, he played for the Kiwoom Heroes of the Korea Baseball Organization and did quite well, batting .277 in 126 games, with 30 doubles, 21 homers and 77 RBIs. However, his legal woes continued back in the U.S., as he was the subject of a federal investigation into an illegal sports gambling business. To compound his issues, he was caught making false statements to federal authorities, a crime which carried a possible five-year jail sentence and up to $55,000 in fines. That was in addition to the sum of $282,900 he was alleged to have lost in the gambling scheme. He filed a guilty plea, given the overwhelming evidence against him, and while there were no allegations that he had bet on baseball, this latest scandal was unlikely to facilitate an eventual return to MLB.

Notable Achievements[edit]

2013 Topps All-Star Rookie Team
NL All-Star (2014)
20-Home Run Seasons: 3 (2017-2019)

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Yasiel Puig

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