PawSox
Power Surge
Never a long ball threat, Outfielder Lou Collier has now found the stroke to go
yard.
Dan Hickling
MinorLeagueNews.com
Pawtucket,
R.I. -- Lou Collier has played a lot of baseball in a lot of cities. He's
made his share of friends and admirers in just about every one of them.
One member of the unofficial "Lou Collier Fan Club" took it upon himself to give the 30-year old Pawtucket Red Sox outfielder a little pep talk from the nearly empty Lynx Stadium stands, during a recent game in Ottawa, which was Collier's address last year.
"Hey Lou! Just hit the *&%#**# ball, already," bellowed one pair of leather lungs.
At that precise moment, Collier did exactly as he was told, turning on a Mike Drumright fastball and sending it clean out of the park and onto Coventry Road, just missing a group of passing cars.
"I couldn't help but hear him," said Collier. " It was all in fun. All part of the game."
|
Collier takes one deep |
Collier
knows a lot about the game. He plays it hard. He plays it well.
Well enough
to spend the last 11 years playing professional baseball, but unfortunately,
not well enough to earn more than a few cups of coffee in the majors with
Pittsburgh, Milwaukee, and Montreal.
Nonetheless,
the Chicago native is fresh off his best April start ever.
He is hitting
for average, which is typical for him, and with big time power, which is
not.
"I
just try to do my job, man. I get the opportunity and try to hit the ball
where 'they ain't'. I'm being blessed for that to be happening to me."
There's
a lot of "ain't" whenever Collier leaves the batter's box.
Collier
wound up the opening month of the season hitting a torrid .389, third in
the International League.
Even more
impressive was his April run production. His 24 RBI was tops in the IL,
and his five homers put him with the league leaders.
Never
a big home run threat, Collier is just one homer shy of last year's total
with the Lynx.
PawSox
manager Buddy Bailey, who routinely pencils Collier's name in the fifth
spot, admits he's a bit surprised by Collier's explosiveness at the plate.
"I
wouldn't have thought he'd have had five (homers) right now," he said."
It's a beautiful thing, and hopefully it keeps happening. He's in one of
those slots, now. He's been on the ball good. He's adding a lot of RBIs
for us. He's getting pitches in zones he can handle and he hasn't been missing."
Collier
is on pace to put up career high bests in home runs (14 in 2001 with Indianapolis)
and RBI (52 last year with Ottawa).
While he
stands just 5-10 and weighs 191 lbs, one glance at him out of uniform in
the Pawtucket clubhouse reveals a chiseled physique that would put a Greek
statue to shame.
The guy
is cut.
"He
may not be the biggest guy in the league," said Pawtucket's Freddy
Sanchez, "but I'll tell you, he's one of the strongest. The guy is
absolutely rock solid. He crushes the ball."
For his
part, Collier says there's no secret to his success, just a little patience
and a lot of diligence.
"I'm
just hitting the ball hard, and it's going out of the park," he said.
"I'm
not doing anything different. I'm just getting pitches to hit, and I'm hitting
them hard."
While
Collier won't admit to making any changes, there have been a few teensy
alterations, at least according to Pawtucket hitting coach U.L. Washington.
"We've
been working on him hitting the high pitch," said Washington, "which
is what they like to throw him. He's starting to make adjustments on that.
The main thing is that he goes the other way, and when he sees a pitch to
hit, he does something with it."
One would
think that the revitalized Collier would like to shed a few years, maybe
hoodwink a few major league scouts into thinking that he's a young prospect
instead of a late bloomer.
Washington,
for one, thinks that Collier could help a few big league teams. He should
know, having spent 11 years in "the Show" himself.
"He's
the kind of guy that a club up there could really use," Washington
said. "(Lou's) helped us out here a lot, and we'd hate to see him go."
For his
part, Collier is focused only on the task at hand, which is to help drive
Pawtucket into the playoffs.
"I
think there are going to be a lot of positive things happen for this team,
this year," he said. "I feel real good about the group of guys
that we have. When everybody is clicking, we're going to be tough to beat."
