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Video: What to Expect From Dodgers' Corey Seager, Will Smith in 2020

Video: What to Expect From Dodgers' Corey Seager, Will Smith in 2020

There are two schools of thought on Corey Seager. One says that in a comeback 2019 season after both Tommy John and hip surgery, he managed a National League leading 44 doubles, 19 home runs and 87 RBI, with a .272/.335/.483 slash line. You think he should've done better after what he'd been through? Well, grab a bat.

On other side, there’s a belief that the Dodgers shortstop is injury-prone, could go down with say, a hamstring, at any time, and then struggle to regain whatever timing and momentum he'd built up prior to injury. Which happens. 

The struggles in October are a real concern. He's a .203/.275/.331 hitter, with three homers and 10 RBIs in six postseason series and 118 at bats. He hit .150/.190/.200 versus the eventual champion Washington Nationals last fall, with eight strikeouts in 20 at bats. Which is better than teammate A.J. Pollock, who went hitless, fanning 11 times in 13 at bats, God bless em.

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Seager is 26 and has one more season after this one before hitting free agency, precisely the same as Cleveland shortstop Francisco Lindor, who was rumored to be coveted by Los Angeles for a good portion of the winter.

All that said, this is a regular season projection piece, never more of a crap-shoot than in as weird a year as this one. So here is my round-numbers guestimate for Seager: .285/.375/.465, with 15 doubles, eight homers and 25 RBIs.

My colleague, Shawn Childs, handled the Will Smith part of this assignment. See the video at the top of the page the skinny on the Dodgers' catcher..

And remember, glove conquers all.

Howard Cole has been writing about baseball on the internet since Y2K. Follow him on Twitter.