His back is back, and Gabriel Gonzalez is scorching the baseball because of it

CEDAR RAPIDS — His back is back. So Gabriel Gonzalez is, too.

The Cedar Rapids Kernels outfielder has been among the most productive hitters in the Midwest League a month and a half into the season.

He went into Saturday night’s game at Veterans Memorial Stadium against Peoria hitting .326 in 32 games, which ranks him fifth in the MWL. His .538 slugging percentage and .926 OPS are each second.

A lot of this damage is being done because the 21-year-old from Carupano, Venezuela, physically feels good. A nagging back injury sabotaged his 2024 season with the Kernels.

“I feel excellent,” Gonzalez said, with the translation help of teammate Jose Salas. “Last year, I had a couple of back injuries, a couple of injuries that didn’t really let me show my full potential. I feel super healthy. I came into the season trying to be as healthy as I possibly could.”

“I think 365 days can always do wonders for a guy,” said Kernels hitting coach C.J. Baker. “Getting a year older, you’re more experienced. He dealt with some health ups and downs last year that he really tried his best to battle through. It ended up knocking him down for a while. This year seeing a healthy version of him that is just able to walk in and enjoy the game again has been all the difference in the world, I think. He can feel free not to worry about A, B and C going on in his back and that stuff. I think he’s just healthy. That’s like the biggest piece.”

Gonzalez came to the Minnesota Twins organization via a late January 2024 trade with the Seattle Mariners that included major league second baseman Jorge Polanco. He’d signed with Seattle as an international free agent in 2021 for $1.3 million.

He has hit everywhere he’s been sans last season when he had a .255 batting average in 76 games for Cedar Rapids. That included just four home runs and 35 RBIs.

Gonzalez already has surpassed last season’s homer total and is nearing his extra-base hit total. He had two home runs and a career-high six RBIs in a Kernels win Thursday night over Peoria.

“C.J. and I talk about it all the time. Gabby is one of the smartest hitters that I’ve been around,” said Kernels hitting coach Julian Gonzalez. “It’s like he sees things in slow motion. It’s weird, but he’ll come up and be like ‘Julian, I’m going to hit a homer.’ I mean, hitters always say that. But then in his next at-bat, he does, he’ll point at me at first base (where he coaches) and say ‘I told you!’

“He knows pitchers. Other hitters go up to him and pick his brain. We go up and pick his brain. Things like ‘Hey, what do you see with this pitcher?’ He’s just a very good hitter. He’s a very professional hitter. He works hard, he loves it, he competes every single day.”

Baker said Gonzalez’s bat-to-ball skills are preternatural, which can be a conundrum. Because there isn’t much swing and miss in his right-handed swing, he has had a tendency to go out of the strike zone and produce weak contact.

His ability to hone in on the strike zone this season has improved. The numbers prove it.

“I’m really working hard on plate discipline,” Gonzalez said, through Salas. “Getting my pitch when it comes up. I’ve really been working on that in the cages and stuff like that. I just feel really good right now.”

“Now he’s able to foul those pitches off and get to mistakes, where last year, I think he was pressing to just put the ball in play,” Baker said. “This year, he is just locked in on the zone and what he is able to get to, and it is giving him these opportunities.”

Opportunities to reach Double-A, perhaps sooner than later.

“He has an elite feel for what (pitch) is coming,” Baker said. “He’ll be at times like ‘I was sitting on that slider the whole time, just waiting for it to get there.’ So I feel there are times where he’ll be like ‘I don’t want that,’ or gets to two strikes and fouls off a pitch like ‘Well, I don’t want that.’ Then he gets the pitch he wants and just lights it up. He has grown a ton.”

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