By Blake Dowson
Things weren’t always easy along the way for now-former Iowa center fielder Joel Booker.
There were times during his junior season as a Hawkeye when he wanted to put the bat down and get away from it all for a while. But the decision to double-down for his senior season, to have more of an impact on a team that was starting to make some national noise, got his name called in the 2016 MLB draft by the Chicago White Sox in the 22nd round.
The senior’s surge surprised a lot of people in college baseball, including Booker.
“Am I surprised, kind of yes, kind of no,” Booker said about his breakout season. “I’ve always known what I was able to do. Ever since high school, I was confident I could play at a high level and be successful. To do it at a Division-1 level, it’s a little surprising.”
To say Booker made improvements between his junior and senior seasons is a criminal understatement. During his draft-eligible junior season, Booker hit a meager .235 and did not show up on a single scout’s radar. An elite athlete in right field, he was just that — an athlete trying to figure things out on the diamond.
In Booker’s final stanza, he hit .370 splitting time between hitting leadoff and third. More than the average, pitchers feared throwing the ball to him. All of a sudden, this spot-filler from a year ago was screaming line drives into the gaps and crushing home runs off the Jumbotron behind the left-field wall.
But it didn’t happen all of a sudden for Booker. It was the culmination of a long fall that turned into a cold winter, getting his body and mind right for his last season as a Hawkeye.
Booker dedicated hours in the batting cage tweaking his swing, seeing pitches, and working on the approach that worked so well for him this season.
“I was just seeing pitches all winter,” Booker said. “Getting used to seeing pitches [in the cage] has helped me a lot.”
Head coach Rick Heller said at his team’s media day in February he could sense that he had a different Booker now manning center field.
Midway through the year, assistant coach Marty Sutherland knew he had a different player from the one who played right field in 2015.
“As far as tapping into those five tools, we’ve seen flashes of it this year,” Sutherland said. “Last year, we would get a little flash of it; this year it’s in longer stretches. It’s been great for us, and it’s benefited us as a team.”
What the senior from Columbus, North Carolina, meant to the Hawkeye lineup was the same as a floor-general point guard— he made things happen.
At times, it appeared as though he didn’t feel like hitting for power, so he bunted for a hit and then stole a couple bags. And when that got dull, he went back to turning the opposing outfielder’s backs to the infield as they chased after one of his 26 extra-base hits.
His speed to the gaps in center field shrunk the outfield, and at times he flashed a plus arm to make runners think twice about trying to swipe an extra 90 feet.
For those keeping track, that’s five tools. And the scouts noticed.
“Booker possesses above average raw power with bat speed and strength in his frame,” a Perfect Game draft report of Booker stated. “He has the athleticism and plus speed to handle center field at the next level as well.”
The White Sox grabbing Booker in the 22nd round seems like a steal. For a guy who has just started to tap into his potential, the sky is the limit.
Booker, who could not be reached for comment, will now head to Great Falls, Montana, to play for the White Sox rookie-league affiliate.
