JUPITER, Fla. — It’s going to be fun to watch Jazz Chisholm bring a pro’s focus to the plate this year and a blueberry-ice-cream glove to the field. Or maybe a veteran’s craftiness in dropping a bunt and a strawberry glove with sprinkles to second base?
Here’s the contest within the contest for Chisholm, the one you have to hope he wins for the fun-of-baseball’s sake: Can you be a year older and wiser but just as fun and flashy?
Chisholm, to that end, has worked on bunting this spring. He was just talking at his locker with the former master-bunter, Juan Pierre, after he tried to lay one down in the final spring game against the St. Louis Cardinal’s nine-time, Gold Glove winner Nolan Arenado at third base.
“I figured if I can do it against him, I can do it against anyone,’’ Chisholm said. “I nearly did, too.”
The ball rolled just foul in Tuesday’s spring finale.
“[You get a truer] roll at Marlins Park,’’ he says. “You’ll see. And when I get on first, there’s the chance I’m [stealing] second base.”
The cheeky ease with which the Marlins’ second baseman talks of his game mirrors the joy he combines with his jolting foot speed and elastic-bodied maneuvers. That flash captures enough imagination that the second-year second baseman is a popular break-out candidate for the season, which begins Friday in San Francisco.
“Forty-forty, that’s what a breakout season is for me,’’ he says.
Forty home runs and 40 stolen bases for a player who had 18 and 23, respectively, as a rookie?
“If we’re talking about a breakout year, it’s not 20-20,’’ he says.
Thirty-thirty?
“We can talk about 30-30 as a breakout year,’’ he says. “But I’m sitting the bar high as high as it goes. Forty-forty.”
Chisholm may or may not reach that level, but he’s already wonderfully pushing another barrier out there: Can a baseball player be great without being grim?
As much as the Marlins’ revised lineup counts on the $109 million spent on free-agent Jorge Soler and Avisail Garcia or the trades for All-Star Joey Wendel and catcher Jacob Stallings, the next step of Chisholm matters just as much.
He had a .388 on-base percentage last April and May when he broke old patterns with the joy he introduced himself. But he only had a .303 on-base percentage by year’s end. That’s where the year-older-and-wiser them must resonate — one he ties into plotting for 40-40 this year.
“What happened last year is I got messed up when I know it was a ball and they called it a strike,’’ he said. “That’s where my head went. How was that a strike? That happened, like twice a game.
“Think about it. All the games I went 2 for 4, or 1 for 3 — if I wasn’t giving up two at-bats a game, think what I could do. Think about it, that’s 250 at-bats not given away. Easily 250 at-bats. And that’s where my focus is this year.”
Chisholm, 24, spent the offseason working on that mental part of his game. Live batting practice? He worked on ignoring if the catcher made a bad call. Spring training? He spent as much time getting his mind right as his swing.
This concrete step has to become as much a part of his electric game if he’s going to become a star and not just an Instagram favorite.
“Consistency in his work and preparation,’’ manager Don Mattingly says is what he’s looking for in Chisholm this season. “He’s a little all over the map. Like a young player, he’s up and he’s down. I want him more consistent in his routines, consistent in his preparation. We just want to see growth.
“We don’t want to pin Jazz down and curb his enthusiasm and his personality. We just want him to be more business-like in his work and preparation. Let the game do what it does. But his work and preparation need to be clean.”
Bags were being packed, equipment piled up for the first road trip. It’s everyone’s favorite rite of spring — the end of it. The Marlins and Cardinals got in a final spring’s day of work at Roger Dean Stadium.
Chisholm sat at his locker afterward packing his waffle-cone-and-ice-cream themed gloves. There’s strawberry with sprinkles, cookies-and-cream and …
“Blueberry,’’ he says, holding up one of that color.
Chisholm is part-owner in a company, Aria Collective (Absolutely Ridiculous Innovation for Athletes) that makes them. He designed them.
That’s part of his personality beyond the Marlins-blue hair he wore to last year’s opener, beyond his Grand Theft Auto-patterned cleats. It’s why if his game supports that personality it will be a baseball marketer’s dream.
Forty-forty?
“I know I can get it,’’ he says.
It’s the start of a new year. Anything is possible. That’s the dream, so chase it with a strawberry glove.
