Klay Thompson’s brother Trayce was an asset for the Los Angeles Dodgers last season. This season has been a tail of the complete opposite.
Trayce, 26, is an outfielder in the Dodgers’ organization and was sent down to the minors after going 0-for-8 with three strikeouts to begin the season. The team probably figured he would see more action in Triple-A, which would benefit him. It hasn’t at all.
Trayce played his first game for Triple-A Oklahoma City on April 6 and went 0-for-4 with two strikeouts. He continued to struggle for the next two weeks, as it took until April 24 until he recorded his first hit of the season. The next day he went 0-for-5 with four strikeouts.
After getting his first hit, Thompson finally had a batting average, but it was an embarrassing .032.
Thompson went 1-for-43 (.023) in the month of April at OKC. If you combine his stats at both levels, he went 1-for-51 (.020) in April.
Trayce Thompson's .019 batting average is the worst hitting month in history for anyone with 35+ PA and it's not particularly close
— Robot Chicken Puppet (@chicken__puppet) May 2, 2017
There is one caveat to that stat, and that is the statistic takes into account time split at both levels for Thompson, but not for others.
Still, no matter how you slice it, Thompson had a terrible month and will be happy to put it behind him. He may be on his way to improving as well, as on Tuesday he recorded his second hit of the season, boosting his batting average in the minors to .038.
Thompson certainly is capable of doing much better. He has batted .243/.316/.459 with 19 doubles and 18 home runs in 127 career MLB games. Maybe this is one of those things where he’s stuck in a funk and has lost confidence. That can happen in the extremely tough sport of baseball.
