SURPRISE, Ariz. — Rarely does Royals infielder Michael Massey doubt Bobby Witt Jr.’s ability to make a play. The two are best friends, having come up together through the minors. Massey has seen the heroics long enough to expect them. There’s usually no reason to question it.
A few seasons ago, though, was the one time he did. It was 2023. A midseason game. Witt chased a fly ball that Anthony Rizzo sent slicing toward the left-field line. Witt, calm as ever, never hesitated, tracking it in a way that seems exclusive to him, his athleticism always under control.
The ball kept drifting. Witt kept running. Then he slid and made the grab. It looked easy. It wasn’t.
“I mean, he almost caught it and ran into the left-field foul pole,” Massey said. “It was one of the most incredible things I’ve seen. And he made it look so natural as he was covering the ground. You’re just like, ‘Yeah, that’s not supposed to happen.'”
Much of what Witt does isn’t supposed to happen on a baseball field. A quintessential five-tool talent, he carries the traits of an inner-circle Hall of Famer, even as his career is still being written — the type of player whose athleticism never outruns his control.
Dayton Moore, the longtime Royals general manager who drafted Witt in 2019, once said the Gold Glove shortstop could just as easily have been a Gold Glove center fielder.
“He’s one of those guys that could play anywhere on the field and do it well,” Moore said. “He’s the best player I’ve ever scouted.”
That’s saying something considering Moore scouted the likes of Andruw and Chipper Jones during his time with the Braves early in his career.
Witt, who is currently starring as Team USA’s shortstop and leadoff man in the World Baseball Classic, is an athletic freak. There’s a case to be made he’s the most athletic player in baseball. Ronald Acuña Jr. might be the only player who can go toe-to-toe with him.
Yet what separates Witt isn’t athleticism alone. It’s the poise that comes with it.
He can track a ball down the left-field line like he did against the Yankees. He can range up the middle at full speed, spin and fire a runner out at first without losing himself in the moment. He can make his patented diving play, body parallel to the dirt beneath him, the movement always measured. He can go first to third — or first to home — with his 30.3 mph sprint speed (tied for second in the majors last year) and never look like he’s trying to run fast. He can barrel balls in the zone and outside of it just the same.
He makes the routine play routinely. And the extraordinary play look routine.
“I’ve never seen him out of control on the baseball field for as athletic as he is,” said Moore.
You see, athleticism only gets you but so far. It can rev the engine, but it doesn’t keep the car on the road. Control does.
Athleticism can open the door but it doesn’t get you through. Control does.
Witt makes it through with ease.
“I think the most impressive part is he’s able to do things, but he’s able to do them quickly,” said Royals teammate Vinnie Pasquantino. “It’s almost like they, you know, when you’re watching TV and somebody comes on frame and you don’t see him, then they make the play. That’s what I feel like watching.”
The snapshots of his success on the baseball field don’t tell the whole story. Sure, the athleticism is there. But so are the countless hours spent on the fields of Colleyville, Texas, his hometown, long before he reached the big leagues — where this control was fine-tuned.
The more he prepared, the slower the game became. The more he stretched his competitiveness beyond baseball, the sharper his skillset became within it.
“God gifted me with this talent and ability to be athletic,” Witt said. “But I was also working at it at a young age. I was always outside, playing other sports and always doing things for my body. Then in the offseason, I put my body in difficult positions that made it easier when the season came.”
Witt was always the fastest player on his teams. As a freshman, he played slot receiver on his junior varsity football team — there’s no escaping football in Texas — and his dad, Bobby Witt Sr., noticed early how easily his son could pull away from opponents.
Witt Sr.’s expertise, however, is in baseball. He’s a former big leaguer. He understood what it took to make the big leagues. And no doubt, his son had the talent. But he was always cautious of placing the big-league expectations on his youngster. He knew how hard it was to make it.
But as Witt grew, the controlled athleticism came with him by way of the countless reps.
“There were times we’d be out in the yard hitting ground balls,” Witt Sr. said. “We’d be out there 45 minutes, and I’d be exhausted. I’d say, ‘That’s good for me.’ He’d say, ‘Nah, let’s keep going. Let’s do some more. And then I said, ‘You know what, man, this kid might have a chance.'”
Chance meeting preparation has helped turn Witt into one of the premier players in the majors.
His overall package exists in a tier few players can touch. The marriage of promise and production. The crystallization of what scouts projected. Rarely does it unfold that way.
“He, to me, is the most elite player in the game. He just is,” Moore said.
And on Monday evening, Witt will have the chance to help secure the United States’ WBC quarterfinal spot. Witt’s Royals made the playoffs in 2024, but he’s getting another chance this March to play in front of a national audience.
Just a few years ago, it was Witt who was spending most of his time on the Team USA bench as a backup on the 2023 WBC squad. He had just three plate appearances in that tournament, but he shared a clubhouse with more established U.S. stars. Now, he’s one of them.
Witt is in control.
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