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One the brightest rising stars in Major League Baseball, 21-year-old Vladimir Guerrero Jr. began the 2020 Major League Baseball season weighing over 280 pounds. And he wasn’t happy about it.
He’s lost over 30 pounds since.
“I did not get to the second [spring] training well, and I told myself that this cannot happen again,” Guerrero admitted to Dominican newspaper El Caribe. “I was overweight, I said that it couldn’t happen again and I got to work at once.
“Things happen because you don’t work. I finished the season more or less and put that in mind. I started with the slow swing and when I lost 20 pounds I started feeling better.”
Now he says he is down to 250 pounds with the eventual goal of a playing weight in the 240 to 245 pound range.
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“I learned after these months of the coronavirus that if you don’t work hard you can’t be in the Major Leagues. Why do (Fernando) Tatis and (Juan) Soto put good numbers? Because they work hard,” he said. “I hit the hits I hit because of the ability that God gave me. But I knew it from the beginning. I know I did it wrong. I apologized to my teammates and decided to play like this, but I did it wrong.”
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Guerrero, the son of Hall of Fame outfielder Vladimir Guerrero, says he is working out every day, has revamped his diet, and as a result has dropped 12 pounds since the season came to an end.
“Now I eat differently,” he said. “Nothing with fat and I have dinner at 7:00 at night. After that, it’s water until the next day.”
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Even at his higher weight and having to make the shift from playing third base to first base, Vlad still slashed .262/.329/.462 with 9 homers and 33 RBI in just 60 games. In his two-year career Guerrero ha hit .269/.336/.442 with 24 home runs and 102 RBI in 183 games.
Pitchers beware.
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