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Andrew Lambo is making a name for himself with the Great Lakes Loons. Rapidly emerging as one of the top prospects in the Dodgers organization, the 19-year-old Lambo has been one of the best players in the Midwest League this summer, earning All-Star honors while ranking among league leaders in several offensive categories. A left-handed hitting outfielder who was taken by Los Angeles in the fourth round of last year’s draft, Lambo debuted in the Gulf Coast League in 2007 where he hit .343/.440/.519 in 54 games. With the Loons, Lambo is hitting .293/.348/.487 with 15 homes runs and 49 EXB. A notable facet of the lefty-swinger’s game is an ability to hit southpaws; on the season Lambo is hitting .333/.382/.552 against left-handed pitchers.
David Laurila: What is the baseball life story of Andrew Lambo?
Andrew Lambo: I’ve been playing my whole life. I grew up in a place called Southern California, in the San Fernando Valley, and played a lot of travel ball with big-name guys, like Mike Moustakas and Matt Dominguez; I played against Freddy Freeman and Josh Vitters — a lot of the big guys in the ‘07 draft. There was Robert Stock, who’s over at USC, Jason Stoffel, who’s over at Arizona right now. And I think it’s fair to say that when you play with that kind of caliber, you get better. I lived in the San Fernando Valley, then I moved into Ventura County district where I played my last two years at Newbury Park High School. From there I got drafted in the fourth round and played my first year in the Gulf Coast League, at Vero Beach. I ended up hitting around .340, so I had a nice little average and a pretty good year. I ended winning an award for the best first-year draftee out of California, which obviously made me pretty happy. Now I’m here in Midland (Michigan), just trying to continue it.
DL: If you had to give a scouting report on yourself, what would it say?
AL: That I have a good bat but need to work on my other tools – the other aspects of my game. I wouldn’t say that they’re bad, or weak, but they just need a little more tuning up. Speed-wise, range-wise, and stuff on the base paths – just little things like that. I’m not too worried about it, because they’re going to come along as I get more experience in pro ball, but right now that’s what I’m trying to work on.
DL: How would you describe your hitting style?
AL: My hitting style is a simple approach. I try not to get fooled; I try to get my pitch to hit and hit it hard. That’s all a hitter can really look for, is to get your pitch to hit. If you sit there chasing a pitcher’s pitch, you’re going to have a hard time. You want to get your pitch and try to get on top of something.
DL: In saying that you don’t want to get fooled, do you mean that you try to make sure that you stay back on pitches?
AL: Everybody tries to stay back. Of course, we can’t all be fortunate to stay back all the time, or else we’d be hitting a thousand. When you’re in a pitcher’s count, like 0-2 or 1-2, you might strike out on a tough pitch, and if that happens, you can’t really do much. But you don’t want to get fooled. Getting fooled, for the most part, is looking stupid on a hitter’s count like 2-0 or 3-1 when they throw you something that’s not your pitch – and you chase it.
DL: Is your approach to try to hit the ball to all fields, or do you look for pitches you can pull?
AL: It’s all fields, really. When you’re thinking up the middle, you’ll usually have a lot of success. You don’t want to try to pull everything, and if you’re thinking left side a little too much, you’ll start fouling balls off that you kind of should have hit, so your best bet is thinking middle, up.
DL: You have a remarkable reverse split this year (a .934 OPS vs. southpaws, .771 vs. right-handers). Why is that?
AL: It is kind of weird, and you almost want to try to figure out why that is. I don’t know, but we have seen a lot of them; I’ve seen more lefties out here than I ever have in my life. Maybe sometimes left-handed hitters don’t know that staying on the ball with the front shoulder — that’s all it is. But it is kind of a funny statistic. I looked it up with my host dad the other night and saw that I was hitting three-something off lefties. But it’s just keeping the front shoulder in. Sometimes hitters pull that front shoulder off and it leads to bad stuff.
DL: A lot of left-hander hitters do a good job of standing in against southpaws, but there are far fewer who can consistently hit for power against them. Do you feel that you can continue to drive the ball against left-handers?
AL: Yeah, I think I can. It’s just getting ready to hit, you know. It’s having a pitch to hit, but I do think that lefty-on-lefty is harder than righty-on-righty. Righties might sit there and call me a liar, but I think it’s true because you don’t see lefties as much. You see a lot of righties, so you can kind of get the angle figured out. Because you don’t see as many lefties, if you have one going 92-93 with a good hammer, you have to be ready to hit.
DL: Mechanically, what do you look like at the plate? Are there specific players you resemble when you’re swinging the bat?
AL: Scouts have their comparisons, and I’m fine with that, but I don’t ever sit there and compare myself to anybody. I am who I am. For the most part, I’m pretty spread out. I have my hands in a pretty good hitter’s position. I have a pretty generic swing; it’s not really unique or anything. I have an open stance that’s pretty generic, and I kind of just step forward and throw my hands at the ball, really. It’s kind of simple, with not too many things going on in my swing.
DL: Where are you defensively right now?
AL: I think I’m right where I need to be. I get pretty good jumps on balls, and that’s what gets me by. I’m still trying to work on my speed, which will come eventually, but it takes time. And that’s something that’s going to come with a lot of work. If you’re swinging the bat well, you can’t just keep doing that and not work on anything else. Ken Griffey said that if you want to play a couple of years in the big leagues, just work on one thing you’re good at — but if you want to have a good career in the bigs, you have to also work at the things you’re not good at. You can’t sit there and think, “I swing the bat pretty good, so I’ll just rest on that until I get there.” You want to have good tools; you want to have a good throwing arm; you want to have good speed; you want to be a good base runner.
DL: Defensively, what are some of things the Dodgers organization has you focusing on this season?
AL: I played first base in high school, and they moved me to right field, and then to left, and people may think it’s not a big adjustment, but if you want to be good, it is. It’s tough moving from left to right because of the angles of the balls. How a lefty hits it to left, and how a lefty hits it to right, are different, and it’s the same with how righties hit the ball. There are different tails on the ball that you have to pick up; there are different reads and cuts.
DL: How about at the plate?
AL: They don’t really try to change much swinging-wise. If you had really good success the year before, they’re not going to want to do a whole lot. But with your mental approach, you can change stuff — every day you can change things on the mental side of hitting. That’s something they’ve worked with me on.
DL: Is there anyone in particular that has helped you a lot with that facet of your game?
AL: Gene Clines – he’s our hitting coordinator, and a great guy. But they like to keep it really simple; if you’ve had some good success, they don’t really want to change you up too much. He’s given me some tips, like how to overcome the cold in the Midwest in the early part of the reason – just mental stuff, really. I think that the physical attributes are there and ready to go.
DL: Who were some of the coaches and instructors you worked with in spring training, particularly about hitting?
AL: Don Mattingly came up to us a couple of times, and he talked to us mostly about the mental side of things, too. Hitting is pretty tough; if you go three for 10 you’re an above-average hitter, so it’s a different from all other sports in that you have to deal with failure a little more. In the NBA, if you’re a three-for-10 shooter you’re not doing so well. It would be the same if you were a passer in the NFL – you’re not doing so hot. So we have to settle on failures, and that’s the number one thing for a young guy to learn to overcome. You can’t go four-for-four every single game, so you have to learn how to have that bad game and bounce back; you have to learn how to keep it consistent.
DL: What is your history as a sports fan?
AL: I’m not going to lie – I’m not really too much of a sports fanatic. I don’t like to sit there and watch sports. I’m the kind of guy who can’t watch something too long, I have to go out there and get it. In the offseason, I’m not too much of a football guy either. I just like watching movies and stuff, or playing video games. Still, it is kind of corny that I got drafted by my hometown team – I grew up about an hour out of L.A., so my whole life I’ve been a Dodgers fan; I grew up going to Dodgers games. So I guess it’s pretty cool.
