No Room at the Infield: Jordan Lawlar Moves To Center Field

Time waits for no man, except Jordan Lawlar, who’s been on the cusp of major league stardom for about four years.

The skinny on Lawlar as a prospect — where he topped out at a 60-FV grade in 2024 and 2025 — is that he carries the potential for plus power and plus shortstop defense with a plus-plus run tool. That’s a lot of pluses for an up-the-middle position, which is why the Diamondbacks spent a top-10 pick on him out of high school in 2021.

He played well enough to make Arizona’s playoff roster on the run to the 2023 NL pennant (though he didn’t play much, going 0-for-2 with a walk), and the two full seasons since have seen Lawlar’s path blocked both by his own injuries and the emergence of Geraldo Perdomo as a bona fide star.

Even so, Lawlar is the kind of talent you either trade for a big return or find a big league home for. Shortstop prospects who see their path to the majors blocked most frequently end up at second base; Arizona GM Mike Hazen felt out the trade market for Ketel Marte this winter but didn’t like what he saw. If anything, second base is even more blocked than shortstop at the moment.

How about third base, then? What do Manny Machado, Alex Bregman, and José Ramírez have in common, apart from a bunch of top-five MVP finishes? They all could’ve been shortstops had their teams not had a better option at the position. (Admittedly, this structure flatters J.J. Hardy, but he really could pick it back in the day.)

For most of last year, the Snakes had a killer third baseman, Eugenio Suárez, but he’s no longer there. In fact, the first time it occurred to me that someone other than Lawlar would play third base for the Diamondbacks in 2026 was the moment they traded for Nolan Arenado, or what’s left of him.

We move on. To center field, apparently, which is where the Diamondbacks have resolved to play Lawlar for the foreseeable future.

On Saturday, Lawlar made his first major league appearance in center field, and it went well. He went 1-for-2 with a walk and a home run at the plate, and made a clean play on the only ball hit in his direction: a first-inning fly ball from Ezequiel Tovar. It was the kind of play you’d expect an infielder to make (or a pitcher, or an athletic trainer), but so far, so good.

I have two questions regarding Lawlar’s move to center field: First, can he do it? Second, is it a good idea in the long term?

As far as Lawlar’s ability to play center field, I have no doubt about his physical tools. While the orthodox move would’ve been third base, the shortstop-to-center field path has been well-traveled. Jackson Merrill did fine. So did Mickey Mantle.

Lawlar absolutely has the speed for the position; he hit 30 ft/sec in sprint speed last year, putting him in capital-e Elite territory. A shift to center field might actually bring out the best in Lawlar. One of Eric Longenhagen’s few gripes about Lawlar’s defense was his tendency to make awkward throws on the run, especially off his backhand. He got the job done, it just looked a little janky.

Here I’ll add another insight I picked up from Eric when we were watching a World Baseball Classic game together a few years ago. He was talking about how much better Mookie Betts’ throwing arm played in right field than it did on the infield.

The numbers over the past few years bear that out; Betts was a plus arm strength guy in right, but while he’s been a good defender at shortstop overall, he’s a bit noodle-armed on the dirt. That’s because infielders have to release the ball quickly and often off-balance, whereas outfielders mostly throw either while charging the ball or after setting their feet. Betts in particular benefited enormously from a stable throwing platform.

That makes sense if you’ve ever watched a good left-side infielder for more than a couple innings. (Here I’ll mention again my theory that, like, 40% of what makes Patrick Mahomes one of the best quarterbacks of all time is stuff he learned as a high-level third base prospect.) I don’t know if Lawlar will take to the outfield the same way, but maybe having that extra fraction of a second to set up will take his arm from good to transcendent.

The rest of the defensive stuff will all have to be learned: reads, positioning, footwork. That comes easier to some outfielders than others, and it’s reasonable to expect some growing pains. Up until last weekend, the sum total of Lawlar’s non-infield game experience was three games in last year’s Dominican Winter League. We should be patient here.

At the same time, I’m choosing to believe that Lawlar can learn to play center field until he proves otherwise. It’s the only assumption to make, based on his ability at shortstop.

How valuable that bat will be is a real question. First, Lawlar has to stay on the field, after suffering injuries to his shoulder, ribs, scapula, thumb, and hamstring over a five-year professional career. Some of those were freak acute injuries, but any list of physical ailments that long is going to contain at least a couple troubling chronic issues. Perhaps he’ll benefit from leaving the infield behind in this respect.

Lawlar was barely out of the womb in 2023 and missed most of 2024 due to injury, but he got 28 games in the big leagues in 2025 and didn’t cover himself in glory: .182/.257/.288 with a 35.1% strikeout rate. Yes, that’s a tiny sample, but it’s a data point. His first extended encounter with major league pitching was a comprehensive defeat. And even the rosy scouting reports on him show a lot of swing-and-miss.

But not enough swing-and-miss to constitute a red flag. The in-zone contact numbers are on the low end of normal. Especially for an up-the-middle guy who hit .300 with 20-homer power and a double-digit walk rate almost everywhere he went in the minor leagues. I don’t see a specific reason why Lawlar can’t hit big league pitching. He just has to prove he can do it.

So is center field the best place for Lawlar? And are the Diamondbacks best served by putting him there?

Lawlar’s bat would’ve been most valuable at shortstop; obviously he won’t be needed there as long as Perdomo’s around. But the difference is minimal between offensive expectations at third base and offensive expectations at center field. If anything, Lawlar might be more valuable in center, where the league-wide wOBA was three points lower in 2025. Add on the possibility that his arm might play up out there and the lower physical toll might do the injury-prone Lawlar good, and this seems like the right move.

Even if you think the Diamondbacks are wasting their time with Arenado at third base, they still have both Marte and Perdomo under team control through 2030 and another Top 100 infield prospect, Tommy Troy, on the verge of major league readiness. That infield logjam is not getting any less crowded anytime soon.

Meanwhile, the Diamondbacks do need a center fielder. Their right field situation is one of the best in baseball, or at least it will be once Corbin Carroll grows a new hamate bone. Left field is pretty dire at the moment, but top prospect Ryan Waldschmidt is in major league camp, and maybe Lourdes Gurriel Jr.’s bat will heal around the same time his ACL does. But Lawlar has a chance to be a center fielder who makes legitimate contributions on both sides of the ball. Those guys don’t grow on trees.

I think it’s fair to ask if the Diamondbacks would be better off in the short term putting Lawlar in left and Alek Thomas in center, rather than the other way around. There’s a chance Lawlar might not transition to the outfield well — at least not right away — and basically the only thing Thomas has going for him is his glove.

But the Diamondbacks aren’t going to win a division as tough as the NL West by taking small swings like that. Lawlar might not work in center. He might not hit at all. But if he does, that’s a potential star, like the Padres have in Merrill. Maybe even better. The upside for that position is such that, if the Diamondbacks think Lawlar’s future is in center, he should get every rep available as soon as possible. Either he’ll learn the position faster, or the Diamondbacks will know sooner that they have to go to Plan (counts on fingers) E for his future.

Or he can spend another year on the verge of claiming a major league job. We’ve waited this long, after all.