Javier Baez has looked like a player on the verge of exiting MLB over the past few years. The 2024 season was especially bad for Baez, who hit just .184 with a .516 OPS. The Detroit Tigers star, at 32 years old, has had a resurgent 2025 campaign, though. He's currently hitting .289 with a .793 OPS. Tigers manager AJ Hinch recently revealed what led to Baez's bounce back season, via Jon Heyman of The New York Post.

One big element of Baez's campaign has been his move to center field.

“We talked about Javy all offseason on what his role was going to be,” Hinch explained on The Show with Joel Sherman and Jon Heyman. “Now when Javy got hurt last year, was right at the beginning of this resurgence of young talent coming up to the big leagues. We had a number of guys come up from Triple-A… We had this influx of youthful energy… Our team had changed. And so during the offseason, now you're putting these pieces together, like, what is Javy gonna do to help us?”

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The Tigers were patient, but ultimately moved forward with the Baez-center field idea as injuries continued to emerge. Baez's ability to still play the infield gave Detroit additional options as well.

“And we waited until he got very healthy into spring and back into games and he and I met and he asked, ‘what can I do to help this team be better?' We just came to that agreement, like, you can move around, like, second base, third base, shortstop, little bit of center. We didn't know exactly where the piece was going to fit, but we knew he could contribute in a lot of different ways. And when I said center field, his eyes lit up… He was like, ‘I've been trying to tell people I can play center field.'

“Now, it's different when you're shagging in BP or it's theory you're going to play center field. But he did that for a better part of a month while we were trying to get healthy… So now he's back at shortstop and playing virtually everyday at that position. I started him at second the other day, he moved in game to third base two or three games ago. The jack of all trades part of Javy's game is awesome.”

Perhaps Baez's defensive success has helped him find his confidence at the plate again. Baseball is a game of confidence, and Baez seems to be locked in so far in 2025.