I would argue that Diaz is more of a naturally gifted hitter, than a proven hitter. He is still young enough and has never had plate discipline, so a crash course workshop without the pressure to perform might help. Of course there is also the possibility of damaging his confidence and it actually hurting rather than helping.
He’s 8 for his last 34 with 3 extra base hits. While that is not setting the world on fire, it is an obvious improvement. No need to send a proven hitter down at this very early stage. He’s digging out of his slump now. He hit .360 w/risp last year. He hit .299. The year before he blasted 23 bombs in half a season. That’s a season and a half of proven performance. He has been slumping for 3 weeks.
Strikeouts don't take many PAs to become worrisome. Also, other than 100 or so PAs in AAA, he had abnormally high swing and miss rates in the minors. His minor league stats look like someone that forced pitchers to throw strikes. In the minors, that means he was likely teeing off on center-cut fastballs for really good BABIPs, but ISOs that while good, aren't good for a swing-and-a miss guy. I really hope Dezenzo pans out. So far, I see Jon Singleton. This isn't to say that every Jon Singleton like guy has a Singleton-like career, Just that there is a high chance he never makes enough contact.
I don't think you could have picked a less accurate comp for Dezenzo than Singleton. Maybe Altuve? Seriously though, Singleton hits lefty handed works counts and takes walks. He has zero baserunning value and negative defensive value while being limited to 1b and DH. While it hasn't been determined how good of a fielder, Dezenzo will be, he can play 4 positions. He hits RH and has yet to show patience at the plate. He also has some baserunning value. Trying to find a comp, maybe a slightly faster Taylor Jones?
Dezenzo's Cstr% is about equal to league average, he's just whiffing a lot which isn't that all uncommon in a player's initial exposure to major league hitting. Singleton's main problem (besides being a nonentity defensively) was that he didn't do much damage when he did put the ball in play. Dezenzo doesn't have that same difficulty, although he would of course benefit from keeping the ball off the carpet.
I'm telling yall. Dezenzo will hit. He's going to be at worst a league average bat if given regular time. We sort of need him to be a better than average bat if we are going to move deck chairs around to get him PT, but it is what it is. Be sort of excited for him. Like- 1/2 a cam smith level of excitement and 1/10000th of the excitement you should have for Forrest F'ing Whitley.
