Gavin Sheets

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Gavin Crawford Sheets

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Biographical Information[edit]

OF/1B Gavin Sheets is the son of Larry Sheets. He was drafted by the Chicago White Sox in the 2nd round of the 2017 amateur draft from Wake Forest University. Three years earlier, the Atlanta Braves had taken him in the 37th round of the 2014 amateur draft, but he had declined their offer in order to attend college. In his final season at Wake Forest in 2017, he had hit .317 with 21 homers and 84 RBIs in 63 games.

He reached AA in 2019, hitting .267/.345/.414 with 16 homers and 83 RBIs in 126 games and under normal circumstances would have made his major league debut the following season, but 2020 was the year when the COVID-19 pandemic limited the season to 60 games and shut down the minor leagues, so Gavin spent they year at the White Sox's alternate training site without getting the call to the Windy City. He then started 2021 in AAA with the Charlotte Knights, hitting .295 in 60 games with 11 homers and 46 RBIs, and made his major league debut with the White Sox on June 29th, going 2 for 4 with 2 RBIs in a 7-6 win over the Minnesota Twins, then had another 2 hits and blasted his first major league homer, off Matt Shoemaker, in a 13-3 win over the same Twins the next day. He played right field both days and secured a spot as the starter at the position. However, after his very hot start, he slowed down in July and returned briefly to Charlotte in August, before returning to Chicago in September and playing regularly the rest of the way, splitting time between right field, DH and first base. He ended up at .250 with 11 homers and 34 RBIs in 54 games for an OPS+ of 122. He also made his postseason debut that year, going 4 for 12 with a double and a homer in Chicago's loss to the Houston Astros in the Division Series.

It looked like Sheets was going to become a dominant hitter in Chicago, teaming up with other youngsters like Andrew Vaughn, Eloy Jimenez and Luis Robert to form a terrifying heart of the line-up for years to come, but things came crashing down quickly. In Jimenez and Robert's case, injuries forced them to miss large blocks of playing time over the next couple of years, while Gavin was unable to reproduce his rookie numbers over a full season. In 124 games in 2022, he hit .241 with 15 homers and 43 RBIs, but that was good for just a 99 OPS+. He then had a dreadful season in 2023, falling to .203 in 118 games, with 10 homers and 43 RBIs. His OPS+ tumbled all the way down to 64 and the White Sox lost over 100 games. He bounced back slightly in 2024, to .233 with 10 homers and 45 RBIs in 139 games, his OPS+ climbing back to 90. However, the team set a new American League record for most losses in a season with 121 and his slight improvement was lost in the shuffle. He was now 28, and had shown no improvement since reaching the majors four years earlier in spite of copious playing time so he did not figure in the plans of a team re-building from the ground up. A free agent after the season, he signed with San Diego Padres just as spring training was getting under way in 2025.

With the Padres, he went to spring training as a non-roster invitee but hit well enough to insert himself in the team's plans, with 5 homers in his first 14 Cactus League games. He made the team's Opening Day roster, and in the team's first game, played on March 27th, he hit a game-tying solo homer as a pinch-hitter in the 7th inning, starting off a four-run rally against the Atlanta Braves. He went on to be a major contributor for the team that year, playing 145 games with his prime positions being left field and DH, with a few games at DH as well. He batted .252 with 19 homers and 71 RBIs, setting personal bests in just about every hitting category. His OPS+ was 106 after three straight seasons of finishing below 100. In the postseason, he went 1 for 6 as the Padres lost to the Chicago Cubs in the Wild Card Series.

Back with the Padres in 2026, he developed a reputation for hitting clutch homers as he hit go-ahead three-run homers in the 9th inning on three separate occasion in the early going. On April 10th, he hit a walk-off three-run shot off Juan Mejia of the Colorado Rockies, after having hit a solo shot earlier in the game, to give San Diego a 5-2 win. On April 23rd, he celebrated his 30th birthday with a repeat performance against the Rockies, with his three-run blast coming off Victor Vodnik to cap a five-run outburst in the top of the 9th; the Padres won that game, 10-8. Then on May 13th, with the team down to its last out at American Family Park, he connected off Abner Uribe of the Milwaukee Brewers for another three-run homer, that one turning a 1-0 deficit into a 3-1 lead for closer Mason Miller to nail down. No one had ever pulled off such a trifecta over a whole season, let alone a seven-week span! In fact, only one other player, Andrew Benintendi of the Chicago White Sox, had hit such a homer in the majors all season.

Further Reading[edit]

  • AJ Cassavell: "Sheets powering up -- and buying in -- with Padres: Lefty slugger homers twice vs. former club, including walk-off smash", mlb.com, March 11, 2025. [1]
  • Max ralph: "MLB has a new clutch home run king, and he did it again", mlb.com, May 14, 2026. [2]

Related Sites[edit]

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