PHOENIX -- Sometimes a player is called up from the Minor Leagues because the big league team has an injury or a hole to fill.
And sometimes it's simply a matter of a player performing so well that a team cannot ignore it. Such was the case Friday when the Diamondbacks selected the contract of infielder LuJames Groover from Triple-A Reno.
Ranked as the organization's No. 10 prospect by MLB Pipeline, Groover was hitting .322 with an .873 OPS for the Aces at the time of the promotion.
"It was a situation where Groove pushed his way into this opportunity," Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo said. "Sometimes things happen through injury, there's other reasons for callups, but this was a situation where he was really progressing on both sides of the baseball, and we felt like it was a really good opportunity to get him here and show us what he's able to do."
Groover takes the place of infielder Jose Fernandez, who was called up to make his big league debut just after Opening Day -- and he was impressive at times, including hitting a pair of homers in his first game to lead Arizona to a 7-5 win over the Tigers on March 31.
Fernandez didn't always have consistent playing time and still had some developmental work to do. Prior to his callup, he had only four Triple-A at-bats to his name. A shortstop for much of his professional career, Fernandez played mostly first base and DH for the Diamondbacks.
"If you were to ask me on Opening Day if Jose Fernandez is going to be basically in our Opening Day lineup, I would have said no chance, not having played in Triple-A and all that," Arizona GM Mike Hazen said. "And I thought he played great up here. I think he's got to go down and play every day, he's got to get back to shortstop. I think that he hasn't played any shortstop up here outside of a couple games, and I think that's important for him. Being a part-time player up here is not going to serve him well for the entire year."
In 177 plate appearances, Fernandez compiled a slash line of .255/.289/.352, but he did show well early on slashing .325/.349/.470 in his first 25 games (86 plate appearances).
Groover, 24, selected in the second round of the 2023 MLB Draft, will primarily see time at first base and at the DH spot.
"He's here to get at-bats," Lovullo said. "He's not here to sit on the bench. If that was the case, we'd still develop him in Triple-A. How it shakes down, I'm not exactly sure. I'm going to do some lineups over the next couple days, and just play around with it, but he's going to get some right-on-right at-bats. We feel like he's very capable of going out and stringing some real quality at-bats and games together."
True to his word, Lovullo had Groover hitting fifth and playing first base in his Major League debut Friday night against the Nationals. He went 0-for-4 and shifted to third late in the game in the D-backs' 14-1 loss.
If Groover can give the Arizona offense a boost initially, that would be a plus. That's what Fernandez did for them, and it's also what Ryan Waldschmidt did when he first got called up.
Like Fernandez, Waldschmidt has cooled off a bit since his hot start. That's no surprise as opposing pitchers make adjustments to young hitters and it's a matter of them countering those. It's more than likely going to lead to some ups and downs.
Groover's parents were among those in attendance for his debut.
"This is a dream," he said before the game. "It's what we work for all those years. It's a hard grind, it's a very rare opportunity and I just want to have fun and make the best of it today."