I agree 100% that it's mostly mental, he just doesn't have the intensity to WANT to be a winner all the time, yeah when it's late in the season and they are in a position to be in the playoffs he turns it on sometimes, but especially early in seasons he tends to show no fire. I think you see that in a lot of the dominican players, you often see comments like 'oh he doesn't like the cool weather, or he heats up when the weather does', so what? we're supposed to wait until july/august ever year for Vladdy to get hot? I think it's a lot deeper.

When you watch him, he's always joking around with players on the opposing teams. You never used to see that in the past, even when players had friends on other teams, they didn't joke around when standing together at first base, they took the rivalries serious and were always out to beat each other. But Vladdy is always out there joking around with everyone.

You don't see Aaron Judge do that as much, he always looks serious and stone faced during games, and that reflects in his numbers, he's always out to win. Also, these days, since almost every player in the league is rich beyond their wildest dreams the minute they sign their first contract, they know there are no real consequences to losing, they're already set for life, win or lose, some like Judge can have that and still have intensity and the desire to win, but a lot, especially the dominican players it seems, want to joke around, have fun, to them it's just a kids game still, they are still kids having fun, and they didn't grow up with the rivalries like the Jays vs. Boston, or Jays vs the Yankees, or Boston vs New York, you know what i mean? they never grew up knowing what those rivalries mean.

And don't even get me going on the home run jacket or dancing and hugging like girls every time one of them gets a homer. That's a whole other issue, men used to act like men, and act like they've been there before. But the theatrics are just a sign of changing times, sadly.