Honoring Nick Solak, a 2023 MLB Player.

I didn't want to wait until 2028 to write about Nick Solak's 2023 season.

Following the NBA trade deadline last week, there were no MLB or NFL trades until March 11, 2014. I’m interrupting my scheduled vacation for a different type of post that focuses on a player rather than a particular transaction. Rest assured, I’m mainly focusing on the player due to a series of absurd transactions.

Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News began his February 29, 2020 article (Articles Four Years Later) with “Nick Solak is named after a sports bar. A guy drops this on you and no way it is not going to end up as the first sentence of your story, no matter how random a fact it may be.”

I completely agree with Grant’s sentiment, and since I have to be clunkier by citing a secondary source I’ll make up for it with depth. The name of the bar was Nick’s Sports Page in Dolton, Illinois and a July 1994 article in the Chicago Tribune describes it as cheesier than you could imagine, with menu items including “foul tips” (which are just chicken strips) and the “Ryne Sand Burger” that could be ordered as a half-pound “major” ($3.50 to $4.25) or quarter-pound “minor” ($2.50 to $3.25). According to Grant, “the exterior featured shaker shingles, chocolate-stained diagonal sheathing and baseball bats for door handles.” The Solak parents met at Nick’s on February 5, 1985 while attending a Carlton Fisk night – their son Nick was born just under ten years later.

Nick’s Sports Page closed long ago, along with the manufacturing plants that had powered the economies of Dolton and other South Chicago suburbs. As of 2007, the triangular plot of land where Nick’s once sat looked to host a similar-looking building, but was now occupied by Mr. Ricky’s 141 Club, a nightclub whose Twitter account posted 107 all-caps tweets between March 28 and August 18, 2011. In the last weekend of June 2011, four people were shot inside Mr. Ricky’s, which did not stop the club’s Twitter account from advertising “THURSDAY NIGHT FREE ADMISSION ALL NIGHT FREE MECHANICAL BULL RIDE AND POLE DANCING CONTEST WHEN [sic] $100” two days later. By August 2012, the building was vacant with a “for sale” sign in the window and by August 2018, the building was gone. It looks like a bus stop shelter was put up sometime before July 2022 but then removed by May 2023; the lot is otherwise vacant.

We’re too tangential too quickly; Solak didn’t even grow up in Dolton. He was born in nearby Woodridge and went to Naperville North High School, which he described as “a very competitive high school [that] prepared me mentally for the MLB” in an email interview with the student newspaper. Solak excelled on the baseball field, but stood just 5’9” and didn’t have the athletic profile that MLB teams look for out of high school draftees. His performance was enough to attract attention from the University of Louisville, where he hit .351 as a freshman, .324 as a sophomore, and started off batting .455 through 22 games as a junior before a pitch hit his right wrist and caused him to miss a month. He still ended the season with a gaudy .376/.474/.576 slash line, demonstrating enough offensive potential for the New York Yankees to select him #62 overall in the 2016 MLB Draft.

Solak still wasn’t any taller and wasn’t bashing home runs, but shortly after being drafted he remarked “I think I just showed, metal or wood, I have a very consistent swing that’s going to play with whatever I’m holding in my hand.” He had done enough at Louisville to convince the skeptics he could hit, but the skeptics remained firmly skeptical about the rest of his game. In March 2017, his first year as a minor leaguer, Eric Longenhagen at Fangraphs ranked Solak as the 42nd-best Yankees prospect (they ranked 33 guys and then listed Solak ninth among other notable prospects placed “in order of preference”), acknowledging that “he hit well … and scouts think it will continue” while noting that his swing “produces little game power” and “he’s a below-average defender at second,” concluding that Solak probably didn’t have the profile of an everyday player. 

Interestingly, this isn’t much different from what scouts might’ve written about Solak if they had bothered to watch him in high school. It’s also not that different from what they’d write about him later on, even as the tenor of the commentary changed. 

Lo and behold, Solak continued to look like a great hitter as a Yankees farmhand in 2017. He hit .301/.397/.460 in 100 games for the High-A Tampa Tarpons before earning a promotion to AA Trenton. In February 2018, Solak was part of a three-team trade that resulted in him being sent to the Tampa Bay Rays (the MLB team, not the High-A team), which I won’t comment on further at risk of spoiling my February 2028 fun. Longenhagen provided a scouting report that was similar in substance, but much more complimentary in language, when describing Solak at the time of the trade. He was now upgraded to “at least an average defender at second base” and a “plus runner” who “puts a surprising charge into the baseball for his size.” We also got a mention of his “elite makeup,” scout-speak for “great dude.” Although this still led to the same conclusion that Solak needed improvements “to soundly profile as a regular,” Solak was subsequently ranked 9th in a Rays system that was contemporaneously described as “one of the best farm systems in baseball.” Both predictions seemed correct midway through 2018, as Solak began demonstrating game power that led Marc Hulet to state that he “should be considered the Rays’ second baseman of the future – unless he’s their left fielder of the future.” 

2019 ushered in an era where praise about Nick Solak started to get hyperbolic. Solak was once again ranked as the 9th-best Rays prospect, but his Fangraphs scouting report included the absurd anecdote that “Solak actually broke one club’s makeup algorithm, scoring higher than they thought was possible.” To my knowledge, this still ranks as the dorkiest way somebody has ever been called a “great dude.” The praise for Solak continued with “it’s probably not surprising to hear that he’s a grinder type of player who makes the most of his sneaky-good tools,” but the depth of the Rays minor league system meant that “there’s likely a trade coming at some point” with no clear spot for Solak on the MLB roster. That trade prediction came to fruition in July, when Solak was flipped to the Texas Rangers for Pete Fairbanks, which I won’t comment on further at risk of spoiling my July 2029 fun. 

Evan Grant’s article from four years ago claimed that Rangers Midwest area scout Mike Medici argued vociferously on behalf of the acquisition of Solak. Medici had scouted Solak since high school, when he worked for the Blue Jays and lived in an apartment that backed up to Naperville North’s baseball field (this is either a slight exaggeration or Medici lived in a strip mall). By 2016, Medici was convinced that Solak would figure things out as a professional and recommended that the Rangers take him with the 63rd pick in the draft. When the Yankees selected Solak at pick #62, Medici managed his disappointment and continued to recommend Solak until he finally became a Ranger at the 2019 deadline. Grant quotes Medici referring to Solak with elevated praise as “the epitomé of a South Sider as a player. South Siders are tough, hard workers. He’s not one to tell you what he’s going to do. He just does it. There is no flash. That’s exactly who he is. He is a throwback.” I’d like to remind my Chicago-familiar readers that Nick Solak went to Naperville North High School and that Mike Medici, who lived in an apartment close to the baseball field, had appropriate context to understand that “South Sider” was quite a geographic stretch. 

Like always, Solak raked on arrival in Texas. He destroyed baseballs at AAA Nashville, launching ten home runs in just 30 games before earning his big league debut. Solak was called up on August 20, 2019 for a doubleheader against the Los Angeles Angels. He recorded his first hit in the first game, then recorded his first home run and the game-winning 11th-inning RBI in the second game, describing the experience as “pretty surreal.” In 135 plate appearances at the end of the 2019 season, Solak hit a precocious .293/.393/.491, mostly as a designated hitter but sometimes as a 3rd baseman. He hit five home runs, the most critical of which was hit in a September 12 game against new Rays reliever Pete Fairbanks and served as proof that Texas had “won the trade.” That offseason, Solak proposed to his girlfriend and, because this family seems to only have one romantic angle, the guy named after Nick’s Sports Page proposed at the bar where he and fellow former Louisville athlete Roxanne McVey had their first date.

MLB players are considered rookies and therefore “prospect-eligible” until they have 130 at-bats. Solak had attained 135 plate appearances in 2019, but only 116 at-bats, allowing one final hype cycle entering the 2020 season. Baseball Prospectus ranked Solak as the 74th-best prospect in baseball and Fangraphs ranked him 2nd among Rangers prospects, notwithstanding the fact that questions remained surrounding his eventual defensive position and time was running out for there to be an answer. “Solak is a high-effort player but effort alone won’t solve his defensive issues,” wrote Longenhagen at Fangraphs. Solak played a nearly-full-season of 58 MLB games in 2020 (a total which led the Rangers), but for the first time in his baseball career, he hit pretty poorly. His average fell to .268, his on-base percentage fell to .326, and most-concerningly, his slugging percentage fell to .345 as he had just twelve extra-base hits (two home runs and ten doubles) on the season. This rough offensive output combined with the known-quantity bad defense made Solak one of baseball’s worst contributors in 2020 with -1.0 wins above (below?) replacement.

As it turns out, the power potential that Solak had demonstrated over the last couple of seasons might not have been entirely legitimate. There is substantial evidence that MLB and AAA utilized modified baseballs in 2019 that induced a dramatic increase in the number of home runs by making baseballs fly further. Nick Solak was no exception, going from 10 home runs across three collegiate seasons at Louisville to 32 professional home runs in 2019 (27 in AAA and 5 in MLB). For a guy who never had the most tools but always made the most of what he had, a change to the baseball that resulted in just a few more feet of flight could make all the difference. 

There were two more seasons of Nick Solak in Texas but not much more to report. Each of these seasons included lengthy demotions to AAA Round Rock, and he had more AAA games than MLB games in 2022. Part of that was due to a foot fracture that caused Solak to end his season on the injured list. When the season ended and the time came to reinsert Solak to the roster, the Rangers decided the experiment was over and sent him to Cincinnati for cash considerations on November 10, 2022. Drew Koch at “Blog Red Machine” (good name) made the hopefully-clickbait claim that Solak “will be the Reds best offseason pickup,” showing that fans still connected Solak to the upside that his name once carried.

Actually, let’s switch to a more chronological narrative form for 2023. We should highlight these dates.

January 6, 2023: Drew Koch makes that Nick Solak prediction.

February 21, 2023: Nick Solak takes his spring training photo in a Reds uniform, wearing #16. 

March 11, 2023: Drew Koch includes the fifth outfielder battle between Solak and Stuart Fairchild as one of “3 Reds position battles that will come down to the wire this spring.” 

Also March 11, 2023: The Cincinnati Reds cut their MLB spring training roster down to 56 players, part of a gradual cut down to the 26-man opening day roster. This is the stage where Nick Solak is cut and reassigned to AAA Louisville. 

He’d surely rather be in the majors, but being assigned to AAA Louisville is a good outcome for Solak, a former Cardinal who met his wife while attending the university. He arranges to leave a car with family in Louisville so that it’s available when spring training ends. 

March 30, 2023: The Reds want to give an active roster spot to Jason Vosler, who is not on their 40-man roster. Solak is designated for assignment to make room.

March 31, 2023: The Seattle Mariners trade cash to Cincinnati to acquire Nick Solak, who is added to the 40-man roster and assigned to AAA Tacoma.

April 10, 2023: The Mariners want to give an active roster spot to Jose Rodriguez, who is not on the 40-man roster. Solak is designated for assignment to make room. He ends his tenure in Tacoma with one hit and three walks in 17 plate appearances.

April 14, 2023: The Chicago White Sox claim Nick Solak off waivers, add him to the 40-man roster and assign him to AAA Charlotte. “The fact that Solak is in a limbo zone where various teams are interested in his abilities yet he keeps losing his roster spot is a reflection of his uneven career so far,” writes Darragh McDonald at MLBTradeRumors. But this one is probably especially exciting for Solak, who was at least sufficiently “South Side” to grow up as a big White Sox fan. 

April 16, 2023: The White Sox want to give an active roster spot to Adam Haseley, who is not on the 40-man roster. Solak is designated for assignment to make room. 

April 18, 2023: The Atlanta Braves claim Nick Solak off waivers, add him to their 40-man roster and assign him to AAA Gwinnett. In the past three weeks, Solak has been on four baseball teams and has gotten one hit in AAA. Additionally, since baseball’s waiver order goes in reverse order of record, Solak’s claim by one of the best teams in baseball suggests that league-wide interest was beginning to dry up. 

April 25, 2023: The Braves call Nick Solak up to their MLB roster to fill in for Eli White (paternity list). Solak wears #15, as he did with Texas. 

April 26, 2023: Atlanta has started the year strong, but spends most of this game losing to the Miami Marlins. They score their first runs in the bottom of the 6th to cut Miami’s lead to 4-2. In the bottom of the 8th, Matt Olson leads off with a home run to make it a 4-3 game. After Sean Murphy hits a one-out single, Nick Solak is brought in to pinch run. The next batter is Eddie Rosario, who hits a game-tying triple that scores Solak and presumably would’ve scored anybody with legs. The Braves score two more runs that inning and go on to win 6-4, with Chadwick Tromp replacing Solak and catching the 9th inning. 

April 28, 2023: Eli White returns from the paternity list, so Nick Solak is optioned to AAA Gwinnett. But Michael Harris II is activated from the injured list that same day, so Eli White is also optioned to AAA Gwinnett. Congratulations on the child Eli!

Solak ends his time in Atlanta with 1 game, no plate appearances, no innings in the field, and 1 run scored.

June 6, 2023: The Braves acquire Ben Heller from the Rays and send him to Gwinnett, but need to give him a spot on the 40-man roster. Solak is designated for assignment to make room. 

June 9, 2023: The Detroit Tigers claim Nick Solak off waivers and assign him to AAA Toledo. The Tigers had among the highest waiver priorities in MLB, so maybe never mind about that whole “diminishing league-wide interest” thing. 

June 10, 2023 (morning): The Tigers call Nick Solak up to their big league roster. Ideally for content purposes, they had him fly into Detroit on the 9th and then drive an hour south to Toledo before calling him up to make him retrace his steps the next day. 

It actually would’ve gone like that, but by the time Solak had landed in Detroit on the 9th, Akil Baddoo had already sustained the injury that opened a roster spot for Solak on the 10th. Evan Woodbery asked Solak how he had handled his tumultuous experience over the past few months and didn’t get much of an answer. “I don’t know if I’ve totally processed it,” Solak said, undoubtedly telling the truth. 

On the bright side, this iota of stability was sufficient for him to get his car back – his cousin drove the car from Louisville to Detroit that day.

June 10, 2023 (afternoon): The Tigers are being shut out at home by the Arizona Diamondbacks. In the 9th inning, the first two batters strike out before Miguel Cabrera hits a two-out double to keep the game alive. Cabrera ranked 580th out of 583 MLB players in Statcast’s sprint speed metric in 2023 and is an easy pinch-run candidate. Nick Solak comes into the game to replace him. He’s wearing #46 now.

Jake Rogers draws a walk. Andy Ibanez pops out to foul territory. The game ends and the Tigers lose, 5-0. 

June 12, 2023: The Tigers option Nick Solak to AAA Toledo. He ends his time in Detroit with 1 game and no other statistical output whatsoever, but because Cabrera was in the lineup as DH, Solak technically appeared in that position when he came in as a pinch runner. 

This is Nick Solak’s last taste of an MLB active roster in 2023. He ended his 2023 season having played in 2 games for 2 teams with 2 uniform numbers. He scored one run and had zero plate appearances (or other statistics). His teams had a 1-1 record. 

The entire purpose of this post was to get to that point, so I’ll repeat it for emphasis: Nick Solak played in 2 MLB games for 2 teams in 2023 and did not have any statistical output except for one run scored.

August 4, 2023: The Tigers claim Andrew Vasquez off waivers and need to give him a spot on the 40-man roster. Solak is designated for assignment to make room.

August 6, 2023: Mercifully, it seems league-wide interest in Solak finally has diminished. Solak clears waivers and is assigned to AAA Toledo, where he finishes the season. Solak’s slash line at Toledo was .221/.348/.315, with just two home runs in 221 plate appearances.

January 30, 2024: Nick Solak signs a minor-league contract with the Seattle Mariners.

So far in spring training, Solak has gone 2-for-6 with a double. Maybe his MLB career is basically over; maybe there’s untapped potential for the still-young 29-year-old. With no more minor-league option years remaining, it’s unlikely that Solak will experience quite the same roller coaster in 2024.

Today, Dolton, IL is known less for Nick’s Sports Page and more for its self-proclaimed “super-mayor” Tiffany Henyard. Henyard has drawn scrutiny while in office for self-promotion efforts and excessive spending, like spending $22,000 in taxpayer money to put her image on billboards. Henyard simultaneously serves as Supervisor of Thornton Township, located a couple towns south of Dolton, and makes $224,000 per year in that capacity, though she recently proposed an ordinance that would cut the position’s salary to $25,000 if anybody except her ever has the job, a move that municipal attorney Burt Odelson described as “the worst attempt to try to dissuade people from running that I’ve ever seen.” You may think it inevitable that somebody else will one day serve as a public official in this capacity, but Henyard may not – after she survived a recall attempt (following her appointment of a paroled sex offender as code enforcement officer), she made a celebratory Instagram post with the caption that “I am and forever will be Dolton’s Mayor.”

She might be wrong — last week, the Dolton Board of Trustees passed a resolution asking for a federal investigation into Mayor Henyard. There are reports that the FBI is beginning to interview witnesses. But she might be right — a few days later, Henyard announced she would be debuting a podcast on Spotify next week.

None of this has much to do with Naperville North’s Nick Solak, but if you find out about that Instagram post in the course of your research there’s no way it doesn’t end up closing out your story, no matter how random a fact it may be.