Why Carson DeMartini Models His Game After a Former Phillie Rival

Phillies Carson DeMartini
Photo Credit: Ben Silver

It’s ironic. The future for the Philadelphia Phillies at the hot corner may owe their career to the man who drew more ire than any other at Citizens Bank Park 15 years ago. 

Just like David Wright, Carson DeMartini grew up on the Virginia coast and, as a child, modeled his game after the future New York Met whom his father coached back in the 1990s. It was the hard-nosed attitude and composed nature that DeMartini emulated on the ballfield at Ocean Lakes High School and Virginia Tech that led the Phillies to select him in the fourth round of the MLB Draft in 2024.

In the year since then, he impressed the organization enough to merit speedy promotions from Single-A Clearwater to High-A Lakewood, then from Lakewood to Double-A Reading on June 9, 2025.

Across DeMartini’s 12 months in pro ball, he’s slashed .267/.367/.419. His defense at third base has also been excellent, with evaluators even considering a possible move to shortstop. Much more important than those surface-level numbers is Demartini’s makeup.

Carson DeMartini

The 22-year-old infielder graduated with honors from the Mathematics & Science Academy at Ocean Lakes High School. That background has allowed him to be a more cerebral ballplayer, always interested in learning more about his game and the other team through analytics and data.

“I’m pretty big in the analytics part. I mean, I probably look into it a little bit more than I should,” he said. “And I think sometimes you get baseball guys that are trying to look at data and not realizing that there are certain outliers that have influenced the data, and like certain stuff affects the way that data is spit out to us in a baseball way.”

That intuition has allowed DeMartini to stay positive through the first real slump of his professional career. Mired in a 4-for-36 slog that’s seen his season batting average drop from .270 to .252, the lanky infielder is just as aware as anyone else that the .154 BABIP he has dealt with in this stretch is unsustainable.

“I think the biggest thing is just to keep going steadily,” DeMartini said. “Like you just kind of want to be as even as it gets while still addressing the issues that need to be addressed.”

DeMartini has maintained an intense level of consistency throughout both his college and professional careers. Across his three seasons with Virginia Tech, he never once had a season OPS below the 1.000 mark. Likewise, coming up through the minors the past two seasons, DeMartini never posted an OPS below .860 ‘til he got to Reading. In fact, the game before he arrived may have been the best of his career.

Facing Bowling Green’s TJ Nichols, owner of a 3.11 ERA over 33 starts in pro ball, DeMartini laced a 1-0 pitch for a home run before adjusting to crush an off-speed pitch for a second homer in the fifth.

“I think the biggest thing when you’re going well like that is that there is really no thought process,” he said. “Obviously, you’ve got your plan that you’re going in there [with]… But the biggest thing is once you step with that box, man, you just got to see the ball and hit.”

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Carson DeMartini and Aidan Miller. Photo Credit: Ben Silver

Future of the Phillies

The baseball pedigree instilled in him by his father, Tommy, is the same pedigree that was once instilled in the aforementioned David Wright. Along with DeMartini’s future high school coach, Rick Zell, Tommy DeMartini ran baseball camps back in the day, attended by all four Wright brothers. And throughout Wright’s professional career, Tommy and Carson DeMartini remained close with the family, watching their friend at National League parks up and down the East Coast.

“[Wright] is as good as it gets when it comes to playing on the biggest stage in baseball, being the number one guy. He’s the captain and always stays even-keeled; you never saw him get flustered. He was never in trouble,” the younger DeMartini said. “I think that’s the biggest thing to take away is that every single day he’s the same guy, whatever happened out there.”

Though always hated by Philadelphians, it’s undeniable that DeMartini had an excellent role model. And if the Reading Fightin’s third baseman can harness some of the talent that the former Mets’ third baseman once possessed, Phillies fans might be thanking New York’s David Wright.

Photo Credit: Ben Silver