CLEARWATER, Fla. — Mike Easler says every great hitter needs a nickname. He already has one picked out for Justin Crawford. “J-Dawg,” Easler said. “D-A-W-G. That’s gonna be his warrior name as he goes into the big leagues. When he hits, he gets down and dirty. Like a junkyard dog.” Crawford is 22 years old and is expected to be the Phillies’ everyday center fielder this season. He’ll be the club’s youngest regular since Jimmy Rollins in 2001. Carl Crawford, his father, was a Gold Glove outfielder and a six-time All-Star during his 15-year big-league career. The name fits. So does the moment. Easler, who hit .293 with over 1,000 hits across 14 seasons, is the man with the plan. A 75-year-old former All-Star living in Boynton Beach, Easler has long been known as “Hitman.”  He has been texting his analysis to Crawford before games and after at-bats since Justin attended Bishop Gorman High School in Las Vegas. “He had the pedigree,” Easler said of the speedy outfielder then. “He just needed things put in place. Like a chiropractor of hitting — I just put things together.” Easler found Crawford the way he’s found most of his best students — through another hitter.  Astros prospect Tyler Whitaker, a fellow Bishop Gorman product with whom Easler had been working since he was nine, brought Crawford to his gym during their junior year of high school. Easler just watched. “When he first came, I never talked to him,” Easler said. “I just observed. I heard about him. I knew Carl Crawford. I knew his career and what a great player he was. I was just curious.” That curiosity turned into something more that summer, when Crawford struggled at a tournament and called the phone number he got from Whitaker. “He said, ‘Mike, I’m struggling. This is my senior year. Would you mind being my hitting coach?” Easler recalled. “And he couldn’t see me, but I jumped through the wall [with excitement].” Crawford drove to Easler’s facility every day after school. Easler doesn’t know if Crawford even had his driver’s license.  He showed up anyway, though. “He worked every single day during the season,” Easler said. He hit .490 in his senior year. All of that hard work paid off when he was drafted in the first round by the Phillies. “I was a happy man when he got that call,” Easler said. “Happy, happy, happy man.” Crawford will tell you that growing up around his father’s success wasn’t always easy. Carl Crawford was one of the most dangerous baserunners of his generation. A standard like that can be hard to chase. “I tried to be like him so much, almost to the point that it hurt me,” Justin said. “As I got older and kind of learned to just be myself and play my game, our games became really similar. That’s the player that I model my game after.” Between his father and Easler, Crawford’s foundation is rooted in a bygone era. “I’m old-fashioned, honestly,” Crawford said. “Old school works. It has for me, knock on wood. I stay away from the metrics. I’m gonna stay with that. Mike is one of the best to do it, and I trust him with my life.” Carl Crawford finished his career with the Dodgers. A young Justin used to wander into the manager’s office there. That manager was Don Mattingly, now Philadelphia’s bench coach, another lefty-swinging “Hitman” and former teammate of Easler’s on the 1986 and 1987 Yankees. “Being around those guys was really cool at that time, especially at that age,” Crawford said. “Don is a legend. Being able to be a sponge and soak up all the information — that’s really good.” “When we were playing, Mattingly was [the Hitman] in the American League,” Easler said. “I was the Hitman in the National League. So Justin’s got the best of two worlds now.” In only a few weeks of working with one another, Mattingly already knows what the Phils’ rookie can bring to the dish. “He’s always hit,” Mattingly said of Crawford. “You don’t miss guys like that. They figure it out.” Kevin Long, the Phillies’ hitting coach, said he also noticed Crawford’s identity right away. “He doesn’t care how he gets hits,” Long said. “He doesn’t care if he hits a 15-hopper. He’s not looking at exit velocity. He’s not looking at his launch angle. He’s looking at, ‘How can I help the Phillies win games?’” “I have not been this confident about a rookie player in quite a while,” Long said. When Crawford asked him who the last one was, Long didn’t hesitate. “Robinson Canó.” That’s high praise for Crawford. Canó had one of the sweetest lefty strokes in baseball history, and the then-22-year-old batted .297 in his rookie campaign.  Crawford’s readiness at 22 is no accident. It’s what happens when Easler has been in your corner since high school. His philosophy sounds simple until you try to execute it: Balance plus extension equals damage. “Staying in my legs, staying to and through the ball, short and quick, with extension,” Crawford said. “That’s what Mike has instilled in me.” It’s an equation he refined working with brand names like Mo Vaughn, Dante Bichette, Jim Edmonds and Matt Kemp across seven seasons as a big-league hitting coach.  Vaughn won the AL MVP the year after they began working together.  In addition to observing Japanese stars during his two-season stint in Nippon Professional Baseball, Easler used to meticulously study Rod Carew’s Sybervision series—a silent film that dissected swing plane in stick figures—frame by frame.  This allowed him to comprehend the body’s intended movements before a hitter could experience them firsthand. With Crawford, the work centers on what Easler calls the “tuck-and-attack” — locking in the back leg so the swing stays connected through contact — and the follow-through. “The follow-through is freedom,” Easler said. “Once I get this follow-through down pat, that man’s gonna be a force to be reckoned with.” The approach was on display once again in 2025. It marked Crawford’s third consecutive professional season with at least a .310 batting average, an .800 OPS and 40 stolen bases. Last year at Triple-A, Crawford hit .334 and went to the opposite field at a 43.3 percent clip. Since MLB began tracking the statistic in 2002, no left-handed hitter has done that in the bigs. “That’s all I told [Crawford],” Easler said. “The only way you’re gonna win batting titles is going the other way. With authority.” His batting average on balls-in-play (BABIP) was above .400 — only two lefties have reached that threshold at the level since 2006. The last left-handed hitter to do so in the Majors was Carew back in 1977, en route to one of his seven batting titles. “I’m going to try to battle, put the ball in play any way I can, to try to cause some havoc,” he said. “Especially with my speed — they get the ball, rush it, throw it. Next thing you know it, I’m on second base. I take a lot of pride in being a tough out.” Crawford would finish as the International League batting champion, but after not earning a September call-up to the Phillies’ crowded outfield, Easler pulled Crawford aside and told him something he needed to hear. “I said, ‘Justin, it’s not time,’” Easler recalled. “‘It’s not about your average… I’m not here to candy-coat anything with you, because I want you to be great, not good.’” That conversation put a chip on Crawford’s shoulder, but he’s set up for success entering 2026. “You’re playing with Trea Turner, Bryce Harper, Kyle Schwarber,” Easler told Crawford. “These guys are set in stone of greatness. You go there, feel what they feel, do what they do. Be yourself. You are gonna make the biggest difference in the world with that ball club.” Mattingly sees it similarly. “The best part of him being here is he’s in a lineup where he can just do his thing,” Mattingly said. “If he can go out and get his hits, play good defense, steal some bags, do what he’s always done — then he’s gonna fit in perfectly.” Away from the field, Crawford enjoys movies like Gladiator and 300. Stories about warriors who battle to the end. That theme rings true to his own goal. “A championship,” Crawford said. “Just trying to go out there, help the team any way I can. The ultimate goal is to win the championship.” Easler doesn’t hide what he thinks is possible. “I want Justin to help lead the Phillies to the 2026 World Series,” he said. “The rest will take care of itself.” The Hitman built the plan. Now J-Dawg has to execute it. ...read more read less