Ethan Salas is, among his many attributes, polished. As polished, perhaps, as any 17-year-old male could be.
The groundedness, the self-assuredness that doesn’t stink of cockiness, comes across as a grown-up without trying to act like one. It all encompasses one of the traits baseball people rave about when speaking of him.
It is, much like his smooth swing and soft hands and easy motions, a skill honed by a young man groomed in a baseball-playing family to be a magnificent catcher and big-time big leaguer.
But for all that polish, he still is a kid in a big-league clubhouse.
As he considered where he was on Monday morning, in front of his locker in the Padres spring training clubhouse, the organization’s top-rated prospect looked to the right and then to the left, nodding slightly in each direction.
“It’s cool,” he said. “I watched these guys play on TV when I was younger. I played with them in video games. It’s pretty cool. It’s pretty cool just getting to know them as people and as teammates.”