Cozens Power On Display For Double-A Reading

By Matt Leon

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- The Phillies minor league system is full of prospects fans should be excited about.

Double-A Reading has several on their roster, including 21-year-old outfielder Dylan Cozens (pronounced like Cousins) who right now is probably swinging the hottest bat in the organization.

Last night in a 3-0 win in Trenton against the Thunder, the 6'6" Cozens hit his 10th home run of the season. That's the top total in the Eastern League and he's hit five of those home runs in his last six games.

"Feeling great right now," Cozens told KYW Newsradio after the game. "I like where my swing's at. I like my approach. I feel like I'm getting my pitch and doing some damage with it."

Listen to the entire interview with Reading outfielder Dylan Cozens

Cozens has already surpassed his home run total from last season (8 in 111 games mostly spent with Single-A Clearwater) and the left-handed hitter is moving closer to his career high of 16 (set at Single-A Lakewood in 2014). He talks about what has led to this power surge.

"Just changing," Cozens says." Changing my approach, my swing, bunch of different stuff. Couldn't tell you how many times I've changed, not only my swing, my approach. You've got to be willing to change if you want to be successful. If you're doing something that's not working or you're not where you want to be, something's got to change. I wasn't really happy with how I played the past three years so I just made tweaks to my swing and workout routine and mental approach and it's starting to pay off finally."

Cozens isn't just hitting for power. He sports a solid .274 average this season and last night he stole his 9th base of the season (in 10 tries). In 33 games here in 2016, he has also drawn 17 walks.

A second-round draft pick of the Phillies back in 2012 out of Chaparral High School in Scottsdale, Arizona, Cozens has moved pretty steadily up the organizational ladder since signing, but really seems to be coming into his own now. He talks about a big lesson that pro ball taught him relatively quickly.

"How to deal with failure and struggling," Cozens says. "Came out of high school and I was one of the better players and you get into pro ball and everybody's the better player where they came from. Did good in the beginning and then I had a bad slump and I was like, 'Man, this is crazy.' I didn't know how to handle it. Took me a while to be able to deal with failure, but that's just part of growing up and trusting the process."

The arrow is definitely pointing up for Cozens and he is gaining more and more attention as he continues to excel. So does he think about what it will be like when the call to the majors does come?

"That's something you can't control so you don't want to try to worry about that too much," Cozens says. "Just try to go out there and keep dominating wherever you play."

Reading continues its series in Trenton tonight.

You can follow Matt on Twitter @mattleonkyw.