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The Yankees are controlling the strike zone well this year, but should they be a little more aggressive?

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(Maddie Meyer/Getty)

Twelve games into the 2018 season, I think we’ve learned four things about the Yankees and their offense. One, Aaron Judge is still a monster. He’s hitting .348/.474/.587 (200 wRC+). Two, Giancarlo Stanton can do things to a baseball very few people on Earth can do. That triple last night was insane. Three, the Yankees probably won’t steal many bases. They’ve stolen six and attempted nine steals in a dozen games.

And four, the Yankees are a disciplined team at the plate. Their offense ranks among the game’s best at drawing walks, not chasing out of the zone, prolonging at-bats, and all those other things that fall under the plate discipline umbrella. Some quick rates and ranks:

  • Walk Rate: 11.2% (5th best in MLB)
  • Pitches per Plate Appearance: 4.06 (8th)
  • Chase Rate: 30.9% (11th)
  • Two-Strike Foul Ball Rate: 23.5% (5th)

Believe it or not, the Yankees have the 11th lowest strikeout rate in baseball so far at 22.0%. For real. Stanton and Judge strike out a lot. That’s who they are as hitters. The rest of the team? They’ve been pretty good at avoiding strike three so far. Controlling the strike zone is a Yankees’ hallmark. The late 1990s teams were great at it before on-base percentage was all the rage.

“I want us to be obsessed with controlling the strike zone,” said Aaron Boone to Erik Boland back in Spring Training. “That’s one of the bumper stickers, if you will. I know (hitting coaches Marcus Thames and P.J. Pilittere) are really driving that message home with our guys. We want to be great at that … We feel like if we do that, with our (power) potential, when you’re controlling the strike zone, that’s a dangerous combination.”

Walk rates and plate discipline go hand in hand, but walks are a byproduct of plate discipline, not the goal. The goal is to get a good pitch to hit. The more pitches you see in an at-bat the more likely you are to get something out over the plate, a damage pitch. Sometimes that damage pitch comes early in the at-bat. When it comes to first pitch fastballs in the zone, the Yankees haven’t done much at all:

  • Swing Rate: 18.3% (18th in MLB)
  • AVG: .250 (28th)
  • ISO: .207 (11th)
  • xwOBA: .331 (25th)

The Yankees are pretty good at working the count and prolonging at-bats, and that’s great! There is also something to be said for being aggressive early in the count though. Call it controlled aggression, combining the ability to work the count and take a walk, and the willingness to jump on a hittable pitch early in the count. So far, the Yankees haven’t had much success on those early count fastballs in the zone.

“We want to be uber-aggressive and lethal in the strike zone,” said Boone to Boland. “Yeah, we’re going to strike out some, but if we’re really controlling the strike zone at a high level, it’s going to end up resulting in a lot of runs for us, just because of what we’re capable of from a power standpoint. But I just want us to, as a mantra, we walk in each day, these guys are just obsessed with controlling it. I want that to be their mindset.”

I love that the Yankees have worked the count and driven up pitch counts so far this season. Pretty much every winning team does that. I also think they could benefit from jumping on those first pitch fastballs a little more often. Throw a wrench in the scouting report, basically. Make pitchers nervous when they try to steal a first pitch strike with a fastball. Make them think twice about it.

Boone talked about controlling the strike zone back in Spring Training and the Yankees have done it so far. They’ve done it very well so far, really. And I suspect that, once Stanton and Gary Sanchez really get locked in, the Yankees will control the zone even better. Ditto whenever Greg Bird returns. The lack of first pitch fastball success is more minor nuisance than fatal flaw. It strikes me as a potential area of improvement, though finding the right balance between discipline and aggression may not be easy.

Gary Sanchez, not Giancarlo Stanton, is the Yankees’ biggest problem on offense right now

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(Elsa/Getty)

Eleven games into the 2018 season, Giancarlo Stanton has yet to be the impact hitter he’s shown he can be throughout his career. Even before his MVP season last year, Stanton was a .266/.357/.539 (142 wRC+) career hitter who averaged 41 homers per 162 games, and that is undeniably great. We haven’t seen that guy yet, however.

The biggest beneficiary of Stanton’s early season slump? Gary Sanchez. Stanton and his strikeouts have been getting all the attention the last week or so, yet Sanchez has been the Yankees’ worst hitter in the early going, and it’s not even close. Two-hundred-and-twenty-eight players have at least 30 plate appearances so far this year. Here’s where Sanchez ranks among those 228:

  • AVG: .056 (228th)
  • OBP: .081 (228th)
  • SLG: .167 (220th)
  • wRC+: -42 (228th)

How go you interpret a negative wRC+? You interpret it as really freaking bad. It’s only eleven games, yes, but in those eleven games Sanchez has legitimately been the worst hitter in baseball. He is 2-for-36 with a homer, a homer that landed a few rows back in left field and elicited this reaction off the bat …

… and that reaction doesn’t exactly scream “hell yeah I got all of that one!” It just happened to clear the wall in the #LittleAssPark. Gary has been really freaking bad in the super early going. Stanton has also been bad, and because he’s the high profile offseason addition, everyone is focusing on him and Sanchez’s total lack of production is seemingly flying under the radar.

“As far as the hitting goes, when you’re that good a hitter and you’re as young as he is or in the prime of your career, that’s a matter of time,” said Aaron Boone to Brendan Kuty recently when asked about Sanchez’s slump. “It just means somebody’s going to pay at some point, so I don’t sweat that at all. That’ll come. What I’m excited about is the impact that he’s having on a daily basis behind the plate.”

Sanchez’s defense has been pretty good in the early going. He was never as bad as the pundits would lead you to believe, but through eleven games, Gary has looked very good defensively. He’s been terrible at the plate though, and the bat is what makes Sanchez special. There are plenty of no bat/good glove catchers out there. Sanchez is supposed to be an elite bat/good glove catcher, and we’ve yet to see it this year. A few things on Gary’s slump.

1. He’s not striking out. Stanton’s slow start has been an eyesore because he’s striking out so much. He’s struck out 22 times in 52 plate appearances, or 42.3%. Sanchez has struck out six times during his 2-for-36 start, which works out to a perfectly acceptable 16.2% strikeout rate. The league average strikeout rate this year is 22.7%. Last year it was 21.6%. If you could guarantee me Sanchez would maintain that 16.2% strikeout rate all season, I’d sign up for it right now no questions asked.

Furthermore, Sanchez’s swing-and-miss rate is 9.2%, down from 12.5% last year and below the 10.7% league average. It’s a small sample size. I know it is. The point is Sanchez’s slump has a different shape than Stanton’s. Giancarlo has had problems simply getting the bat on the ball. Gary has not. This has not been a strikeout fueled slump for Sanchez. This is a “the balls are not falling in” slump. The dude has a .034 BABIP. I mean, come on.

2. He’s not walking either. Sanchez hasn’t struck out excessively so far this season and he hasn’t walked either. Like, at all. Zero walks in 37 plate appearances. Believe it or not, Gary’s 37 plate appearances are only the sixth most among players with zero walks this year. Ozzie Albies has 50 plate appearances without a walk. Marcell Ozuna has 48 and Avisail Garcia has 47. Yikes.

Through 37 plate appearances Sanchez has seen only six three-ball counts, so that’s one three-ball count every six plate appearances, give or take. The league average is one three-ball count every 4.5 plate appearances. Sanchez has averaged 3.84 pitches per plate appearance so far, which is basically identical to last year (3.86), so it’s not like he’s having shorter than usual at-bats. The walks just haven’t come yet. When Aaron Judge went through his slump last July and August, he still walked a ton. Gary’s not walking at all right now.

3. The batted ball data points to more than bad luck. That .034 BABIP is so hilariously low that there’s basically no chance it continues. The law of averages won’t allow it. Pitchers are collectively awful at hitting and they have a .217 BABIP so far this year. A .034 BABIP is baseball randomness at its worst. In years past we’d point out the low BABIP and say don’t worry, it’ll correct at some point. We’re smarter than that though. We can look deeper.

On one hand, Sanchez has hit some rockets for outs so far this year. He’s made seven outs on balls hit 100 mph or harder, second most behind Joey Gallo’s nine. The league average is a .524 BABIP on balls with a 100 mph exit velocity or greater. Sanchez has a .125 BABIP on those such batted balls. Baseball can be so stupid sometimes. Now, on the other hand, here is the early infield pop-up leaderboard:

  1. Albert Pujols: 6
  2. Gary Sanchez: 5
  3. Eddie Rosario: 5
  4. Several tied with 4

Five infield pop-ups doesn’t seem like much, but we’re talking about a 37 plate appearance sample. It’s a sample of 30 balls in play once you remove the six strikeouts and the one hit-by-pitch. One out of every six balls Sanchez has put in play has been an infield pop-up this year, and those pop-ups are BABIP killing easy outs. Last season Gary had one infield pop-up every 25 balls in play. Now he has five in the span of 30 plate appearances.

It’s no surprise then that, even with those seven outs on 100+ mph batted balls, Sanchez has a .229 expected wOBA this season. There is an element of plain ol’ bad luck to Gary’s slump. He has had an inordinate number of well-struck baseballs turn into outs. Overall though, Sanchez is not making quality contact. He’s popping up a lot of pitches and his 26.7% hard contact rate is far below last year’s rate (36.9%) and the league average (32.2%).

* * *

The question now is why. Why is Sanchez making not great contact and not walking? Is it mechanical? Is he playing hurt? Has the league figured him out? I’d be very surprised if it’s the last one. For what it’s worth, Gary chalks it up a timing issue. “I feel like I’m rushing a little and opening my body. I want to correct that and try to stay up the middle and make good swings,” he said to Kuty.

In his relatively brief big league career, every Sanchez slump has looked the same. He gets jumpy at the plate. It almost seems like Gary has made the decision to swing before the pitch is even thrown. That he hasn’t struck out more during this slump is a testament to his hand-eye coordination and overall hitting ability. Once he relaxes a bit and gets back to distinguishing between pitches he can hit and pitches he should let go by, he’ll get on track.

Sanchez has been really bad so far this year. There’s no way around it. Truly the worst hitter in MLB, and that’s not hyperbole. Worst by batting average, worst by on-base percentage, worst by wRC+. I don’t think Gary’s true talent level has changed though. I still think he’s an top tier hitter with the ability to hit for average and power. We haven’t seen that guy yet this year. The sooner Sanchez figures things out at the plate, the better off the Yankees will be, and they need him to figure it out soon.

The suddenly more disciplined Didi Gregorius

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(Jim McIsaac/Getty)

Ten games into the 2018 season, perhaps the one number that stands out the most to me is nine. That’s how many walks Didi Gregorius has drawn so far this season. One of those nine was intentional, but eight unintentional walks in ten games? For Didi? It seems impossible. His eighth unintentional walk came in his 58th game last year.

Didi’s sudden willingness to take a walk does date back to late last year to some degree. He drew seven walks in 13 postseason games — at one point spanning ALDS Games Three and Four, and he walked in five consecutive plate appearances — and he walked seven times in his final 28 regular season games. Gregorius drew 25 walks all season, remember. Now he has 23 walks in his last 51 games.

Obviously, ten games is a tiny and possibly meaningless sample. Gregorius has drawn eight unintentional walks in the first ten games and would anyone be surprised if it takes him until June to draw his next eight unintentional walks? I don’t think so. There is one thing worth noting, however. Didi has seen fewer pitches in the strike zone so far this season than at any other point in his career.

  • 2018 zone rate: 37.4% (40.0% MLB average)
  • 2017 zone rate: 44.4% (previous career low)
  • Career zone rate: 46.8%

My guess is opposing teams are trying to get Gregorius to chase out of the zone because they know he’s a free swinger. Makes sense, right? He’s still chasing out of the zone quite a bit, just not as much as in the past. His 38.5% chase rate is above the 32.0% league average, but is down from 41.8% last year. Fewer pitches in the zone equals more walks. That’s usually how it goes.

And the fewer pitches in the zone thing started late last year, really. Gregorius started seeing fewer and fewer pitches in the zone sometime around August, and it’s continued into the early going this season.

Plate indiscipline and a lack of walks has been the one bugaboo in Didi’s game during his career with the Yankees. He’s grown into power, he hits to all fields, and he’s one hell of a defender. He just hasn’t walked a whole lot. As great as he was last year, he had a .318 OBP, and that isn’t good at all. One-hundred-and-forty-four players qualified for the batting title last season and only eight drew walks at a lower rate than Didi (4.4%)

For whatever reason Gregorius has seen fewer pitches since about last August. I’m sure there are some “Gary Sanchez sucks now and teams are pitching around Didi to get to Sanchez” fire takes out there, but no. This is something that dates back to late last year. And that’s cool! If this were a little ten-game blip, it wouldn’t even be worth writing about. But it started last year and it’s continued this year.

I know this much: Gregorius won’t continue walking at his current 21.4% clip (19.6% if you remove the intentional walk). Not even Joey Votto and Aaron Judge walk that much. The hope is that, as his walk rate does inevitably slow down, Didi can settle in closer to a league average walk rate (about 9%) rather than the 5% or so he’s posted most of his career. Four extra walks per 100 plate appearances may not seem like much, but it does add up.

“We’ve challenged him to be more of a patient hitter,” said Aaron Boone after Gregorius drove in eight runs in the home opener. “But the reality is he’s a free swinger, and we like that about him because he can handle good pitching too.”

Devil’s Advocate: Splitting up the big righty bats with a lefty

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(Presswire)

Ever since December, when the Yankees acquired Giancarlo Stanton, it’s been impossible not to dream about the lineup possibilities. Stanton and Aaron Judge are arguably the two best power hitters in baseball, and Gary Sanchez is no slouch with the stick either. He missed nearly a month with an injury and still socked 33 home runs last season.

Stanton, Judge, and Sanchez all happen to be right-handed hitters, and these days, the general belief seems to be that stacking batters with the same handedness anywhere in the lineup is a bad thing, especially the middle. Stanton, Judge, and Sanchez back-to-back-to-back in whatever order opens up the possibility for a right-handed specialist.

Of course Stanton, Judge, and Sanchez will bat in the middle of the order. But there has been plenty of talk about squeezing a left-handed hitter in somewhere to break up all the righties. Aaron Boone has called it an “ideal situation,” in fact. From George King:

“I think it would be nice (to break up the righties). I am not married to it yet,’’ Boone said. “In an ideal situation I would have a lefty splitting those three. Nothing is for certain and it might be a matchup thing. It could be a team’s bullpen and how we view that matching up in a game. But ideally, I would like to have a lefty in there.’’

Give the Yankees a truth serum and I’m certain they’d tell you they wanted Greg Bird to be the left-handed hitter who broke up the big righty bats, but that’s not possible now. Bird will miss the next 6-8 weeks after having another ankle surgery. Sucks. Boone hit Bird third between Judge and Stanton several times late in the spring. You could tell it was something he was strongly considering for the regular season.

With Bird unavailable, Boone slotted Didi Gregorius into the cleanup spot between Stanton and Sanchez in Monday night’s spring finale, and he went deep. It worked!

As I’ve said several times in recent weeks, I don’t love splitting up the big righty bats with a lefty. Seems unnecessary to me. Stanton, Judge, and Sanchez all crushed righties last season and they are the three best hitters on the team. My ideal lineup has Judge, Stanton, and Sanchez in the 2-3-4 spots. That way Judge and Stanton are guaranteed to bat in the first inning, and if anyone reaches, Sanchez gets to hit too. Perfect. Stack the big bats and let ’em eat.

There are two sides to this argument, however, so for the sake of completeness, I’m going to be my own devil’s advocate and examine the benefits of splitting up those big right-handed bats with a left-hander. Let’s talk this out.

1. Mixing in a contact hitter. Among the 144 hitters with enough plate appearances to qualify for the batting title last season, Judge (4th), Stanton (27th), and Sanchez (34th) ranked among the top 35 hitters in strikeout rate. Or bottom five, I guess would be more accurate. Anyway, Judge and Stanton are always going to have some swing-and-miss in their game because they’re so big, and Sanchez can get jumpy at the plate, leading to strikeouts.

Batting Judge, Stanton, and Sanchez back-to-back-to-back in whatever order creates the opportunity for the opposing team to escape a jam without a ball being put in play, especially with a high strikeout reliever on the mound. Heck, a few weeks ago someone named Drew VerHagen struck out those three guys in a row.

Those three are going to strike out a bunch. That’s just who they are as hitters. With Bird sidelined, Gregorius is the obvious left-handed bat to slot in the middle of the righties, and he’d provide a contact element those three do not possess. Some quick 2017 numbers:

  • Judge: 30.7% strikeouts (67.4% contact)
  • Stanton: 23.6% strikeouts (70.5% contact)
  • Sanchez: 22.9% strikeouts (74.0% contact)
  • Gregorius: 12.3% strikeouts (80.5% contact)

All contact is not created equal — Gregorius has the lowest hard contact rate of the four by nearly 14 (!) percentage points — but sometimes all you’re looking for is a ball in play, and Didi is a much better bet to provide one than the three big righty bats. It’s not necessarily about breaking up the righties. It’s about breaking up the strikeout prone bats.

2. Giving the pitcher a different look. I’m not sure there’s a way to quantify this and it might be total nonsense anyway, but when you stack hitters of the same handedness in the lineup, you run the risk of the pitcher getting into a groove with a specific set of pitches and/or pitch sequences. The starter could get locked in with, say, fastballs in and sliders away, even if only for a few batters. Better execution through reputation.

Whenever Judge, Stanton, and Sanchez hit back-to-back-to-back, a righty is going to attack them with fastballs on the inner half and breaking balls away. That’s the way to go after them. If it’s a southpaw, we’re probably talking fastballs and changeups down and away. Make sure they either can’t extend their arms, or have to really extend their arms to get to a pitch. If you miss, miss well outside the zone. These dudes will make you pay dearly otherwise.

Squeezing a lefty (Gregorius) somewhere within the three big righties would, in theory, help prevent the pitcher from getting into such a groove. He can’t go fastball in/slider away for three straight batters, not unless he intends to pitch a lefty the same way, and hey, maybe he does. Like I said, this might not be total nonsense, but I feel like I’ve seen games in which a pitcher faced several batters of the same handedness in a row, and settled in quickly.

(Presswire)

3. Opposing managers will do something stupid. Stupid is too harsh. But inevitably moves will be made to match up that are overly cute, and they’ll backfire. Happens all the time. All the time. Perhaps that means bringing in a left-on-left matchup guy to retire Gregorius, and leaving him in to face Stanton. Or staying with a left-handed starter to face Judge and Stanton because you want him to face Gregorius. Things like that.

Point is, when you bat hitters of the same handedness back-to-back-to-back in the lineup, it makes life easy for the opposing manager. In this case, with hitters like Judge and Stanton and Sanchez, you bring in your best righty reliever and hope for the best. Insert a left-handed hitter into the mix — it has to be a quality lefty, obviously, not any old lefty will do the trick — and you create the opportunity for the opposing manager to overthink things (i.e. bring in a inferior pitcher), which could potentially lead to mistakes or poor decisions. Some managers won’t fall for it. More than you’d think will.

* * *

Based on last season, the platoon splits don’t help the argument to break up the big righties with a lefty. Judge, Stanton, and Sanchez all hit lefties and righties better than Gregorius last year. Look:

  • Judge: 179 wRC+ vs. RHP and 149 wRC+ vs. LHP
  • Stanton: 144 wRC+ vs. RHP and 202 wRC+ vs. LHP
  • Sanchez: 130 wRC+ vs. RHP and 131 wRC+ vs. LHP
  • Gregorius: 120 wRC+ vs. RHP and 72 wRC+ vs. LHP

That’s why I am against splitting them. Judge, Stanton, and Sanchez are great hitters regardless of who is on the mound, so don’t overthink things, and just let them hit. After all, if you were an opposing pitcher, wouldn’t you rather see Judge-Gregorius-Stanton or Judge-Stanton-Gregorius coming up rather than Judge-Stanton-Sanchez? Of course you would.

There is a case to be made for breaking up those big right-handed bats with a lefty, however. Adding a contact bat to the mix and inviting the opposing manager a reason to make a potentially unnecessary pitching change are chief among them. How much impact will that have in a single game or across the entire 162-game season? Eh, hard to say. The overall impact of the lineup tends to be overstated unless we’re talking about something like Judge batting eighth instead of second. As long as the big righties are near the middle of the lineup, the Yankees will be fine.

There’s more to Greg Bird’s slow spring than the usual noise, but he thinks he’s found a fix

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(Presswire)

Spring Training is, without question, the worst time of year to evaluate players. Basically no one is in midseason form, rarely do we know what a player is working on on a given day, and the quality of competition varies wildly. Not just day-to-day either. Inning-to-inning. A hitter could face a Cy Young candidate one at-bat and a Single-A kid the next.

Because of that, I never did think much about Greg Bird’s slow Grapefruit League season. He’s hitting .171/.292/.268 in 48 plate appearances at the moment — it was .158/.289/.184 prior to that long home run yesterday — which is objectively terrible, but it is Spring Training, so who cares? With Bird, I’ve been more worried about health than performance. I don’t think that’s crazy.

As it turns out, Bird’s rough Spring Training is more than the usual spring small sample size noise. He’s healthy! That’s the important thing. Apparently Bird has also been dealing with a mechanical issue, a mechanical issue he believes he and hitting coach Marcus Thames have fixed, or will fix soon. From George King following yesterday’s game:

“My timing has been off. When my timing is right, I get the ball in the air more and my contact point is better,’’ said Bird, who also lofted a fly to deep center. “I feel it can click at any time when you have a couple of good at-bats.”

…

“The homer today, but he hit a ball to center field and a couple of balls well [Saturday],’’ Boone said of Bird. “Him and [hitting coach] Marcus [Thames] identified something in his swing that they are really honing in on, a minor adjustment that will allow him to take off. It was good to see him impact the ball today. That ball was covered.’’

I guess that explains why Bird has been swinging through more than a few low-90s heaters these last few weeks. I guess I never really considered the possibility Bird could be healthy and bad. I’ve just always assumed that, as long as he’s healthy, Bird will rake. That’s not the case. He’s human and he’ll go through slumps like everyone else, and right now he’s fighting a mechanical issue.

Bird socked that long home run yesterday — in the interest of full disclosure, it came on a hanging Caleb Smith breaking ball — and in his previous game he jumped on a middle-middle heater for a double into the right field corner, so hopefully that’s a sign he’s starting to snap out of it. He’s hitting the ball hard and crushing the pitches he’s supposed to crush. A few too hittable pitches got by him the first two or three weeks of the Grapefruit League.

The important thing is that Bird (and Thames) have identified some sort of flaw and are working to correct it. That’s step one. Identifying the problem. Once you do that, you can develop a solution and implement it. And who knows, maybe this is all lip service and one of those adjustments players and coaches talk about that leads nowhere. Wouldn’t be the first time. My eyes tell me Bird has looked a bit better lately, but what do I know?

Bird and Aaron Boone say Bird’s slow spring is not just Spring Training randomness. There’s an issue with his timing. There are ten days to go before Opening Day — the Yankees play their final exhibition game one week from today — so Bird still has time to get himself on track. He’s a good enough and smart enough hitter to figure things out, and as long as he’s healthy — that more than anything is the question with Bird — I expect him to hit.

Brett Gardner and the future of the leadoff spot

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Hicksy, Gardy, Ellsburyey. (Presswire)

For much of the last five seasons Brett Gardner has occupied the leadoff spot for the Yankees, and he’s been one of the more productive leadoff hitters in the game. Gardner started 513 of 810 possible games at the leadoff spot from 2013-17 — Jacoby Ellsbury started most of the other 297 games at leadoff — and during that time the Yankees are top ten in OBP and wRC+ from the leadoff spot.

Aaron Boone recently said he’s kicked around the idea of batting Aaron Judge leadoff — “I’ve thought of it. I wouldn’t necessarily say it’s likely. But something like that I would view as possible,” he said to Brendan Kuty — though it would surprise me if anyone other than Gardner batted leadoff this season. At least at the start of the season. Maybe at some point he has to be bumped down due to a lack of performance. For now, I think it’s safe to say Gardner’s the guy.

How much longer will Gardner be the leadoff hitter? It’s tough to say, though I don’t think it’ll be that much longer. He’ll turn 35 in August and 2018 is the final guaranteed year on his contract. The Yankees could pick up his $12.5M option for 2019 — Brian Cashman told Kevin Kernan they’ve yet to discuss Gardner’s future, which makes seeing how there’s an entire season to be played before a decision has to be made — but even then Gardner might not bat leadoff next year. His performance may no longer warrant it.

At some point in the not-too-distant future the Yankees will have to find a new leadoff hitter. Maybe this year, maybe next year, maybe two years from now. It’ll happen at some point reasonably soon. And looking at the current roster and the farm system, there’s not an obvious long-term leadoff hitter in the organization. Three names immediately jump to mind as leadoff candidates:

Jacoby Ellsbury
Aaron Hicks
Gleyber Torres

Ellsbury has not been good the last few years and it’s difficult to expect him to get better as he enters his mid-30s, so even though he’s under contract another three years, I’d bet against him being the next leadoff guy. Hicks has the OBP skills to hit leadoff, though he’s yet to have a full productive season, and even then he’s only under control through 2019. He might not be around any longer than Gardner.

Gleyber is an interesting case because he has the bat-to-ball skills and the OBP ability to hit leadoff, and there are some questions about his long-term power, and the best spot for high on-base/low power guy is leadoff. The Yankees have Judge and Gary Sanchez and Giancarlo Stanton to hit in the middle of the order for the foreseeable future, so it’ll be tough for Torres to slot into the lineup as the No. 3 or No. 4 hitter. Leadoff may be the best spot for him.

Didi Gregorius doesn’t get on base enough to bat leadoff. Love the guy, but no. Estevan Florial is too far away to start planning his future lineup spot. Miguel Andujar or Brandon Drury probably won’t have the OBP skills for leadoff and Thairo Estrada might not hit enough in general to warrant getting more at-bats than literally everyone else in the lineup. Tyler Wade? He might be the best long-term leadoff candidate in the organization. Wade can run and he has a history of getting on base, and the skills to continue getting on base. He’s almost like the infield version of Gardner.

There is a case to be made for batting Judge leadoff, a case built around his great on-base ability and the fact he sees tons of pitches. If he were even a 30-homer guy instead of a 50-homer guy, it would make more sense to me. George Springer, Brian Dozier, and Charlie Blackmon all socked 30+ dingers as leadoff guys last year. But 50? I think Judge has way too much power to stick him at leadoff, where roughly one-fifth of his at-bats would come with the bases empty. Bat him second and his OBP is still high in the lineup, but there will be more men on base to take advantage of his power.

Signing a free agent or making a trade for a post-Gardner leadoff hitter is certainly possible, and it may come to that. Hicks might not stick around long-term, Wade might not hit enough to deserve a premium lineup spot, and Gleyber might be too good to hit anywhere other than the middle of the order. Right now, in March 2018, I’d rank the future leadoff hitters candidates like so:

  1. Gleyber Torres
  2. Trade pickup
  3. Tyler Wade
  4. Free agent signing
  5. Aaron Hicks
  6. Jacoby Ellsbury

Gleyber at the top because I think he has the best chance of being great and being a Yankee long-term. Hicks near the bottom because he’s two years from free agency and simply might not be around much longer. The Yankees — or pretty much any team, for that matter — are seemingly no longer interested in adding payroll, which is why I think a trade is more likely than a free agent signing. The Yankees will probably prioritize paying Judge and Sanchez (and Luis Severino) before spending money on someone else’s players.

For now, the Yankees have a leadoff hitter in Gardner and a pretty good backup leadoff hitter in Hicks, plus there’s always Ellsbury, who could fill in if necessary. Gleyber and Wade are knocking on the door and could seize the job long-term, so figuring out the next leadoff hitter is more of a thought exercise than a problem in need of a solution. These things tend to sort themselves out. Lots can and will change between now and the time the Yankees need to replace Gardner as the leadoff hitter, which could be as far as two years away.

Brandon Drury and the Fly Ball Revolution

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(Presswire)

A record number of home runs were hit last season, and you needn’t be a hardcore fan to know what launch angle is these days. Players talk about it, broadcasters talk about it, and dumb bloggists like me talk about it. More home runs are being hit now than ever before, partly because hitters are increasing their launch angle. They’re trying to get the ball in the air and, by and large, it’s working.

Last week the Yankees acquired Brandon Drury from the Diamondbacks in a three-team trade, and in his first days with the team, he talked about wanting to improve his launch angle. Drury hit a solid .275/.323/.453 (97 wRC+) with 29 homers in 979 plate appearances the last two seasons. He also slugged 68 (!) doubles. Drury wants to turn some of those doubles into homers going forward.

“I would always really swing steep and downhill. I’d hit a single up the middle or a double in the right-center gap, which was great, but that’s not what I want,” said Drury to Ronald Blum. “The homers, you can’t force them. But I feel like naturally they’re going to come more since I’ve put so much work into getting the ball in the air more. If I could take — easy to say — 10-15 of those doubles and turn them into homers, power numbers are going to be decent.”

Drury said he worked with hitting guru Robert Van Scoyoc during the offseason, the same instructor who helped turn J.D. Martinez into a top power hitter and Chris Taylor into one of the game’s breakout stars. (Martinez referred Drury to Van Scoyoc when the two were teammates in Arizona last year.) Brian Cashman spoke about Drury’s untapped power potential last week, and Marc Carig spoke to scouts who feel the same way.

Simply put, launch angle is the angle the ball leaves the bat relative to the ground. The ideal launch angle is somewhere in the 10° to 30° range, though exit velocity is important too. The last two seasons Drury had an 8.2° average launch angle, below the 10.9° league average and well south of the ideal range. Drury’s launch angle the last two years was similar to Brett Gardner’s (7.7°) and Billy Hamilton’s (7.9°), two speed guys.

As a result of the lack of launch angle, Drury had a 49.5% ground ball rate the last two seasons, 20th highest in baseball among the 155 hitters with at least 900 plate appearances. Again, that’s similar to speed guys like Eduardo Nunez (51.4%) and Denard Span (49.1%). That Drury managed 68 doubles, 29 homers, and a .178 ISO the last two years despite that ground ball rate is pretty impressive. I mean:

Not many players with a better than league average ISO once you get above a 48% ground ball rate or so. Drury is one of the few. In fact, among the 19 players with a higher ground ball rate than Drury the last two seasons, the only one with a higher ISO is Ryan Braun. Braun managed a .227 ISO despite a 52.9% ground ball rate. Point is, players who hit as many grounders as Drury usually don’t show even league average power.

Hitting the ball in the air is much easier said than done, of course. Drury listed two reasons to believe he’ll be able to do it. One, he adjusted his swing path. I mean, duh. That’s why he went to Van Scoyoc. “It’s a simple move I’m making that’s getting the ball in the air more. Actually, my (swing) path is more level up through it than down,” explained Drury to Brendan Kuty. He added a bit of an uppercut, basically. Here’s more from Billy Witz:

The changes have resulted in Drury’s getting the bat head into the hitting zone early and carrying it through longer so that he has greater margin for error, and also changing the plane of his swing, so it has an upward tilt, which he hopes will result in more fly balls that carry over the fence.

And two, Drury has a better understanding of how to attack certain pitches, specifically in hitter’s counts. He explained that when he got count leverage, such as a 2-0 count or 3-1 count, he’d load up and take a bigger than usual hack. Some players can get away with that — Raul Ibanez sold out for power in those counts more than anyone I can remember — but it didn’t work for Drury.

“I’ll take a line drive up the middle all day. But when I’m getting a 3-1 fastball or looking for a certain pitch, I don’t want that to be what I’m settling for. I want to drive the ball and be able to hit some home runs,” said Drury to Witz. “I didn’t understand how to hit certain pitches that I was trying to get. I was just trying to get big with my swing, and that doesn’t work. It’s got to be your natural swing.”

For all intents and purposes, Drury’s ability to make hard contact is league average. Over the last two seasons his 32.3% hard contact rate, 88.4 mph average exit velocity, and 93.2 mph average exit velocity on fly balls and line drives are a tick better than the MLB averages (31.6%, 87.2 mph, 92.2 mph). League average is okay! There’s nothing sexy about it, but it’s not like Dee Gordon is trying to turn himself into a power hitter here. Drury has some thump.

Combining that league average hard contact ability with an increase in fly balls will inevitably lead to more homers. Yankee Stadium is more homer friendly than Chase Field, at least according to the park factors at FanGraphs, and going from intra-division road games at Petco Park, AT&T Park, and Dodger Stadium to Fenway Park, Camden Yards, and Rogers Centre will be quite the change.

Drury is moving into a more homer friendly environment, so he has that going for him. Ultimately, it’s up to him to use that adjusted swing to hit more fly balls in games. Maybe it works, maybe it doesn’t. If it does work, great! If it doesn’t work, hopefully he doesn’t become a pop-up machine, because pop-ups are easy outs. Drury is young and he has some natural pop. That he knows he needs more fly balls is the first step in becoming a better player. Actually hitting those fly balls is the hard part.

“I don’t feel like I’ve done anything like I’m capable of the last couple of years,” said Drury to Kuty. “Both (years) have been kind of a grind. The numbers are okay, I would say. But I don’t think those past two seasons are half of the player I am. I truly don’t believe it. But I’ve got to go out and do it.”