Climbing Out of the Deep End: Five Hitters Who Have Turned Their Seasons Around

At any given point in the season, it’s not too hard to figure out which hitters are performing the best and which the worst — various leaderboards do a good job of that. But particularly when it’s early in the season and the samples are on the smaller side, it’s easy to miss when a slow-starting player has gotten it going, as his overall numbers may not be as eye-catching.

That isn’t exactly a new epiphany, but it’s one I was reminded of when writing about Oneil Cruz on Wednesday, and, to a lesser extent, when tracking Aaron Judge in the weeks before I finally wrote about his hot streak (which, remarkably, has continued). What may look like a stat line of fairly typical production can conceal some interesting developments or adjustments. Or maybe it’s just some positive regression.

With that in mind, I decided to take a look at players, such as Cruz, who started the season slowly but have come around more recently. I’ve used May 1 as the dividing line for creating my list, because the flipping of the calendar page is an obvious reference point, and in this case it’s still pretty close to the midpoint of the season to date; when I wrote about Cruz, for example, the Pirates had played 31 games before May 1 and 35 since.

To be eligible for this, players must have made at least 80 plate appearances on either side of May 1, and they must have an overall wRC+ of 100 or better; while I’m interested in the progress of extremely slow-starting players such as Randy Arozarena or Gavin Lux, their overall numbers still look pretty grim, and so they are stories for another day. (I did cover Arozarena’s rough April here.) Here’s a list of the top 15 wRC+ improvements over the more recent segment of the season, which now amounts to six weeks. I’ve written about a few of them already — Vladimir Guerrero Jr. is another one, here, though not in the context of in-season splits — so in the interest of length, I’ve chosen five of these players who particularly stand out to me; they’re highlighted in yellow below. All statistics are through June 11.

Corey Seager, Rangers

After winning the World Series MVP award for the second time last fall, Seager and the Rangers hoped that a sports hernia that had been an issue during the postseason would heal sufficiently, but once he began working out in preparation for spring training, the discomfort lingered. He underwent surgery in late January, and missed almost all of spring training. It wouldn’t have been a surprise if he’d opened the season as the Rangers’ designated hitter, but despite playing just three Cactus League games, he was in the Opening Day lineup at shortstop, and went 4-for-5 in the season’s second game. He had good numbers through the first two weeks before falling into an 11-for-76 slump that included just one double and one home run, and that carried into early May.

Through April, Seager was hitting just .236/.319/.311 with two homers, but some of that may have been just bad luck; while his 88.9 mph average exit velocity, 9.3% barrel rate, and 38.4% hard-hit rate were all low by his standards, he was pulling the ball with his usual frequency, and had a .457 xSLG. Lately, he’s been swinging harder (21% fast swing rate, compared to 14.3% before May), and his blast rate — his rate of squared-up balls on fast swings — has more than doubled, from 9.2% to 20.5%. His batted ball stats since the start of May are exceptional (93.5 mph average exit velo, 22.2% barrel rate, 58.9% hard-hit rate), producing a .304/.397/.625 line. Still, his overall slugging percentage lags 89 points behind his .561 xSLG, leaving open the possibility of more positive regression ahead.

Nolan Gorman, Cardinals

After enjoying a nice little breakout last year — 27 homers and a 118 wRC+ in his age-23 season — Gorman was among the many Cardinals position players who struggled early, with Paul Goldschmidt, Lars Nootbaar, and the since-demoted Jordan Walker among the most prominent. Gorman hit just .196/.261/.363 through the end of April, chasing 34% of pitches outside the zone, striking out 34.2% of the time, and averaging just 85.5 mph when he made contact.

Following up on his father’s advice about honing his mental game, Gorman sought a mental skills coach in early May. He also worked with hitting coaches to recalibrate his swing. The work has paid off, in that he’s hitting .250/.350/.596 with 11 homers since May 1. Though he’s struck out a third of the time in that span, he’s cut his chase rate to 25.9%; now at least he’s swinging at strikes. His quality of contact has improved, with his average exit velocity up to 89.7 mph, and his barrel rate up from 12.5% to 21.9%.

José Ramírez, Guardians

Being a switch-hitter means having two swings to maintain, as if doing so for one isn’t difficult enough. Ramírez is beating a trail toward Cooperstown by hitting well against pitchers of either hand, producing a 122 wRC+ against lefties for his career and 132 against righties. But while he was productive against lefties this March and April (.294/.342/.529, 133 wRC+ in 38 PA), the same wasn’t true against righties (.235/.261/.400, 88 wRC+ in 88 PA). Lately, it’s been a different story, as Ramírez has been one of the majors’ most unstoppable hitters since the start of May, with a wRC+ that trails only those of Judge, Juan Soto, Bryce Harper, and Seager. In that span, Ramírez has hit .354/.426/.625 (200 wRC+) over 54 PA against lefties, and .258/.346/.634 (170 wRC+) across 107 PA against righties. His hot streak helped the Guardians go 16-7 in the absence of Steven Kwan, who himself had been red-hot to start the season before straining a hamstring.

This is one where I can’t exactly put my finger on the “why.” Ramírez has never been a player to light up Statcast in the first place. He doesn’t rank any higher than the 62nd percentile in any of the contact-related categories besides whiff rate and strikeout rate. His average exit velos, barrel rate, and hard-hit rate have increased slightly from both sides of the plate since the start of May, but not so much that one can point to them as driving his uptick in production, and with regards to the new bat-tracking metrics, his fast-swing rate, squared-up rate, and blast rate have all gone down since the start of May. What does stand out is that with the exception of his March/April stats against righties, he’s produced well ahead of his expected numbers:

Often, players outdo their expected numbers because of high pull rates, but Ramírez is actually pulling the ball less often versus righties lately (48.8% since May 1, compared to 51.3% prior) while suddenly doing so way more often against lefties (65.1% since May vs. 37.9% prior) — though he has just three pulled fly balls against the latter — total! In fact, while his launch angle has improved against righties, it’s down against lefties. To these eyes, it’s all a reminder that when dissecting performance by month and by handedness, one winds up trying to discern meaning from some pretty small samples that may not line up in ways that offer clarity. Best to just sit back and enjoy the ride.

Matt Chapman, Giants

Chapman and agent Scott Boras spent the winter expecting to land a nine-figure deal via free agency, but the third baseman’s market was less than robust, with poor situational hitting and a lousy finish possibly contributing to the perception that he was overreaching. In early March, he settled for a three-year, $54 million deal with a pair of opt-outs and a mutual option for a fourth season. The late signing meant an abbreviated spring training, so it wasn’t terribly surprising when he hit just .222/.266/.385 through the end of April. His 29% chase rate and 48.3% swing rate — respectively about nine points and five points above last year’s marks — suggested he was pressing; he walked in just 4.8% of his plate appearances.

What wasn’t clear unless one looked more closely was that Chapman was still hitting the ball hard, producing a 92.4 mph average exit velocity, 10.5% barrel rate, and 46.5% hard-hit rate; he was 39 points short of his xSLG. The bat tracking data — which places him among the game’s fastest swingers — arrived just in time to offer him some reassurance that he needed only to continue making minor adjustments instead of overhauling his mechanics or cheating on the fastball. Since then, he’s cut his chase rate to 23.5% and boosted his walk rate to 12.3%. He’s making better contact, pulling the ball more frequently and hitting .248/.351/.414 — though now he’s 76 points short of his xSLG. Some positive regression may be in store, though it’s worth remembering that Oracle Park tends to suppress right-handed power.

Yandy Díaz, Rays

After years of high exit velocities offset somewhat by high groundball rates, Díaz won the AL batting title, set a career high in homers, and made his first All-Star team last year. An increased barrel rate — particularly on balls in the upper third of the strike zone — was a big factor in his breakout; he increased his overall barrel rate from 4.8% to 9.6% and his rate in the upper third from 10.7% to 16%. Though he was still making good contact in March and April of this season, with an average exit velocity of 91.1 mph and a hard-hit rate of 50.5%, he didn’t barrel a single ball from that part of the zone, and was down to 2.1% overall. Meanwhile, his groundball rate soared to 60.8%, and his pull rate dropped to 19.6%; he produced a .193 wOBA on grounders during that span, compared to .302 for all of last year. He hit just .220/.290/.288 through April 30.

Since the calendar flipped to May, Díaz has still struggled to do damage with pitches in the upper third, but he’s trimmed his groundball rate to 53.4%, and raised his pull rate to 27.4%. His average exit velocity has increased to 93.5 mph, and his barrel rate to 7.6%, leading to a more productive line (.286/.354/.408). It’s nowhere near as impressive as last season, but he’s at least pointed in the right direction.