Analyzing the Slump (Hitters)

[JohnBriggs12]

1. Carlos Gomez: I didn't see any change in Gomez before he got hurt. He's the same guy and still should be once he returns. So there's hope there. Of all the Brewer hitters, he is least prone to press

 

2. Jonathan Lucroy: Without a doubt the most surprising struggler. Seems like he took last year's collapse hard and was pressing from the get go. Is taking stuff down the middle and swinging at stuff way out of the zone. He's got a lot on his shoulders. I think dropping him in the order might take some pressure off him.

 

3. Ryan Braun: We're 12 games in and he has zero extra base hits. Amazing. He's hit some balls hard but they are all to the opposite field. Personally, I think he changed his approach to compensate for his thumb and now that the thumbs not an issue he can't find his old stroke. Maybe it's time he finally goes to a smaller, lighter bat.

 

4. Adam Lind: They are getting about what they expected from Lind. But it's not enough to carry a team.

 

5. Aramis Ramirez: I had low expectations to begin with but he can't even reach those. Can still make contact and should get some hits with better luck but bat speed and ability to drive the ball are in his past. Maybe he should consider moving up his retirement date by a few months.

 

6. Khris Davis: On the positive side, he seems to be a more patient hitter and has made consistent contact to the opposite field. But is he sacrificing his long ball threat some by increased focus on going the other way? See Ryan Braun.

 

7. Scooter Gennett: Talk about a manager sending mixed signals to a player?? Wow. All offseason, they proclaim confidence in Gennett's ability vs. both RH and LH pitching, then for the most part he's relegated to unfamiliar and taxing 8th spot in the order after hitting at the top of the order most of last year and with the rest of the lineup so inept, the plan to let him play vs. LH pitching gets tossed out the window. No wonder Scooter too is pressing.

 

8. Jean Segura: Not the same guy as we saw last year. Looks a lot more relaxed at the plate and he isn't carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders. Too bad it's not carrying over to his teammates. Fielding problems not affecting hitting. Yet.

 

Subs:

 

Too little sample size to make sweeping statements. Hector Gomez made things a little interesting by getting 3 doubles early on. Maldonado and Schafer still 0 for April. Parra's defense great, but not looking like a $6.24 million player at the plate. We need to see more of both Jimenez and Rogers as neither can be worse than Aram at this point.

[Baldkin]

They have the highest O-swing % in baseball.

 

That means: They swing at a higher percentage of pitches outside of the zone than any other team in baseball.

 

Fangraphs O%

 

They are 29th in BB%.

 

Fangraphs BB%

 

The hitting approach on this team is absolutely horrible.

[stoutdude04]

This team always seems like they swing and balls and take pitches that are right down the middle.

[reillymcshane]

 

7. Scooter Gennett: Talk about a manager sending mixed signals to a player?? Wow. All offseason, they proclaim confidence in Gennett's ability vs. both RH and LH pitching, then for the most part he's relegated to unfamiliar and taxing 8th spot in the order after hitting at the top of the order most of last year and with the rest of the lineup so inept, the plan to let him play vs. LH pitching gets tossed out the window. No wonder Scooter too is pressing.

12 strikeouts in 29 ABs. When I've seen him, he's looked lost. He's guessing, swinging at bad pitches, etc. Like you said, he's pressing (like a lot of guys on this team).

 

My biggest fear is that Scooter isn't adjusting to how he is pitched. His slugging has steadily declined since he broke out in 2013. Last year after the all-star break, he had a .621 OPS. Yes, he had some injury issues, so you can attribute the decline to that. Plus hitting 8th - no one likes hitting in the eight spot. But the guy just doesn't walk much, and pitchers may simply have learned that he chases bad pitches. He can rake when the pitcher throws one over the plate, but pitchers probably just know not to give him stuff to hit. His aggressive style means more and more weak grounders as opposed to line drives.

 

I look at Khris Davis and see a guy adjusting. He specifically said he needed to get back to his game - which meant a lot more patience. In the minors he usually had walk rates from 11-13%. Last year is was less than 6%. I think I remember he had 1 walk in his first 100 ABs. He's up to 9% (granted, small sample size) this year. I think that will pay off for him in the long run (as long as he stays with it). The HRs will come.

 

Perhaps my fears about Scooter are more based on my preference for guys who take their walks and show a good eye at the plate. I'm a believer that if you don't swing at crap, the pitcher is eventually going to have to throw you more pitches in the strike zone (which are easier to hit and often are hit with more authority). You throw crap, and you swing at it, pitchers are just going to keep doing that. Why would they give you a good pitch to hit? Instead you strikeout or don't make solid contact.

 

Some players are bad ball hitters. They have the athleticism and stature to drive crappy pitches - a guy like Scooter doesn't necessarily have those attributes.

 

Personally, I don't expect Scooter to have an .800 OPS. But it doesn't mean he'll be bad. He's in a funk now, but guys usually rebound from bad spells. I'm not sold on his ability to hit lefties, but for now, I'd just like to see him start hitting righties like he has in the past.

[jerichoholicninja]

They have the highest O-swing % in baseball.

 

That means: They swing at a higher percentage of pitches outside of the zone than any other team in baseball.

 

Fangraphs O%

 

They are 29th in BB%.

 

Fangraphs BB%

 

The hitting approach on this team is absolutely horrible.

 

You don't hit a homerun on any pitch you don't swing at. That seems to be the organization's hitting philosophy the last few years.

[Thurston Fluff]

5. Aramis Ramirez: I had low expectations to begin with but he can't even reach those. Can still make contact and should get some hits with better luck but bat speed and ability to drive the ball are in his past. Maybe he should consider moving up his retirement date by a few months.

 

Give him some time before writing him off. He tends to start slow most seasons. Age is a easy excuse and it might be contributing somewhat to his lack of power but his inability to hit at all is premature. Especially considering his history of slow starts.

 

7. Scooter Gennett: Talk about a manager sending mixed signals to a player?? Wow. All offseason, they proclaim confidence in Gennett's ability vs. both RH and LH pitching, then for the most part he's relegated to unfamiliar and taxing 8th spot in the order after hitting at the top of the order most of last year and with the rest of the lineup so inept, the plan to let him play vs. LH pitching gets tossed out the window. No wonder Scooter too is pressing.

 

Since when has hitting in the 8th spot been more taxing than hitting at the top of the order? His struggles have nothing to do with where he is hitting, his familiarity with that spot in the order, nor the mixed messages he is supposedly getting. He just isn't hitting a lick right now. His major problem seems to be not taking pitches out of the zone. I don''t know if that can be attributed to pressing but if it is the reason he is pressing it most likely has to do with why all of them seem to be at the moment. They want to do too much because they know how badly they are struggling as a group.

 

Other than those two I think you have some pretty good points.

[FVBrewerFan]

They have the highest O-swing % in baseball.

 

That means: They swing at a higher percentage of pitches outside of the zone than any other team in baseball.

 

Fangraphs O%

 

They are 29th in BB%.

 

Fangraphs BB%

 

The hitting approach on this team is absolutely horrible.

 

Simple as this. Nothing more really needs to be said, but I will anyhow. What's more, every opposing team knows this.

 

Another problem that lies at the feet of RR. Not only does this not bother him, he encourages it. That may have worked when you had Fielder, Braun, Weeks, Hart, etc. in their prime. But now power is down across MLB, and even moreso with the Brewers current line-up.

[MrTPlush]

7. Scooter Gennett: Talk about a manager sending mixed signals to a player?? Wow. All offseason, they proclaim confidence in Gennett's ability vs. both RH and LH pitching, then for the most part he's relegated to unfamiliar and taxing 8th spot in the order after hitting at the top of the order most of last year and with the rest of the lineup so inept, the plan to let him play vs. LH pitching gets tossed out the window. No wonder Scooter too is pressing.

 

Yah when he made that claim that he was going to hit against lefties Roenicke figured he would be doing well against RHPs.

 

If he is hitting .140 off RHPs I don't think he could even foul one off facing a LHP.

[reillymcshane]

I'll just go back to my old theory: you swing at crap, you get thrown crap. That means you miss or hit the ball weakly. No pitcher has any incentive to throw us good pitches if we swing at the bad ones.

[pacopete4]

3. Ryan Braun: We're 12 games in and he has zero extra base hits. Amazing. He's hit some balls hard but they are all to the opposite field. Personally, I think he changed his approach to compensate for his thumb and now that the thumbs not an issue he can't find his old stroke. Maybe it's time he finally goes to a smaller, lighter bat.

 

 

I said this even last season. Why is his still using such a big piece of lumber? Even shortening it an inch and moving a tad closer to the plate will give him better bat control and most likely will help him get the bat through the zone quicker. Man, I miss the days where pitchers would try to pitch him in to jam him and he'd put one in the second deck in LF. He really needs to not be so proud, or whatever it is, and adjust if he wants to be the player he should be.

[JohnBriggs12]

Not saying the 8th spot is harder than the top of the order, but it's different. You don't get pitches to hit with men on base and two out. You just don't. At the top of the order, normally a pitcher is walk averse and will throw you more fastballs.

 

Ramirez's has a history of slow starts, but my gosh he's gone well over 200 AB's going back to last year with a mere 2 HR and never has he talked about it being his last year when he's in one of his slow starts. His power outage is into it's 3rd month. That's not a slump, it's a trend that for an older player is often irreversible. I think it's pretty telling when a guy is talking about retiring. It tells me he knows or at least doubts he can't do it anymore.

[danzig6767]

Braun is by far the most scary development so far.

 

Lucroy will eventually hit. I think so will Davis and Scooter, at least against righthanders. Ramirez is just old and likely done, but at least he's retiring after the season.

 

Braun though is still owed a lot of cash through 2021. The days of him being a .900 plus OPS hitter are very likely done, but if him being even just a .800ish OPS hitter doesn't happen either, that will be lots of dead money over the rest of this decade.

[trwi7]

His major problem seems to be not taking pitches out of the zone.

 

Looks like pitchers are throwing him a ton of breaking crap down at his shoe tops and he can't touch it. He's never been a patient hitter and now it looks like pitchers have found a major weakness and will continue to exploit it until he adjusts.

[FVBrewerFan]

They're throwing everything low out of the strike zone to get him out. If it's a fastball, he'll ground out, breaking stuff he'll strike-out.