J. D. MARTINEZ WAS RIGHT

by Holly Horning

What do the Red Sox, Dodgers, Giants, Braves, Astros and Cardinals all have in common other than being playoff teams this year?

They hit the fewest ground balls in MLB (around 40%) and it’s a key to success.  A level of success that allows you to play October baseball.

Baseball is constantly changing and adapting.  And in order to understand and appreciate it, we need to be willing to embrace changes to the game that are supported by results and mountains of data.

Teams employ dozens of analysts who have all majored in sports statistics and have access to the best computers and software imaginable.  So when they run programs and video of players through super computers, they are going to get detailed information that drives what teams do.  These organizations then put these strategies into play and carefully watch the results.

Because of this, the old rule of hitting hard grounders back up the middle are “loooong gone” as Ernie would say.  Statistics now show that hitting ground balls is the worst kind of contact.  Much of the reason is attributed to the defensive shift which now makes hitting grounders easy outs.  Avoiding them, as do the teams listed above, are crucial to winning.

In other words, successful teams focus on hitting the ball in the air.

Look no further than the success story of J. D. Martinez who worked with independent hitting coaches Craig Wallenbrock and Robert Van Scoyoc.  They overhauled his swing completely in order to generate more lift.  J. D. is now considered one of MLB’s premier hitters.

Both coaches, btw, now work for the Dodgers.

But it’s not enough to simply get the ball in the air.  It has to be hit hard either in a line or in the air.

The stats back all of this up.  Players have a .241 BA and .266 slugging percentage when hitting ground balls.  Balls in the air have generated a .399 BA and .782 slugging percentage.  The latter also generates much more run production.

Which now brings us to the terms many traditional baseball fans hate – exit velocity and launch angle.  They are crucial to understanding how well a hitter is performing.  Remember, successful hitting is all about launching a ball into the air with as much force as possible.  As you look at a player’s stats, you can now see their stats for both of these and it will tell you how successful they are at performing these skills.

Until recently, this trend was responsible for the increase in strikeouts and lack of action on the field.  But no longer for teams with advanced abilities to diagnose and correct.  A good number of these playoff teams rank in the bottom third of MLB in strikeouts this year with the Astros leading the way.

This focus on hitting balls in the air has also been linked to solid run production.  All of the playoff teams are in the top ranks in runs, batting average, OPS and home runs.

This stuff, folks, is here to stay unless MLB decides to ban the shift.

And if you really want to understand how the Tigers are doing offensively?  Start looking at the individual launch angle and exit velocity stats of the team and of each player.

Speaking of the Tigers, where do they rank in terms of hitting ground balls?  They rank 11^th which is pretty good considering where they have been previously.  It’s a good sign that they are finally adapting and updating.

There was a reason why they ranked last in almost every offensive (and it truly was!) category before this year.

Lloyd McClendon, their former hitting coach, believed in swinging down on the ball to create backspin – a theory roundly disputed by most hitting coaches.  In effect, he was teaching players to level their swings, instead of helping them arch their swings.  The exact opposite of what almost every other team was teaching.

So it’s no surprise that an increasing number of Tiger players were going outside the organization to hire their own hitting coaches.

Analysts point to how the Tigers’ hitters were messed up and set back in their development due to Lloyd’s coaching. 

Most hurt?  JaCoby Jones who is no longer with the team and Christin Stewart who is teetering on the edge.

Jeimer Candelario struggled, too, before this year.  McClendon got rid of his barrel tilt which generates speed in the load phase and removed the depth from his swing.  Once Lloyd was gone, you can see the changes in his hitting improve remarkably.  Especially notable since the Tigers have had 3 different hitting coaches in the past 3 years.  All teaching different things.

Keeping McClendon, as well as Joe Vavra, has set the Tigers back in terms of development.  It’s going to take Scott Coolbaugh more than a single year to undo the damage of old and incorrect ideas promoted under the Leyland/Ausmus and mostly Gardenhire eras.

But one has to wonder how much potential talent was lost already because of horrible coaching.

Coolbaugh has a solid reputation for improving hitters and Manny Machado gives him full credit for turning him into a successful one.

Need I mention that Coolbaugh has a background as a hitting coach for the Dodgers organization?

In the meantime, it’s an interesting exercise to compare the launch angles and exit velocities of those Tigers who were on the roster under McClendon, Vavra and Coolbaugh.

One can’t say it enough.  Coaching matters.

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What did you miss on our Twitter feed yesterday?

• Another top Tiger prospect gets injured in the Fall League.

• Al Avila’s mangling of the Nick Castellanos trade comes back to haunt with the news of Nick’s next move.

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