Saturday, July 11, 2009

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ESPN's Insider On New York Mets David Wright's Slump

SS

Thanks to M.S. for sending this over.  It appeared in the ESPN Insider which you need to subscribe to, so I don't want to be uncool and post it....but the gist of the article is that when Wright is hot he crushes fastballs when ahead in the count...

But during this slump, Wright has seen 11 fastballs in the strike zone, in hitters counts. And he's taken eight of them!
• He's taken two fastballs in the strike zone when up 1-0.




and then they break out the count several ways.  Interesting stuff, and the insider is cool to sign up for, and I suggest you do, and read the rest of the article.

(I wrote this on Friday so I could hit the beach so if Wright hit 5 home runs last night and you're like "what slump" that's why.)

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1 Response to "ESPN's Insider On New York Mets David Wright's Slump"
Sparks said :
July 11, 2009 at 12:25 PM
I'll say it yet again: HoJo's performance needs to be evaluated. The strikeouts may say otherwise to the uninformed, but Wright's aggressiveness is gone. As the above snippet implies, the reason he's striking out so much is because he's watching pitches he used to hammer and it's putting him in a bad position. That Wright has changed his style so much (as noted by numerous TV commentators and himself in interviews) just because of Citi Field is just plain silly. Just let him do his thing, and he can be successful anywhere. Last year's David Wright in the new park would still have better power numbers than he has now. Sheff is one of the few players regularly producing some RBIs, and you haven't seen him adjust his swing to play the park, have you?

It's team-wide, too. I forget which game is was, but just recently an opposing pitcher was grooving 1st-pitch strikes in there and no one on the Mets were attacking them. I understand trying to work the count, but you're already behind the 8 ball talent-wise, you can't afford to be passive. It's bad enough you have a starting 2nd baseman who can barely get the ball to the outfield. Your power guys have to take their hacks.

And it's not just HoJo, mind you. The entire staff is to blame, as I presume they share responsibility for the team's approach.

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