Victorino may give up switch-hitting

soxhop411

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SARASOTA, Fla. — Shane Victorino has yet to play a game in spring training for the Red Sox. When he does come back, which should be soon, it may only be as a righthanded hitter.
Victorino largely abandoned switch hitting in August last season because of a strained left hamstring. It proved successful as he hit .300 with an .896 OPS in 115 plate appearances batting righthanded against a righthanded pitcher.
Victorino has been coy about his plans, refusing to say whether he will bat lefthanded again. But he has yet to take a swing batting lefthanded during batting practice sessions on the field.
"It's almost going to be a game-time decision. I think he has his viewpoints on it and where his confidence is," manager John Farrell said this morning. "He hasn't told me that he's eliminating switch hitting."
Victorino is a natural righthanded hitter who learned to switch hit in 2002 when he was in the minors. He has been a better hitter righthanded over the course of his career.
"The right side has always been his strong side," Farrell said. "I think last year his production against righthanded pitching probably has enabled him to be a little bit more open-minded to getting the majority of at-bats from that side of the plate."
Farrell said the Red Sox support the idea.
"We want the most productive player," he said. "If that's what it lends to, we'd be perfectly fine with it if that's what he opts to do."
Batting righthanded Victorino hit a modest .216 in the postseason but drove in 12 runs over 14 games. He had big hits in Game 6 of the ALCS and Game 6 of the World Series.
"You look at the approach at the plate and the overall production and the confidence and you tend to think that has a chance to [continue]," Farrell said. "Time will tell."
Victorino has been held out of games so far for several reasons. He is recovering from surgery on his right thumb and has been doing extra work to strengthen groin muscles that gave him problems last season.
"Hopefully by sometime early this coming week he will be on the field," Farrell said. "All his on-field work has been free, no issues. That's been encouraging."
http://www.boston.com/sports/baseball/redsox/extras/extra_bases/2014/03/victorino_may_give_up_switch-hitting.html?camp=misc:eek:n:twit:sox&SREF=Optin&dlvrit=199675
 
I think this would be a good decision by Victorino. Hopefully he continues to have the same success he had last season, hitting from that side of the plate
 

JMDurron

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We should keep in mind that it is likely to be impossible for Victorino to match his late regular season performance as a RHH vs RHP. We saw what happened in the postseason against RHP who figured out that they needed to feed him a steady diet of breaking balls.

Obviously, he still game through in some huge situations against a hanging breaking ball in the ALCS and a favorable count fastball in the World Series, but his postseason rate stats look like a more reasonable expectation than his late regular season stats. I am assuming that he won't replicate his insane HBP rate in 2014, nor should he see many fastballs from pitchers outside of 2-0 or 3-1 counts. I think the "wait, we have no book on this guy as a RHH vs RHP" honeymoon officially ended in October.

I realize that his October numbers may have been injury-deflated, and/or he may get more comfortable against breaking balls from RHP despite 11 seasons of seeing them from a different angle. The latter strikes me as unlikely, and the injury issues don't seem likely to vanish.
 

Ed Hillel

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JMDurron said:
I realize that his October numbers may have been injury-deflated, and/or he may get more comfortable against breaking balls from RHP despite 11 seasons of seeing them from a different angle. The latter strikes me as unlikely, and the injury issues don't seem likely to vanish.
 
While I agree with a lot of what you said, particularly that he seems to struggle identifying the breaking ball early enough to lay off with his left eye, keep in mind the qualify of the RHP he faced in the post-season as well. The entire team struggled mightily against the RHP they faced in the post-season, and for good reason. Scherzer, Sanchez, Wacha, and Wainright twice each, Verlander, Cobb, etc. It's the playoffs, so naturally the competition is more stiff, but that is still a murderer's row of RHP. I'd be happy to see Victorino give strictly RHH a couple of months to see how he's pitched and how he can adjust. The odds may be against his pitch recognition improving so late into his career, but it's been about a decade, likely, since he's tried to (it appears hit hit solely as a RHH in 2003, but by 2005 was a switch). I'm also not sure that his LHH ceiling is all that high anyway, so why not? He can always go back if he finds himself not able to recognize and hit the curve.
 

Sprowl

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Shane's left ribs are going to get mighty sore. He seems to use the same position in the right-handed batter's box against both lefties and righties, which means that there are only four inches between his torso and the strike zone. It gives him great outside plate coverage, but he will get hit a lot, again (11 HBP in 115 PA hitting right-handed vRHP in 2013). He and Pedroia should wear full body armor at the plate.
 

Mike F

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Didn't he have damage to his left hand last fall?
The top hand on the bat takes more punishment and is also more important in the ability to drive a pitch. Perhaps the left hand isn't fully recovered from the surgery.
 

Sampo Gida

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I hope Victorino invests in a state of the art helmet.  He reminds me of Tony C as a RHB'er facing RHP'ers. Both crowded the plate and Tony C was fearless. Victorino may be fearless as well,  or perhaps he just can not react to balls coming at him from the right side, either way the end result is getting hit a lot.
 
It did seem pitchers were adjusting to him in the post season with the breaking ball, although he crowds the plate enough he probably crushes a few breaking balls that are poorly located and grabs too much of the middle part of the plate,  which lesser pitchers are prone to do more often than the post season.
 

radsoxfan

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Ed Hillel said:
 
 I'm also not sure that his LHH ceiling is all that high anyway, so why not? He can always go back if he finds himself not able to recognize and hit the curve.
 
I'm on board with trying the only right handed approach for this reason.  He has always been weaker from the left side, and he has been getting worse recently.  Given that Shane hasn't been doing it for awhile, and it's not his natural side, I think it's very likely he will be a sub .700 OPS guy hitting left handed this season. I wouldn't be surprised at all if his LHH production in 2014 looks like his 2012 line of .229/.296/.333/.629 if he goes back to switch hitting. 
 
Of course it could always be worse from the right side, but I think he should at least give it a couple of months to see how he does now that the league has a bit of a scouting report on him.  The big question is, will he give up the dual earflap helmet if he is no longer a switch hitter?
 

koufax37

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Sampo Gida said:
I hope Victorino invests in a state of the art helmet.  He reminds me of Tony C as a RHB'er facing RHP'ers. Both crowded the plate and Tony C was fearless. Victorino may be fearless as well,  or perhaps he just can not react to balls coming at him from the right side, either way the end result is getting hit a lot.
 
It did seem pitchers were adjusting to him in the post season with the breaking ball, although he crowds the plate enough he probably crushes a few breaking balls that are poorly located and grabs too much of the middle part of the plate,  which lesser pitchers are prone to do more often than the post season.
 
I think he will get hit a lot, but more likely in the upper arm/elbow, since not a lot of pitches overall are at the head, and those tend to induce the panic duck reaction.
 
For the second part, I seem to remember Veras thinking his very good curve was an obvious 0-2 pitch, and catching too much of the middle part, and that was in the post season.
 
I also think the adjustment period to the RHB/RHP breaking ball is a not too long, and after initial discomfort he will settle back in.  I was very surprised by how well he did over his first 100 ABs or so, and think it is very encouraging of future success.
 
He also has a lot of R/R experience before he started switch hitting, which is important compared to anybody who started switch hitting before they saw any very good breaking balls.  I hope he stands in on some RHP bullpens to get the extra eyeball reps, but I'm guessing he might be too proud to bother.
 
Regardless, this is welcome news, and from a game management situation we might concentrate his days off against tough slider RHPs as a result and field Sizemore/JBJ/Nava lineup.
 

nvalvo

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koufax37 said:
 
 
Regardless, this is welcome news, and from a game management situation we might concentrate his days off against tough slider RHPs as a result and field Sizemore/JBJ/Nava lineup.
 
I was just thinking about whether this news corresponded with Sizemore's surprising health deepening our LHH outfield depth: that could be a great setup. 
 

Rasputin

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nvalvo said:
 
I was just thinking about whether this news corresponded with Sizemore's surprising health deepening our LHH outfield depth: that could be a great setup. 
 
An outfield of Nava, Gomes, Bradley, Victorino, and Sizemore is one that fills me with glee.
 

JMDurron

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Ed Hillel said:
 
While I agree with a lot of what you said, particularly that he seems to struggle identifying the breaking ball early enough to lay off with his left eye, keep in mind the qualify of the RHP he faced in the post-season as well. The entire team struggled mightily against the RHP they faced in the post-season, and for good reason. Scherzer, Sanchez, Wacha, and Wainright twice each, Verlander, Cobb, etc. It's the playoffs, so naturally the competition is more stiff, but that is still a murderer's row of RHP. I'd be happy to see Victorino give strictly RHH a couple of months to see how he's pitched and how he can adjust. The odds may be against his pitch recognition improving so late into his career, but it's been about a decade, likely, since he's tried to (it appears hit hit solely as a RHH in 2003, but by 2005 was a switch). I'm also not sure that his LHH ceiling is all that high anyway, so why not? He can always go back if he finds himself not able to recognize and hit the curve.
 
For the record, I hope Victorino hits purely as a RHH all season.  I'm just saying that it's madness to expect anything close to a 300/386/510 line against them, even though he should still be better than his 2013 line as a LHH vs RHP of 274/317/389.  We agree on the low ceiling as a LHH.  The line about continuing the same level of success from last year by the OP is what got me going, I'm completely on board with the idea if Victorino buys into it.  Actually, I'm on board even if he doesn't, because I think that low ceiling as a LHH is actually subterranean.