Tim Britton's article on the struggles Bogaerts and Bradley, Jr got me thinking about Bogaerts' offense this season and how lost he looks sometimes. Here is an excerpt:
Pitchers are feeding Bogaerts outside pitches like crazy this year:
In April and May he has been getting fed pitches low and away. Pitchers have been more reluctant to come inside on him, which makes sense, because in the gifs below he has been hitting well against inside pitches. Right away we can see the source of his struggles based on Rodriguez' observation that Bogaerts is starting to try and pull the ball over the Monster. It is hard to pull outside pitches and make them go far. When looking at the bottom third of the zone, pitchers have started locating the ball below the strike zone in May, moving pitches that were in the lower third strike zone, to bottom of the zone.
I made two gifs (one for April and one for May) that overlays his swing rate zone map and batting average zone map to get a idea of where in the zone he swings a lot and where in the zone he gets hits:
The gifts show why pitchers like to pitch him outside: he swings a lot at those pitches, but doesn't produce hits. In both April and May the inside of the plate has clearly been Bogaerts' sweet spot. In fact both his home runs have come on inside pitches. What is a little troubling is that the middle and outside upper third of the zone has been a trouble spot for him. I would expect him to take middle up pitches and give them a ride. The good(ish) news is that he doesn't whiff on them, so at least he is making some contact in that part of the zone. Bogaerts mentioned that he's missing pitches 'out over the plate' in May, but this isn't really true. The middle-in and middle-middle part of the zone are the only parts where he is producing hits in May. His issue is swinging at pitches on the outside part of the plate pulling them.
If we look at his spray charts from April and May, we see a distinct trend to pull the ball:
In April, a lot of ground balls were pulled (hmmm) but balls put in play to the outfield have a fairly even distribution. There are more line drives to the left part of the field, but this isn't too concerning since there is a nicely distributed cluster of line drives, ground balls, and fly balls to right field. This has changed in May:
The only balls put in play to right field have been 4 fly balls and 1 pop up. He is still hitting a ton of ground balls to the left side of the field, and those balls hit in the air to left field started turning more into fly balls, likely from trying to pull outside pitches. And just to confirm, here is a line chart showing how his tendencies have shifted to more of a pull hitter, despite seeing the same number of outside pitches:
The magnitude of breaking pitches being pulled in May could be a SSS issue, but since he is now pulling all offspeed/breaking pitches more, its possible he's starting to cheat on the fastball and getting himself even more ahead of off speed pitches.
So what needs to happen? Ideally he takes a page out of Pedroia's book and sprays anything outside for a line drive to right field. From the looks of Bogaerts' hit charts, he is a similar hitter to Pedroia in that he crushes inside pitches, but still sees a ton of pitches outside. I've felt that Pedroia's success is due to the fact that pitchers have to come inside to him eventually because he will just punch outside pitches to right field all day for hits. If Bogaerts can start doing that I think we will see him become a much more complete hitter. Line drive singles to right field aren't as sexy as bombs over the wall, but a hit is a hit and maybe he needs to relearn that.
As always, thanks to Jnai and Brooks Baseball for these awesome charts.
This led me to take a look at his heat maps and spray charts to visualize Rodriguez' position that the Green Monster is becoming too alluring for Bogaerts. In particular, I wanted to look at what happened in between April and May, since Bogaerts' May has been slump filled. This is not supposed to be a sky-is-falling post, but more of a look to find out why Bogaerts is slumping so badly, and to figure out what adjustments can be made to return him the powerhouse that he was in the minors.
Pitchers are feeding Bogaerts outside pitches like crazy this year:
In April and May he has been getting fed pitches low and away. Pitchers have been more reluctant to come inside on him, which makes sense, because in the gifs below he has been hitting well against inside pitches. Right away we can see the source of his struggles based on Rodriguez' observation that Bogaerts is starting to try and pull the ball over the Monster. It is hard to pull outside pitches and make them go far. When looking at the bottom third of the zone, pitchers have started locating the ball below the strike zone in May, moving pitches that were in the lower third strike zone, to bottom of the zone.
I made two gifs (one for April and one for May) that overlays his swing rate zone map and batting average zone map to get a idea of where in the zone he swings a lot and where in the zone he gets hits:
The gifts show why pitchers like to pitch him outside: he swings a lot at those pitches, but doesn't produce hits. In both April and May the inside of the plate has clearly been Bogaerts' sweet spot. In fact both his home runs have come on inside pitches. What is a little troubling is that the middle and outside upper third of the zone has been a trouble spot for him. I would expect him to take middle up pitches and give them a ride. The good(ish) news is that he doesn't whiff on them, so at least he is making some contact in that part of the zone. Bogaerts mentioned that he's missing pitches 'out over the plate' in May, but this isn't really true. The middle-in and middle-middle part of the zone are the only parts where he is producing hits in May. His issue is swinging at pitches on the outside part of the plate pulling them.
If we look at his spray charts from April and May, we see a distinct trend to pull the ball:
In April, a lot of ground balls were pulled (hmmm) but balls put in play to the outfield have a fairly even distribution. There are more line drives to the left part of the field, but this isn't too concerning since there is a nicely distributed cluster of line drives, ground balls, and fly balls to right field. This has changed in May:
The only balls put in play to right field have been 4 fly balls and 1 pop up. He is still hitting a ton of ground balls to the left side of the field, and those balls hit in the air to left field started turning more into fly balls, likely from trying to pull outside pitches. And just to confirm, here is a line chart showing how his tendencies have shifted to more of a pull hitter, despite seeing the same number of outside pitches:
The magnitude of breaking pitches being pulled in May could be a SSS issue, but since he is now pulling all offspeed/breaking pitches more, its possible he's starting to cheat on the fastball and getting himself even more ahead of off speed pitches.
So what needs to happen? Ideally he takes a page out of Pedroia's book and sprays anything outside for a line drive to right field. From the looks of Bogaerts' hit charts, he is a similar hitter to Pedroia in that he crushes inside pitches, but still sees a ton of pitches outside. I've felt that Pedroia's success is due to the fact that pitchers have to come inside to him eventually because he will just punch outside pitches to right field all day for hits. If Bogaerts can start doing that I think we will see him become a much more complete hitter. Line drive singles to right field aren't as sexy as bombs over the wall, but a hit is a hit and maybe he needs to relearn that.
As always, thanks to Jnai and Brooks Baseball for these awesome charts.
