Pat Burrell, the Giants’ new hitting coach, has drawn rave reviews from his hitters, but the group has averaged just 2.6 runs per game since April 23.
San Francisco Giants hitting coach Pat Burrell, left, and Tyler Fitzgerald during a baseball game against the New York Mets in San Francisco, Wednesday, April 24, 2024. PHILADELPHIA — What doesn’t show up on the back of Pat Burrell’s baseball card are the stretches, sometimes lasting a month or more, where he didn’t look like the slugger with four seasons of 30 or more home runs, two 100-RBI campaigns or who twice received MVP votes.
Shown on the big screen during Friday’s game, Burrell received a rousing ovation but didn’t offer any acknowledgement back. The camera captured him spitting a mouthful of seeds, then turning away. Back to work. Up and down the lineup, Giants hitters are hitting the ball hard when they make contact. They aren’t striking out at an obscene rate. Based on the quality of their contact, the Giants should be batting .246 as a team with a .399 slugging percentage, according to Statcast, but they are batting only .238 and slugging .371.“I think guys are swinging at pitches we’re supposed to be swinging at; we’re putting balls in play,” first baseman LaMonte Wade Jr. said. “Sometimes it’s just right at people.
The Giants have stepped to the plate 1,280 times this season, and in 458 of those plate appearances, they have fallen behind 0-1 because they watched strike one. Right off the bat, they are putting themselves in a hole more often than the rest of the league — 9.2% of the time, compared to an MLB average 7.9%.
The Giants have been rung up on fastballs 53 times, the eighth-most in the majors, and are watching even more go by early in their at-bats. More than 12% of the pitches they have seen — 615 total — have been fastballs called for strikes, the highest rate in the majors. That all adds up to a 8.2% walk rate, 22nd in the majors, turning a typical area of strength in Zaidi-built clubs into a weakness.
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