Brewers lead MLB in hitting

[edfunderburk]

Brewers are currently leading all of MLB in batting average (.259) & OBP (.335) - plus they are 2nd in runs scored (94) & 3rd in stolen bases (76) as we enter June 

[yfinn6]

Turns out all we had to do is let that light-hitting , weird-batting stance dork go.

[shanedog19]

The thing that stands out most is the improved plate discipline over last year. Is that coaching? Kind of hard not to make that correlation at this point.

[edfunderburk]

11 minutes ago, shanedog19 said:

The thing that stands out most is the improved plate discipline over last year. Is that coaching? Kind of hard not to make that correlation at this point.

Apparently, both our hitting coaches are making an impact 

Hoskins,, Ortiz, & Sanchez are the primary newcomers 

Several players from last year’s team have made significant jumps

[pitchleague]

Is it just me?  When I see a .259 team batting average leading the league, that really doesn’t sound all that good.

Maybe I’m still used to teams from 10-20 years ago hitting .275, though.

[Underachiever]

3 hours ago, pitchleague said:

Is it just me?  When I see a .259 team batting average leading the league, that really doesn’t sound all that good.

Maybe I’m still used to teams from 10-20 years ago hitting .275, though.

Considering the league-wide team batting average is .240, and league average OPS is .695, I think it’s good to view it in the current environment. .259 and .755(!) is exciting. Pitching is too good. 

[sveumrules]

6 minutes ago, Underachiever said:

Pitching is too good

Yup.

In Year of the Pitcher 1968 league average for position players was 245/309/354

This year it’s at 240/310/387 so pretty much dead on to 1968 but with a few more extra base hits.

[Stealofhome]

Usually the hitting numbers are higher during the summer months, so there is some room for them to go up league-wide yet. I couldn't easily find a chart to show that but just looking through the league splits on baseball-reference reveals that trend.

[Cool Hand Lucroy]

3 minutes ago, Stealofhome said:

Usually the hitting numbers are higher during the summer months, so there is some room for them to go up league-wide yet. I couldn't easily find a chart to show that but just looking through the league splits on baseball-reference reveals that trend.

Good point. These discussions are complicated. In some ways, the pitch clock seems to have partly diminished pitcher advantage, but at the potential cost of injuries.

Do others see pitchers getting better at pitch clock gamesmanship? This is just a gut feeling, but pace of play seems a little slower this year (which I think is fine...pitch clock often feels too fast to me), maybe the result of guys getting better at strategically walking around the mound or asking for a new baseball? Fedde was very deliberate last night.

Back on topic: thrilled with this offense's approach. For the first time in a long time, we are ANNOYING to pitch to. Long at-bats, more contact, always pressure on the basepaths. Love to see it. I'm not fully bought in on this team's ability to go far, but I will say that I'm having way more fun this year than in the past four or five. The style of baseball is just much, much more enjoyable to me.

[CheeseheadInQC]

The Brewers currently have four players on pace for 5 fWAR (Contreras, Adames, Turang, Ortiz) and a fifth who would be if not for injury (Yelich). The chances of all five reaching that mark are infinitesimally slim, but considering I don’t know if any team since the 1939 Yankees has done it, being on pace is pretty cool.

[phnxcrew]

After the last few years, I couldn’t have dreamed this would be possible.  This is also with chourio, weimer and Mitchell being injured/ doing very little.  there will be regression from certain players going forward but that will be offset by others getting hot.  

[sveumrules]

After last night’s outburst, the Brewers are up to a 117 wRC+, which at the moment ties them with the 1978 squad for 2nd in franchise history behind only 1982 who came in at 120 wRC+.

The best hitting Melvin teams came in between 107 to 109 wRC+.

In addition to the hot hitting, Brewers are leading MLB in base running (+9.2 BsR), and their +12 OAA is third.

Add it all up and their 13.4 WAR is just fractions behind LAD (13.7) and NYY (13.9) atop the MLB leaderboard.

Pretty fun stuff.

[Stealofhome]

2 hours ago, Cool Hand Lucroy said:

Good point. These discussions are complicated. In some ways, the pitch clock seems to have partly diminished pitcher advantage, but at the potential cost of injuries.

Do others see pitchers getting better at pitch clock gamesmanship? This is just a gut feeling, but pace of play seems a little slower this year (which I think is fine...pitch clock often feels too fast to me), maybe the result of guys getting better at strategically walking around the mound or asking for a new baseball? Fedde was very deliberate last night.

Back on topic: thrilled with this offense's approach. For the first time in a long time, we are ANNOYING to pitch to. Long at-bats, more contact, always pressure on the basepaths. Love to see it. I'm not fully bought in on this team's ability to go far, but I will say that I'm having way more fun this year than in the past four or five. The style of baseball is just much, much more enjoyable to me.

MLB did reduce the pitch clock with runners on base this year from 20 seconds to 18 seconds. We can look at the median pitch tempo change on Baseball Savant, which is fairly constant with bases empty and down a tick with runners on base.

But that doesn't take into account any strategy, count leverage, more important situations, etc.

I put together a plot that compares the Brewers run scoring in the first couple months of the season from last year to this year:

 

Those 0 and 1 run games are much less common, and the 8/9 run games are now 10+. It's almost like they went from bimodal (either 2 or 7 runs) to trimodal (3, 7, or 10 runs).

[markedman5]

 

[rickh150]

I remember reading a paragraph in a recent article about a pitching simulator like program the team purchased to help hitters….seeing different arm slots and pitch speeds, matching up today’s pitcher with simulator. 
I have just searched 20 minutes for this article/paragraph. Does anyone remember this?

[wiguy94]

9 minutes ago, rickh150 said:

I remember reading a paragraph in a recent article about a pitching simulator like program the team purchased to help hitters….seeing different arm slots and pitch speeds, matching up today’s pitcher with simulator. 
I have just searched 20 minutes for this article/paragraph. Does anyone remember this?

I don't know if it's a simulator or an actual pitching machine that you can input that stuff into, but I do remember something being written about them getting it.

[Baldkin]

 

Ortiz just keeps raking. 

AAll this with two really bad hitters getting a lot of PA

[MrTPlush]

15 hours ago, pitchleague said:

Is it just me?  When I see a .259 team batting average leading the league, that really doesn’t sound all that good.

Maybe I’m still used to teams from 10-20 years ago hitting .275, though.

I miss those days, baseball was so much more enjoyable to watch.