July 27, 2024

38 thoughts on “Yankees.com: Yanks’ Jones delivers Mother’s Day gift with first MLB HR”

    1. Burdis probably shouldn’t have been rushed up with only one rehab appearance.

  3. Does anyone think this HR is the start of something for Gleyber? I’m betting it’s not.

    He seems like a good guy – standing for interviews and answering in English which is his second language, right?

    But I think he’s not a “smart” player, as can be seen with his never ending baderunning blunders and fielding miscues. So if something is wrong and he needs to fix it, I’m
    Not sure he can. I knew judge would. But I’m betting against Gleyber.

  5. In other news, Volpe is also hot right now and the numbers are looking really good. I still don’t feel certain about whether he’s a good hitter or not but evidence is mounting that he might be.

    1. He’s really good for a SS, especially as his defense has looked really good despite it being a knock against him. He may be one of those guys who are maddeningly volatile but too good too keep in the minors and then puts up a few 6-7 WAR seasons as a 27 year old and we will wonder where that consistency had been.

    2. BR had him as a 3.2-win player last year and already at 1.9 this year. 6 WAR may come sooner than you think.

  6. I hope Veggie won’t mind if I repost this:

    Veggie Jackson says:
    May 13, 2024 at 2:21 am
    These new bat-tracking metrics, even the more opaque ones, are nifty. Soto ranks super high on “squared-up rate” – 40% of swings (3rd in MLB) or 50% of contact (2nd in MLB) – while Stanton and Judge currently rank at or below average in squaring the ball up, and appear to compensate with their bat speed. The fact that Soto both swings fast and squares it up well might correlate with his swing being shorter.
    The MLB leader in “squared up rate”, at least for swings, is Luis Arraez, whose bat speed is well below average. By Statcast measurements, his swing is also super short.
    There does seem to be a direct correlation between “swing length” and bat speed (suggesting relatively constant swing times across the league), and an inverse correlation between “swing length” and “squared-up rate”.
    They don’t measure “swing time”, but absent direct measurement, such a metric could be computed as a ratio of swing length to bat speed. Would be interesting to see whether shorter swing time is actually allowing Soto to start a swing later, see a ball longer, square it up better.
    Would also be fun if these kinds of metrics had existed back in the days of Wee Willie Keeler, or Tony Gwynn, or Ichiro, or Vlad Sr., or Barry Bonds.

    1. And my reply:

      Ugly Johnny Dickshot says:
      May 13, 2024 at 11:26 am
      It’s not surprising that Stanton and Judge have such long swings as they have such “long levers” as Eric Longehagen refers to them. This is why really big guys are considered difficult to develop and why they are ao often “all or nothing” hitters as Stanton has become.
      The ESPN crew last night mentioned that Chipper Jones swung a heavier bat with a thicker handle to *slow down* his swing with the aim of keeping it in the zone longer.

    1. Consistently very slow.

      He has some interesting parallels with Altuve, who has an almost identical average swing speed, but where Volpe has a very small 2.3% hard swing rate, Altuve’s is 10.3.

      So far this year, Altuve is squaring the ball up more at 34.2% per contact and 28.8% per swing compared to Volpe’s 31.1% per contact and 25.2% per swing. But, Volpe is making ideal contact more often 11.3% per contact and 9.2% per swing compared to Altuve’s 5.8% per contact and 4.9% per swing.

      I don’t have a strong feel for this data yet, but some quick digging shows that Altuve really gets around on balls up and inside and hits them hard, where Volpe doesn’t really have a zone that he really punishes.

    2. Actually aside from the lower fast swing%, Volpe and Betts swing data is pretty similar (they are also listed at the same height/weight). Is it an experience/strength difference?

      I’m not making an argument that Volpe is going to be a Betts, but…

    1. Ok, if you’re an elite pure hitter, do you go the Kwan/Arraez route of spray hitter? Or do you trade a little of that bat control for some power and the ability to identify the pitches you can absolutely punish, like Betts and Altuve?

      You probably need some higher end early pitch recognition to be an Altuve/Betts too, but one of those archetypes is significantly more valuable than the other.

    2. I was thinking more like if you’re like a punchless hitter to begin with, can you sharpen the contact/in play skill up to be a more valuable player? Rather than selling out completely for 8 home runs a year. Imagine if Miguel Cairo could tweak his swing to add 20 more points of average.

    3. Yeah that’s fair. Arraez has basically zero power, so trying to hit home runs makes no sense. I’m not so sure Kwan is as punchless. I wouldn’t be surprised to see him start to hunt and end up as a sneaky 20 HR guy.

    4. Ichiro talked about that at some point, about how he could have been a 40hr hitter if he wanted to give up his average. Ty Cobb and Ruth both had quotes about the same sort of thing (basically elite hitters deciding whether they want to be a big power or big average hitter). I would guess that if the dollars started flowing to good contact more than power, you’d see a shift in how some of the better hitters profile.

    5. Right. but I’m still not talking about how great hitters hit, I’m talking about how 75 OPS+ guys might improve their hitting. They’re never going to be great hitters, but they might get better.

  13. Altuve is good at hard stuff inside? If only someone could have told that to the Yankees years ago.

    Beeter has one career inning, gave up a hit, but only threw 3 total pitches! That’s a bit crazy.

    4. Not exactly just way too soon to write his obituary. I have no idea what the rest of the year will reveal. Maybe he’ll be Gary Sanchez II, maybe he’ll hit to his norm the next 120 games.
      Last year he hit 198/615 in June and 327/1008 in August, around 780 the other months. He’s streaky.

  16. Today, OF Jasson Domínguez and INF Jorbit Vivas commence rehab assignments with Single-A Tampa.

    Additionally, the Yankees transferred the rehab assignment of RHP Tommy Kahnle from Single-A Tampa to Double-A Somerset.

  18. A tough start to the night for Trystan Vrieling (@SOMPatriots). He allowed 3 runs on 4 hits in the first inning. He did strike out two, and Agustin Ramirez cut down a runner trying to steal.

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