Yankees: Why Gary Sanchez could be off to a slow start in 2018

It’s rare for a team to have a catcher like Gary Sanchez that could carry his team’s offense on his own. When he gets going, “Gary is Scary,” but he’s had some struggles early on in 2018. What’s goine wrong for the Yankees All-Star?

Gary Sanchez could be one of the best pure hitters in the MLB today. To reach his potential with the Yankees, he’s going to have to make some adjustments while also catching a few breaks. No, I don’t mean catch a few breaking balls, but we know he needs to improve as a fielder behind the plate as well.

The second half of the 2016 regular season featured a 23-year-old Sanchez flourishing at the plate as a rookie. Some analysts may say the 2016 Sanchez was the best version of him we’ll ever see and they may have a point.

This year Sanchez has had to deal with pitchers gingerly pitching around him. Once “The Kraken” proved to be an honest threat in the batter’s box, one can imagine how intricate a concocted pitching strategy could be in the era of analytics.

According to Fangraphs, Sanchez’s offensive numbers are uncharacteristically off in 2018. During his young career, Sanchez has had 959 plate appearances and a slash line of .267/.343/.547. So far in 2018, Sanchez is batting a mediocre .202/.307/.459 with a WAR of 1.2 in 212 plate appearances.

Something has to be off with Sanchez’s approach because his 2018 numbers are on pace to match Todd Frazier’s unremarkable 2016 season. In “The Toddfather’s” debut with the Chicago White Sox, he belted a solid 40 homers, but he also had a weak slash line of .225/.302/.464.

What are the specific issues with Sanchez’s swing in 2018? Is it a timing issue? Maybe a specific pitch is fooling him? Is he unlucky? Perhaps he’s not hitting the ball as hard? Well, it’s a mixture of a little bit of everything.

Is Sanchez overswinging on purpose?

During Monday night’s YES broadcast of the Yankees vs. Tigers game, commentator Ken Singleton mentioned something interesting. He spoke to Yankees hitting coach Marcus Thames about Sanchez’s struggles prior to the game.

Thames, according to Singleton, noticed Sanchez is swinging as if he’s “trying to get four hits with one cut.” Since Sanchez is batting around .200, it wouldn’t be out of the ordinary to see the young slugger try and do too much at the plate.

But there’s also a chance Sanchez is buying into the latest launch angle trend, which is proving to be a fallacy. More and more major league hitters are buying into the latest launch angle theories.

The logic is a batter will have an increased exit velocity by swinging in an upward motion. The “all or nothing approach” would then, in theory, cause more fly balls. Some believe this change has led to the glaring increase in home runs. According to science, that may not the case.

The NY Times reported the MLB hired scientists to explain why home runs have spiked. They could not prove the exact reason for the power surge, but they did assure it was not because of the new offensive philosophy.

"[The research] also eliminated the notion that the slugging surge was caused by batters’ altering their approach by swinging with a more upward motion (launch angle); swinging harder; or trying to pull the ball more. It found that, by and large, exit velocities on batted balls did not increase at the same rate as the rise in home runs."

Sanchez is a home run threat every time he approaches the plate. His swing is excellent but it doesn’t seem like he’s making the proper adjustments to improve as an overall hitter.

Sanchez is hitting more flyballs, making softer contact

The batted ball data collected by Fangraphs provides enough evidence for one to believe Sanchez is mistakingly focused on hitting the ball in the air more often. His exit velocity is also down and he’s hitting the ball to the opposite field more often, which is atypical of him.

Sanchez is hitting 7.6% less line drives this year (13.5%) compared to last year (21.1%). He’s also batting 1.7% fewer ground balls this year (40.6%) compared to last year (42.3%). As for his fly ball ratio, he’s hitting 9.3% more fly balls this year (45.9%) compared to last year (36.6%). His infield fly ball ratio is also alarmingly up by 12.2% more this year (23%) compared to last year (10.8%).

Soft%, Med%, Hard%

Sanchez’s soft contact percentage of batted balls is up by 2.5% as of now. Consistently over the last years, his Soft% was 18.5% and 18.6%. With a Soft% of 21.1% so far in 2018, expect Sanchez to tear the cover off the ball if he rebounds. His Medium contact% declined from 44.5% last year to 43.6% this year, and his Hard contact% declined from 36.9% last year to 35.3% this year.

Sanchez is struggling against breaking balls

Similar to teammate Tyler Austin, Sanchez struggles against the slider. He’s also underperforming against changeups and splitters. The odd thing about his 2018 performance against these pitches is he’s had great success against them before. However, this year pitchers are throwing more junk, and fewer fastballs, which keeps him guessing and has him off balanced and chasing at the plate.

Why would Sanchez be struggling against pitches he’s proven to have success against in the past? Because pitchers are carrying on an old tradition. Traditionally the best way to limit the production of a big bat is to throw more junk outside of the strike zone and fewer fastballs inside the zone.

More from Yanks Go Yard

In 2017, pitchers threw 48.9% fastballs to Sanchez, and in 2018 they are throwing a reduced 46.1% fastballs. Their slider percentage has increased from 21.6% in 2017 to 23.3% in 2018. Also, curveballs thrown have increased from 11.4% in 2017 to 13.4% in 2018.

Plate Discipline

According to Sanchez’s plate discipline analytics, he’s swinging at fewer pitches outside of the zone and inside of the zone compared to last year. His percentage of swings outside of the strike zone dropped from 33.7% last year to 30.9% this year. His percentage of swings inside of the strike zone has also dropped from 66.5% in 2017 to 62.4% this year.

While Sanchez is swinging at fewer pitches, he’s also making less contact with the baseball. In 2017 his contact rate was 73.8%, but it’s declined in 2018 to 71.5%. Naturally, his strikeout rate has increased from 22.9% in 2017 to 24.1% in 2018.

One reason for this could be linked to the percentage of pitches he’s seen in the strike zone which has dropped from 43.2% in 2017 to 38.1% in 2018.

Is a bounce back on the horizon for Sanchez?

Throughout Sanchez’s career, he’s had a reputation for killing baseballs during the summer, especially in August. In 2016 when he came up he took over New York baseball by putting up historic numbers for a rookie.

Next: Yankees: Get to know first-round draft pick Anthony Seigler

Sanchez is still a kid at 25-years young and will have to be able to adjust to crafty pitching. He’s still one of the most dangerous hitters in the game, so it’s only a matter of time before he goes on a hot streak. Once he starts seeing the ball better and improves his plate discipline, his average, on-base percentage, and slugging percentage should improve. Let’s just hope it happens sooner rather than later.

Home/Yankees News