Abreu seeks hard-hit balls to lift soft stats
ST. LOUIS — One element of José Abreu’s firsthalf struggles sounds simple: He has not been hitting the ball as hard.
Hard contact is Abreu’s hallmark. The first baseman placed in the top 8 percent of major league hitters in average exit velocity and hard-hit rate in three of his last four seasons with the White Sox. Both rates are down in his first season with the Astros. His 89.2 mph average exit velocity on balls in play entering Tuesday would be the lowest of his career, his 41.6 percent hard-hit rate his lowest since 2016.
The Astros gave Abreu a three-day “reset” last week, sitting him for two games around an off day. Back in the lineup at Dodger Stadium, Abreu compiled two games of louder contact. Saturday, Abreu put five balls in play; four left his bat at 95 mph or higher, defined by Baseball Savant as hard-hit. Sunday, Abreu struck a home run with a 110.4 mph exit velocity, his hardest-struck base hit this season. Tuesday, he hit two balls at 106.5 and 109.2 mph.
Afterward, Abreu said he spent the three-day break working with Astros hitting coach Alex Cintrón. An emphasis was Abreu being more “behind the ball” to drive it better. Abreu tweaked his stance to keep more weight on his back leg. Abreu incorporates a toe-tap when he loads, and Cintrón said he
noted a difference early this season compared to Abreu’s time in Chicago.
“His upper body was too forward to start,” Cintrón said. “Which caused him, when he’d do his toe-tap, to be late. He was going forward, then back, then forward. Three movements instead of two. We talked about being more in the middle with his body, taller. So when he does his toetap, it’s one move to the ball. It’s shorter.”
They also looked at Abreu’s hands. Cintrón said Abreu was “cutting off ” some swings with his top hand and worked on keeping a flatter bat path through the zone. Cintrón said the two adjustments in theory would leave Abreu staying back better and being “on time and direct to the ball.”
A tiny sample offered some encouraging signs. Abreu’s average exit velocity on five balls put into play Saturday was 97.9 mph. He averaged 100.6 mph on four balls put in play Sunday and 101.6 mph while going 1-for-4 Tuesday. The home run Abreu hit on a splitter from Tony Gonsolin on Sunday had an 18 degree launch angle, essentially a line drive that carried 412 feet. Only seven home runs hit in the majors this season have had a lower angle.
For Abreu to salvage his season will require much more extended results. Abreu, signed to a threeyear, $58.5 million deal last offseason, awoke Tuesday with a .232/.283/.326 slash line. His .609 OPS was the fourth-lowest among qualified major league hitters. Houston’s minus-1 wins above replacement at first base, according to FanGraphs, reflected his struggles.
Teammates cite Abreu’s track record as reason for optimism. Abreu, the American League MVP in 2020, hit .292 with an .860 OPS over nine seasons in Chicago. His numbers often picked up later in the season. He owns a career .303 average and .882 OPS after the All-Star Break, a trend Astros third baseman Alex Bregman noted after the Dodgers series.
“He’s a great hitter,” Bregman said, “and great hitters always hit.”
That is far from guaranteed. Other trends for Abreu bear noting. He is chasing pitches outside the strike zone above his career rate. He is hitting more than 70 points lower against breaking pitches than he did last season.
Last weekend heartened him. Abreu said he believes that by not having more weight on his back leg in his stance early on, he “wasn’t putting myself in the best position to swing the bat.”
“At first I wasn’t really catching it or grasping exactly what I needed to do,” Abreu said through an interpreter. “But right now, I understand a little bit better, I’m starting to do things right, and it’s something I’ll continue working on.”
The Astros would clearly welcome any resurgence from Abreu. Their lineup is without its main power source, while Yordan Alvarez remains sidelined by an oblique injury, and a veteran presence in Michael Brantley, who is attempting to return from shoulder surgery. They have lost 11 of 17 games, beginning with the game Alvarez exited June 8, after Tuesday’s 4-2 loss to the Cardinals.
Abreu said he views his first half as a “learning experience.” Adding some levity, he said he is trying one other tack: talking to his bats and “saying they’ve got to make more contact.” There, too, Abreu is trying an adjustment.
“I was talking to them in English,” Abreu said, “and they don’t understand English.”