Hernández lets bat do all the talking
On the night of his first career five-hit game, Teoscar Hernández played the at-bat harpsichord thusly:
Single to centre field on an 80.6-m.p.h. slider.
Single to right field on a 78.7 changeup.
Double to left field on a 76.8 cutter. Single to right on a 98.1 fastball. Single to centre a 94.9 fastball. That eruption on Monday last, which didn’t feature a signature Teo jack — he’s racked up 27 of those — presents a microcosm of what’s going so right for the silver slugger as he mostly quietly goes about having a studly season. Of course, on this rendition of the Blue Jays, it’s hard to out-noisy the likes of Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Marcus Semien and maybe even Bo Bichette and latterly Lourdes Gurriel Jr., to say
nothing of Cy Young candidate Robbie Ray on the pitching side of things.
Further, for quite a while now, the normally approachable and entirely congenial Hernández has chosen to make no spoken sound at all, at least not to any correspondent unassociated with the team’s owner/broadcaster. Rather annoying. But maybe Hernández is in a ritualistic groove and doesn’t want to change a thing about the existential nirvana on which he’s being borne along. He no longer appears for BP either, an optional team exercise these days. He does, however, participate animatedly in the dugout shtick: home-run jacket, chorus-line shuffle, stagedesigned gesturing.
Yeehaw. Fun days. If not, on this particular evening, with the spoilsport Twins in town to open a weekend series and a ghastly (again) Hyun-Jin Ryu on the mound — albeit not for long — much fun for the Jays at all. (Nice touch, though, the warm reception for Josh Donaldson; not so nice when he repaid the tribute by launching an ooh-la-la out of the park that knocked Ryu out of the game.)
But the subject was Hernández because … why not. Amidst
MVP talk for Guerrero, quite rightly, and Cy speculation for Ray, Hernández is merely slashing .306/.357/.521 and chasing a batting title — that .306 average (0-for-3 in Friday night’s 7-3 loss to the Twins) fourth-best in the American League behind amigo leader Guerrero, ninth in all of baseball — while his 101 RBIs since returning from a COVIDrelated hiatus in late April are the most in the majors and his 144 hits over that span thirdmost.
Dash it all, if he’d just unclamp his mouth for a word or two. So we reached out to a few others to talk Hernández instead.
“When you start seeing guys at this level hit for high averages, it’s because they have finally solved their weakness,” offers Dante Bichette, father of Bo and intermittent hitting guru for the Jays. “Look at it the other way. When you see a guy come up and he’s on fire, a young player, and all of a sudden he starts to struggle, that’s usually because he has a hole.”
Hernández, a month from his 29th birthday, don’t got no holes. That’s what jumps out from the aforementioned five-hit-night stats: He hit every kind of pitch, to all parts of the field.
“Teoscar has evolved and
you’ve seen it right before your eyes,” continues Bichette. “He used to be kind of a swing-andmiss, pull-everything guy.”
Bichette has a theory, for the offensive roll Hernández has been on really since the beginning of last year’s truncated campaign. “I think what happened to Teoscar is he had some really good hitters come up, who have grown up in this game — Bo, Vladdy, Lourdes, guys that can really hit — and he’s paid attention. ‘Oh man, you guys hit the ball the other way. You guys hunt breaking balls down. You guys have a two-strike approach, you’re not up there just trying to hit homers every time.’ This is a really smart guy. He started picking up on that.
“He learned to be a good hitter rather than just a onedimensional hitter. We’re seeing now what he’s capable of, which is a crazy good hitter.”
Maybe Hernández doesn’t always get the love he deserves. A high strikeout rate might have had something to do with that. And his often loopy routes to the ball a-field, although those bozo blunders are a thing of the distant past now. Or perhaps the measured appreciation reflects in part that he wasn’t a homegrown seedling or seized upon as a flashy free agent or even obtained in a watershed trade — his arrival along with Nori Aoki costing the Jays reliever Francisco Liriano.
Seriously, one of the quietest all-stars ever. Although I expect there will be quite the clamor when he presents his numbers — the stats kind and the dollar kind — at the arbitration altar in the off-season, second year genuflecting for Hernández.
His teammates are well aware and appreciative, in awe even. This is, after all, someone who has this season homered in consecutive games four times, had three multiple home run games and two grand slams.
“He’s got an unbelievable swing path,” says Semien, admiringly. “He’s able to hit the ball to right field, out of the ballpark, which opens up a lot of things. It helps you be able to wait on a fastball or catch a breaking ball out front. I’m sure he’s always had that swing path, but now he’s got the confidence to go with it and he’s had some success. He’s scary. Right now he’s just scratching the surface.”
From Guerrero, the hitting and big bop savant: “I’ve always said, our swings are similar. But what I really like about Teoscar is, he goes direct to the ball. And when you do that, you can hit the ball hard to any part of the field. Of course, he’s made a couple of adjustments in his mechanics too. That’s why he’s so consistent right now.”
Manager Charlie Montoyo reminded of Hernández’s demotion to the minors in 2019, after which he returned a changed man, more disciplined and selective at the plate, definitely sturdier between the ears. Because the demotion, if brief, was humiliating. “After the ups and downs, he’s been one of the best hitters in baseball. A great approach at the plate. His approach has been the same since he got back from the minor leagues. He works hard every day. Just look at the numbers.”
Hernández has hit .400 in September, .461 over the last month.
And this is how the Jays have hit team-wise since Aug. 1 on a week-to-week basis, through a dreadful slump and surging revival of the bats: .262, .260, .238, .252, .300, .323, .381.
About last night, though …