Patience pays dividends
Martinez’ bat is worth wait to Sox
TORONTO — To understand J.D. Martinez, it takes a little deep thinking.
And some patience.
Not even after his 2-for-3 performance in which he hit his 10th home run in his 38th game with the Red Sox, leading them to a 5-3 win over the Toronto Blue Jays yesterday, did Martinez feel like he was comfortable with his swing.
“I know my capabilities,” he told the Herald after the game. “I know when a pitcher throws me pitches that I can handle, that I know I’ve handled before, and I’m not handling them. Then it’s kind of just, ‘OK, why am I missing these pitches?’
“I don’t feel bad at the plate. (Saturday) I did. (Saturday) I felt like crap and it showed. (Yesterday), I didn’t.”
Yesterday was another strong day, as he took the first pitch he saw from Jays starter Joe Biagini, pitching in place of the injured Marcus Stroman, and hammered it for a two-run jack to right-center field in the first inning.
Martinez added an RBI single to right in the fifth inning to give the Sox a 4-0 lead. And even after Drew Pomeranz gave three of those back in the bottom of the fifth, the bullpen held it together and the Sox left Toronto feeling good.
Six of Martinez’ 10 homers have been hit to the opposite field.
“That’s normal for me,” he said. “I don’t necessarily try to hit the ball that way. I just try to stay inside the best I can and that’s where it went.”
The Sox finished the 10-game road trip with six wins, and Martinez had a lot to do with that, finishing with 12 hits — four homers, three doubles — to go with four walks.
“I’ve been saying it the whole time, he’s not just a slugger,” manager Alex Cora said. “He can hit. He works at it and he’ll take his walks. He’ll go the other way. He’s a complete hitter.”
It would’ve been crazy for the Sox to sign Martinez to a five-year contract worth $110 million in February and expect him to perform the way he did last year with Arizona, where he was traded midseason, then hit .302 with 29 homers in 62 games for the Diamondbacks.
But his production with the Sox has been close.
The first 11 games, he struggled. He got a late start in spring training, said he didn’t like the way his swing felt and it showed early. He was pulling the ball, hitting everything on the ground and began the year hitting .227 with a .725 OPS through 11 games.
That was the end of his cold streak. Eleven games.
Since April 13, Martinez leads the majors with a .390 average and has hit a home run once every 15 trips to the plate.
“I don’t get caught up in the numbers,” he said. “I feel like my swing is right when I’m hitting the majority of my balls in the air and they’re carrying. Right now I feel like the home runs are just fence scrapers, as I like to say. They’re home runs and I love them and want all of them, but to me, it’s just grinding to feel it, to find it every day.
“Once I start really driving the ball and hitting the ball in the air, I should have a lot more doubles than I do, for as high as I’m hitting and how hard I’m hitting the ball. Right now my doubles are, even driving the baseball, they’re lower than what I’m used to.”
Not feeling his best and ever the perfectionist, Martinez will keep searching.
“That’s every day,” he said. “That’s what I’m trying to say. You can’t come in here and say, ‘I feel great, I feel locked in, my swing is the best it’s ever been.’ It doesn’t work like that. Because tomorrow you go 0-for and it’s like, what happened? There’s no point in saying that. That’s why I say you’re grinding and working every day, because that’s what this is. I might come in tomorrow and I don’t know what happened.
“It’s like a golfer. All of a sudden he swings and it’s like, what the hell? Hello. Because your body is constantly changing. Your body is never the same. That’s the difference.”