Martinez vows he’ll get better
What’s the most amazing aspect of J.D. Martinez’ terrific start to the season?
How about that eight of his 15 home runs have been to the opposite field, and that he’s going to right field a career-high 36 percent overall.
Or that he has 15 homers despite the cold weather that’s been persistent in the Northeast, and a flyball rate of just 32 percent, his lowest since the Houston Astros released him in 2014.
Or that he’s hitting .343, and at least .300 in eight of the nine regions within the strike zone. The only place to pitch him seems to be upand-in, where he’s 1-for-10.
But none of those compare to this: Even during a stretch that earned him American League Player of the Week honors, Martinez still doesn’t feel like he’s at his best.
“I mean, I hit one ball good, and that was probably the best ball I hit all year,” Martinez said after Sunday’s 5-0 win over Baltimore in which he homered twice, including a 443-foot blast to center field. “Still feels like I missed a few pitches. Missed down on some pitches off today, later on in the game. Still have work to do.” How can he get better?
The easiest thing to do is look at the time period from when he was traded from the Detroit Tigers to the Arizona Diamondbacks on July 19 through the end of last season. Martinez hit .302 with 29 homers in 62 games, including 16 home runs in the final month of the season.
“I don’t know, that was tough,” he said. “I kind of blacked out right there. That last month in Arizona I felt locked in. That’s a tough one to compare. I don’t think I’ll ever have a month like that, like I had there. That was special.”
What he’s showing this year is that, at 30 years old, he’s still morphing. He’s not the same hitter he was in Arizona. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing. He didn’t hit for average in Arizona, and a lot of that has to do with his plate coverage. While he’s hitting at least .300 in eight-ofnine regions this year, he hit under .300 in four-of-nine regions in Arizona: up-and-in, middle-in, middlehigh, down-and-away.
And he’s making more contact now, which would explain his huge jump in batting average. His strikeout rate has fallen from his time in Arizona, dropping from 15 percent on fastballs to 11 percent, and from 28 percent on offspeed pitches to 21 percent.
But since signing a five-year deal for $110 million with the Red Sox, Martinez says he doesn’t feel like he’s gotten better.
“Whenever you see me hit 16 home runs in a month, you come up to me and say, ‘Hey, J.D., you feel like Arizona?’ ” Martinez said. “And I’ll be like, ‘You know what, I kind of do.’ ”
Chase Field is most certainly a hitter’s park, while Fenway Park doesn’t have that reputation for right-handed hitters who like to go to center field and right field, which Red Sox president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski said the team factored in before signing Martinez.
“Without getting specific, we did project him to be an impactful middle of the order hitter this year, realizing there could be some sacrifice of home run numbers due to park differences,” Dombrowski said.
And yet Martinez is flourishing, hitting .365 with nine homers in 22 games at Fenway, and .322 with six homers in 23 games on the road.
“Like I said at the beginning when everybody asked me about the Green Monster and what am I going to do with The Wall, I’m going to do me,” Martinez said last week. “I’m not going to worry about that wall. That’s a trap, I feel like.”
He doesn’t try to hit the Monster, but admits trying to hit home runs.
“Yeah, I do it all the time, but it’s not what you’re supposed to do,” he said. “It’s one of those things where you try, and I hate myself for doing it sometimes. I’m like, ‘Dude, what am I doing? I’m too old for this.’ But it’s like, you get in the box and you’re feeling well, and you’re feeling good, and you’re confident, it’s kind of hard not to let that ‘A’ swing go and really just let it loose.”
Martinez simply seems to still be getting better.
“A lot of people were talking about how Fenway was going to affect him,” manager Alex Cora said. “When it’s 80 degrees and humid, it’s a good place to hit. We’ve seen it before, and I’ve seen it first-hand. He stays with his approach drives the ball to right-center. He has power. The ball is going to go.”