No doubt, Newman is improving
His defense has turned around; his bat is next
Kevin Newman has had plenty of doubters over the past couple of seasons. It’s hard to blame anybody for that. Heck, even Newman had doubts about himself.
The 2019 season, when Newman hit .308 with an .800 OPS in 130 games and had temporarily presented himself as a real piece of the Pirates future, has become a distant memory over the previous couple of years.
The COVID-shortened 2020 season was rough on Newman, but it was rough on many others, too. The 2021 season was a slightly different story.
Newman hit .226, a low marker for sure, but his OPS was a dreadful .574, and he still played in 148 games. Among all players since 1901 with at least 500 plate appearances in a season, Newman in 2021 compiled the 197th-lowest OPS in modern baseball history. In that same span, it was the ninthlowest OPS from a Pirates player.
Those aren’t stats that will inspire confidence in either onlookers or the player himself.
“Hitting-wise, there was some of that [doubt],” Newman said this week in Milwaukee. “I think that’s more common than you’d probably think, just because baseball is so hard. You fail seven out of 10 times, you hit .300. It’s really crazy. I know everyone knows that, but just thinking about that is pretty nuts. There is a little bit of doubt, where it’s like, ‘Where do I go from here?’”
Newman may have been saved by the fact that he was a Gold Glove finalist at shortstop in the National League. At the very least, it likely allowed him to get to 500 plate appearances. The Pirates would have been well within reason to let Newman go or option him to try any other bat on most days.
Perhaps the Pirates remember 2019, too. Maybe they believed in Newman’s offseason work ethic. After the 2020 season, they challenged Newman to improve his defense, and as stated he nearly won a Gold Glove. At the end of the brutal 2021 year, he expressed a belief that if he could turn his defense around, he could do the same with his swing.
He isn’t really at his 2019 level yet, but Newman has been so much better at the plate. His .281 average is the best of any Pirates player this season with at least 50 plate appearances. And while his OPS still sits at .707, a tick below league average, the fact that Newman is on base more often than any time since his rookie season and that the bat has come alive in a way is encouragement enough.
What’s interesting is that Newman’s improvements have come with several changes to his batting stance and a shift in approach. But all of them were in an effort to return to his 2019 swing path, and Newman feels he has made real progress there.
“The biggest thing is direction, staying through balls,” Newman said. “I think I’m staying through off-speed better, and when you’re hitting off-speed better, you see more fastballs. It’s all just relative. I think that’s been really helping me.”
Manager Derek Shelton wasn’t in Pittsburgh in 2019. Surely, he has seen video, but he wasn’t around Newman every day as he pushed to career-best numbers. He did see the down times, though, and he’s now seeing the improvements.
“I think the thing that stands out to me the most is the aggressiveness of his swings,” Newman said. “At times before, it was very contact-oriented. Now, it looks to me like he’s trying to impact the baseball. That’s the thing that stands out to me that’s moved forward the most.”
Now, it isn’t all going to be roses for Newman. It would seem unlikely that he’ll suddenly find a power stroke and hit even 15 homers in a season moving forward. He had just 12 in his rookie year, anyway. Plus, his .707 OPS this season is exactly league average. Obviously, the goal would be to surpass that.
But this season remains a success story, both because of the dreadful season he had last year and because his current positive numbers have come in two stretches sandwiched around soft-tissue injuries.
Newman was hitting .250 through 14 games in April before going on the injured list, but he felt good about his swing at the time. In his time off, throughout recovery, he was still able to swing and said he kept his focus on maintaining his swing path, hopeful that it could bring him closer to his 2019 form.
Since his return in early July, Newman is hitting .283 with a .714 OPS. Since Aug. 9, in 18 games, he has eight multi-hit games, spurring him to a .323 average with a .797 OPS.
Point being, Newman truly has continued to improve as the season has gone on. In his mind, that’s hard work paying off.