What Will it Take for Us To Avg. .300+

[Garnet Gamecock]

I believe that Ray can transform our hitting game.

The Wildcats had 9 hitters who avg. above .300 and some were over .350 and one was over .400, which is insane...

If I saw the correct stats, we had many more home runs this year than they did, so it isn't a power thing, it's "moneyball".

If we set a goal of having 9 of our guys bat over .300, could we pull that off by this time next year?

I say YES!

That would then make for one hell of a rematch.

[carolinafan111]

Originally Posted by Garnet Gamecock

I believe that Ray can transform our hitting game.

The Wildcats had 9 hitters who avg. above .300 and some were over .350 and one was over .400, which is insane...

If I saw the correct stats, we had many more home runs this year than they did, so it isn't a power thing, it's "moneyball".

If we set a goal of having 9 of our guys bat over .300, could we pull that off by this time next year?

I say YES!

That would then make for one hell of a rematch.

it would take a stadium with 400 foot power allies. They out hit us in the finals for sure, but they are strictly a singles hitting team with a few extra base hits. In our park, their power numbers slightly increase but their averages significantly go down because of less room in the outfield

[usc1]

Originally Posted by carolinafan111

it would take a stadium with 400 foot power allies. They out hit us in the finals for sure, but they are strictly a singles hitting team with a few extra base hits. In our park, their power numbers slightly increase but their averages significantly go down because of less room in the outfield

Don't know about all 9 but I could see 5 or so guys realistically hitting .300 next year...English, Pankake, Martin, Costen, and possibly Payne.

[GarnetInChicago]

Originally Posted by usc1

Don't know about all 9 but I could see 5 or so guys realistically hitting .300 next year...English, Pankake, Martin, Costen, and possibly Payne.

It will be very interesting to see how Tanner adjusts after his eye surgery. I could also see Greiner becoming a .300 hitter. He's shown flashes.

[carolinafan111]

Originally Posted by usc1

Don't know about all 9 but I could see 5 or so guys realistically hitting .300 next year...English, Pankake, Martin, Costen, and possibly Payne.

I think as a team if we can average about .280-.285 we will be in good shape hitting

[STEPHONGILMOREFAN!]

Originally Posted by usc1

Don't know about all 9 but I could see 5 or so guys realistically hitting .300 next year...English, Pankake, Martin, Costen, and possibly Payne.

No gg?

[usc1]

Originally Posted by STEPHONGILMOREFAN!

No gg?

He's got potential but a 70 point jump in batting average would be pretty tough to do. I think he's a .260-.280 guy with 8-12 HR next year.

[cack]

A hitting coach. I believe Coach Tanner is one of the greatest Head Coaches of all time, but you can't say he can fix our hitting when it hasn't happened the last few years.

We haven't hit the ball worth a piss during this 3 year run. We've just gotten that one or two timely hit when we needed it, and our pitching has been INSANE. We need a HITTING (not batting) coach to teach these guys approach and how to hit opposite field

[bertoholic]

Agreed Cack. It seems like Coach Chad and Coach Sammy share the duties. I believe with a certified and knowledgeable hitting coach, we could have been unstoppable this year. I sat at 30 games this year and other than a little streak here and there, I saw no progress in any of our hitters.

[eaglegolf018]

Payne has such a sweet swing. That guy has .330 hitter written all over him.

It's a catch 22. You remember when Smoak, Disher, Jones, Havens, and Darnell were killing the baseball? Well how many 12-9 games did we lose? More than I are to count. We had no bullpen and no starting pitching depth. If I had to choose, I pick pitching. But naturally I want to win every game 9-0.

[TheMule]

1. Don't have to hit the first pitch that's in the strike zone
2. Don't have to swing for the fence 70% of the time
3. Use the whole field and hit the ball where it's pitched...especially with two strikes.
4. Choke up on the bat on a two strike count. It doesn't mean you're a sissy. It just gives better bat control to foul off good pitches until you get a good pitch to hit.

IMO hitting a baseball at a high level of competition is tha hardest thing to do in sports. Is the ball going to break up, down, left, right; how fast is it going; is it in the strike zone. You have a fraction of a second to decide all of this and if you hit it fair you've got 9 people trying to keep you from safely reaching base. You're a great hitter if you're sussessful 1 out of 3 times...(even the weatherman has better odds than that!)

[Metalrush24]

Originally Posted by eaglegolf018

Payne has such a sweet swing. That guy has .330 hitter written all over him.

It's a catch 22. You remember when Smoak, Disher, Jones, Havens, and Darnell were killing the baseball? Well how many 12-9 games did we lose? More than I are to count. We had no bullpen and no starting pitching depth. If I had to choose, I pick pitching. But naturally I want to win every game 9-0.

True story..

[usc1]

Originally Posted by cack

A hitting coach. I believe Coach Tanner is one of the greatest Head Coaches of all time, but you can't say he can fix our hitting when it hasn't happened the last few years.

We haven't hit the ball worth a piss during this 3 year run. We've just gotten that one or two timely hit when we needed it, and our pitching has been INSANE. We need a HITTING (not batting) coach to teach these guys approach and how to hit opposite field

Which coach are you gonna replace?

[ccured]

.275 is .325 from 8 years ago. Pitching ERA is the inverse as well

[jcook84]

I saw a ton of bad swings on offspeed stuff this year. We killed fastballs that were pecker-high and middle-in, but too many guys nearly came out of their helmets swinging and missing offspeed/breaking stuff.

We have a really young team, and a lot of these guys are going from big fish/small pond to small fish/big pond. I think this year was the adjustment period for a bunch of our younger players...I think we will hit in the high .280s as a team next year with 4-6 guys over .300.

When Tanner English starts to put the ball on the ground and cut down on his K's he will hit .330+, and like someone said earlier, Payne has a sweet stroke and could be in the .330 range as well. Pankake, Martin, and Costen could hit .300. I see Greiner and LB hitting ~.280 with 10+ home runs each.

[Fear#5]

This lineup getting experience will also help. With all the young guys getting the experience to division one pitching the averages will rise. I believe, depending on who replaces Marzilli, Walker, and Matthews, every person in the lineup has .300 potential except for LB. He's a strict power hitter and I don't know if that will change.

[FloydTheBarber]

So, if y'all want a hitting coach...which current assistant do you give the boot?

[jesse james]

Originally Posted by carolinafan111

it would take a stadium with 400 foot power allies. They out hit us in the finals for sure, but they are strictly a singles hitting team with a few extra base hits. In our park, their power numbers slightly increase but their averages significantly go down because of less room in the outfield

^This.

They had those high batting averages because of the big park they play in. Not to make excuses for our team, but it was a HUGE advantage to them to play in a park so similar to theirs. AZ only had a handfull of HRs all year because they learned that the fence was unreachable, so they didn't go up to the plate looking for it.

Again, not takng anything away from AZ - they thumped us . . . but play that same series at the Blatt, and I think we win handily (we had at least 5 or 6 balls that would have been out at the Blatt)

[Garnet girl]

GG almost hit it out last night. He is going to be a killer in the future.
All of this stuff about Twitter is crazy. I looked at my Facebook, which I do not do daily, and there is a post claiming Ray Tanner was a bad coach during this series. Social media is ugly sometimes. Of course it was one of my "friends."

[bigdog2003]

Originally Posted by TheMule

1. Don't have to hit the first pitch that's in the strike zone
2. Don't have to swing for the fence 70% of the time
3. Use the whole field and hit the ball where it's pitched...especially with two strikes.
4. Choke up on the bat on a two strike count. It doesn't mean you're a sissy. It just gives better bat control to foul off good pitches until you get a good pitch to hit.

IMO hitting a baseball at a high level of competition is tha hardest thing to do in sports. Is the ball going to break up, down, left, right; how fast is it going; is it in the strike zone. You have a fraction of a second to decide all of this and if you hit it fair you've got 9 people trying to keep you from safely reaching base. You're a great hitter if you're sussessful 1 out of 3 times...(even the weatherman has better odds than that!)

I agree with that. Hitting a baseball at a high level is hard. I think they need to spend a lot of time this offseason hitting breaking stuff. There were times we just looked shocked by breaking pitches.

Another thing is hitting with 2 strikes. Choke up and hit it somewhere. We use to say choke it and poke it when I was playing ball, meaning choke up and hit it the other way. You don't have to be a hero every pitch.