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Machado and Davis decline - numbers do not lie


Pat Kelly

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Remember when I said Machado could finish the season at .275 before he started slumping? He was hitting with doubles and racking up the hits, but I saw this coming. People tore me a new one. All I said was he couldn't hit a slider and his plate discipline in general is poor and that his BABIP was unsustainable?

Now look who looks dumb now.

Jeez, Cal, you've just got to stop talking about yrself and tearing yrself a new one everyday in public!

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Two things on Davis. One the league has adjusted to throwing him inside. Two he looks like he is trying to homer every at bat. He has more of an upper cut now. Before he was just trying to hit the ball hard and its would go out the park.

I agree the Maris record has got into his head.

Indeed, he was swinging out of his shoes on every pitch the other night. I just want him to try to make contact right now cuz he's fighting with all his might just to do even that, let alone hit it hard somewhere. He looks like Mark Reynolds up there. Not even close on pitches half the time.

I'd love to know what Buck and Pressly are saying to him about this. it's like he's walking to the plate with no plan, or a bad one.

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I saw a very suprising stat on Machado last night. I have heard and heard he can not hi thte slider which is how they are getting him out. However it is the fastball that is getting him out. I don't remember the exact numbers but in the begining of the season( I believe it was about a month and a hal)f he was hitting .358 and OPSing over 1.050 vs fastballs 93+. Since that time he is hitting just .078 vs them and OPS like .202. So maybe the slider is not th problem. Would love to know the numbes vs the others pitches over that time.

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I saw a very suprising stat on Machado last night. I have heard and heard he can not hi thte slider which is how they are getting him out. However it is the fastball that is getting him out. I don't remember the exact numbers but in the begining of the season( I believe it was about a month and a hal)f he was hitting .358 and OPSing over 1.050 vs fastballs 93+. Since that time he is hitting just .078 vs them and OPS like .202. So maybe the slider is not th problem. Would love to know the numbes vs the others pitches over that time.
From the ESPN piece:
As Justin Havens of ESPN Stats & Information reports, "Machado's approach has completely fallen apart since June 1 -- he's striking out more often, walking less, swinging through pitches more often and chasing more pitches out of the strike zone." Justin reports that Machado has especially struggled with two strikes; through May, he was hitting .267 with two strikes, but since then he's hitting .170 with a chase percentage that's increased from 33 percent to 47 percent thanks largely to a heavy dosage of sliders that he can't lay off. In other words, typical struggles you expect to see from a kid who just turned 21 and isn't named Mike Trout.

Machado has also struggled against good fastballs since June 1; on pitches clocked at 93-plus mph, he's hit .093 with a .230 OPS, worst in baseball. The sample size is small -- just 163 pitches -- but all the indicators are down compared to the first two months, with a swing-and-miss percentage up from 15 percent to 23 percent and line drive rate down from 24 percent to 9 percent. He's just not hitting the good heat. Machado hasn't missed a game, so while it sounds a little bit like a young hitter struggling to adjust, it also looks like a guy who could use a day off.

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The scariest part of this is no matter how much better others hit, no one on the team offsets Davis' slumps. He has been the difference maker so unless Wieters starts hitting HR's every night (with men on base) the offense is in trouble. Davis K's combined with Machado's Ryan Flaherty impersonation out of the number 2 spot in the lineup changes the fortunes of this team unless the starting pitching starts going 8 innings and allows 1-2 runs a night. This team is based on 5 run per game offensive performance, leading the league in team SLG %...we are in trouble if the doubles and HR disappear for a long period.

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Slumps do happen, but there are disturbing numbers on both of these guys that are approaching the 'it might be more than a slump' territory. CUF will say that Machado can't hit the fastball because he's too busy looking for the slider and gets blown away!

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I love the "book is out on Davis" crowd - and I don't want to make fun of anyone specifcially but it really makes me laugh.

Royals Manager: We have Baltimore this week. You heard about this Davis guy?

Royals GM: Davis?

Royals Manager: Yeah, Chris Davis. Says here been in the league 5 years. Has hit 70 home runs the last year and a half? 37 already this year!

Royals GM: Really - 37 home runs already? Want to scout him?

Royals Manager: Hate to bother them - but might be worth asking.

Royals GM: (calls Scout) : What do you know about this Davis with the Orioles?

Royals Scout: Been kind of wondering when someone would ask. Fastballs inside - can't hit 'em.

Royals Manager: Oh good. Let's just do that then.

Everyone relax, it's a slump. Davis is a career .268 hitter who was hitting .330 and on pace to break the single season HR record. He's going to cool off for a while. He hasn't been solved - he'll be back hitting again at some point.

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I love the "book is out on Davis" crowd - and I don't want to make fun of anyone specifcially but it really makes me laugh.

Royals Manager: We have Baltimore this week. You heard about this Davis guy?

Royals GM: Davis?

Royals Manager: Yeah, Chris Davis. Says here been in the league 5 years. Has hit 70 home runs the last year and a half? 37 already this year!

Royals GM: Really - 37 home runs already? Want to scout him?

Royals Manager: Hate to bother them - but might be worth asking.

Royals GM: (calls Scout) : What do you know about this Davis with the Orioles?

Royals Scout: Been kind of wondering when someone would ask. Fastballs inside - can't hit 'em.

Royals Manager: Oh good. Let's just do that then.

Everyone relax, it's a slump. Davis is a career .268 hitter who was hitting .330 and on pace to break the single season HR record. He's going to cool off for a while. He hasn't been solved - he'll be back hitting again at some point.

What you fail to comprehend perhaps is that if he regresses to .800 OPS Chris Davis the offense is screwed. It was great having 1.100 OPS Davis, and now that hes regressing so is the offense.

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I comprehend very well the notion that if Davis unravels that is bad for our offense. What I enjoyed was the notion expressed by some in the thread that the reason Davis struggled the last 3 games is that someone just now figured out how to pitch to him. As though over the last year when he was terrorizing baseball teams were just like "Davis, no time to worry about hm - meh - throw him whatever. We need to get back to working on our plan to pitch to Teagarden if he gets in the game late."

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These slumps are 2 months long. Sure, no one should be leaping off of bridges, but there's cause for some concern.

Yet we keep winning games and every other week we seem to be another "season-high ___ games" over .500.

Machado might not break the doubles streak - but I don't see him simply forgetting how to swing a bat for the rest of the season.

Davis might not hit 62, but I sincerely doubt he has forgotten how to hit home runs. Last year Davis hit 20 homers in July through the remainder. He already has six and July still has a week left in it.

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Yet we keep winning games and every other week we seem to be another "season-high ___ games" over .500.

Machado might not break the doubles streak - but I don't see him simply forgetting how to swing a bat for the rest of the season.

Davis might not hit 62, but I sincerely doubt he has forgotten how to hit home runs. Last year Davis hit 20 homers in July through the remainder. He already has six and July still has a week left in it.

Did you read the article? Those trends didn't even raise an eyebrow?

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