Why Brandon Belt’s approach vs. off-speed pitches will shape 2023 results

When the Toronto Blue Jays signed Brandon Belt, he was positioned as a complementary piece on a group making ending touches to its 2023 roster. 

That’s a good strategy to conceptualize a 34-year-old coming off a 0.0 fWAR season on a flier of a one-year $9.3 million contract. It additionally severely undersells the veteran’s offensive upside. 

Not solely does he have a prolonged monitor document of being a properly above-average hitter, however between 2020 and 2021 he wielded one of the vital harmful bats within the recreation. 

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Because of the pandemic-shortened season and a few accidents, he took simply 560 journeys to the plate throughout that point — however his manufacturing was nothing wanting elite. Belt’s wRC+ of 162 was the third-best mark within the majors amongst gamers with 500-plus plate appearances, proper between Bryce Harper and Ronald Acuna Jr.

Perhaps extra surprisingly his .310 ISO additionally ranked third — a surprising quantity for a hitter who by no means topped 18 dwelling runs between 2011 and 2019. It was particularly spectacular for a participant plying his commerce in a ballpark that ranked because the fifth-most pitcher-friendly venue within the majors in each of these seasons in keeping with Statcast.

Recreating manufacturing like that can be a tall process for Belt. It’s unfair to rely on him to be one in every of baseball’s most potent hitters in 2023. If that have been an inexpensive expectation he wouldn’t have been obtainable on the deal he signed. 

That stated, it’s value understanding what made the primary baseman so harmful in 2020 and 2021 — and because of this, how he might shock as a Blue Jay in 2023.

Much has been manufactured from Belt’s knee points, and rightly so. A return to well being is essential for any success he has this season. Shortly after signing with Toronto, he instructed Shi Davidi that the muscle tissue round his knee shut down all through 2022 and clearly that’s an untenable state of affairs for an expert baseball participant.

When you will have a participant who will flip 35 in April who handled accidents of that magnitude just lately there’s cause for concern.

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At the identical time, what made Belt so good previous to his troublesome 2022 marketing campaign had much more to do along with his strategy than his uncooked bodily capacity. For reference, the primary baseman has the identical profession common exit velocity as Cavan Biggio (88.3) with a max exit velocity simply 0.3 mph tougher.

So, what was the magical strategy that made a man with solid-but-unspectacular energy right into a participant with the second-highest slugging proportion within the majors over a two-year span?

More than something, what Belt did proper was deal with gentle stuff. 

His .544 SLG vs. fastballs ranked 72nd amongst hitters who noticed at the least 500 pitches in 2020 and 2021. His .677 SLG vs. breaking balls and off-speed pitches led the majors.

Without the posh of elite uncooked energy, he completely teed off on something that wasn’t a fastball in a method that he’d by no means carried out earlier than — and failed to copy in 2022.

In order to know the way it helps to divide his strategy towards non-fastballs into pitches inside and out of doors the zone.

A excessive proportion of changeups and breaking balls within the zone are errors. That’s most likely much less true now than it might’ve been 20 years in the past when fewer high-velocity sliders existed and pitchers have been much less experimental with their pitch mixes.

Even so, relating to breaking balls and off-speed pitches, most are designed to get batters to chase exterior the zone, particularly low. If a hitter sees one in every of these choices within the zone it most likely isn’t imagined to be there, and is asking to get smacked.

Imagine any hanging breaking ball you’ve ever seen get crushed. 

Or, higher but, watch Belt destroy this Tylor Megill slider that catches an excessive amount of of the plate.

For most of his profession, Belt swung at these pitches virtually indiscriminately, hacking 72.8 % of the time. The outcomes — a .283 BA and .544 SLG — have been stable, however we’re speaking about hitters’ pitches right here.

In his breakout seasons Belt was much more refined. He swung for 64.6 % of those pitches and regardless that it meant taking extra strikes he was much more environment friendly along with his cuts.

Here’s a take a look at his launch angles on in-zone non-fastballs from 2020-21… 

… in comparison with the opposite seasons of his profession (excluding pre-Statcast years):

By being just a little extra selective, Belt was capable of lock in on among the finest pitches to hit within the majors. He hit .339 and slugged .809 off them with 43.3 % of his balls in play going for hits in comparison with 35 % in his different seasons.

Outside the zone

It’s robust for hitters to win towards gentle stuff exterior the zone, particularly because it usually is available in unfavourable counts after they’re compelled to guard the plate.

For the overwhelming majority of his profession, Belt might do nothing with these pitches, hitting .128 and slugging .144 towards them exterior of 2020 and 2021.

In these two seasons, he made a large enchancment, hitting .210 and slugging .419. While selectivity drove his success on in-zone non-fastballs, his swing fee didn’t change a lot on these pitches. 

Instead, he unlocked the power to dig them out, one thing that had at all times eluded him. In these seasons he hit 4 dwelling runs off gentle stuff of the plate — probably the most spectacular being this 418-foot shot off southpaw Andrew Chafin:

That’s notable as a result of he’d by no means cleared the wall on a pitch like this in 4,221 MLB plate appearances earlier than 2020.

It’s robust to pin down precisely how Belt unlocked this counterpunching capacity, nevertheless it’s unlikely to be gone for good. Even by means of all of his struggles final yr, he hit a protracted ball on one in every of these pitches — projected at 414 ft — than he ever had between 2011 and 2019.

By streamlining his strategy on gentle pitches to hit and discovering some thump towards ones he’d by no means dealt with properly earlier than, Belt turned MLB’s most harmful hitter on non-fastballs.

He’s unlikely to imagine that mantle once more, nevertheless it appears honest to be bullish on a participant who’s used a complicated strategy to show good-not-great uncooked energy into elite energy manufacturing.

Led by his capacity to hit the gentle stuff, Belt has a ability set that ought to play even in his mid-thirties because it’s much more reliant on his strategy than any loud instruments that Father Time can rob from him.

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