Mired in the worst slump of his career, Chicago’s veteran shortstop hits the bench. Craig Counsell hopes a few days off will get Swanson back on track.
The Chicago Cubs will give shortstop Dansby Swanson a mental reset.
Swanson is not in the lineup for Saturday’s game against the San Francisco Giants. Nico Hoerner will take his spot at shortstop, while Pedro Ramirez will draw his third career start at second base.
The expectation is that Swanson will get a few days off amid a rough start to the season. The 32-year-old is slashing just .180/.285/.322 with seven home runs, six doubles, 28 RBI, and five stolen bases across 61 games.
This mental reset is surely much needed for Swanson, as he is arguably in the worst stretch of his career at the plate. He is batting only .135 with one home run, three RBI, and two stolen bases in his last 22 games since May 10.
The Cubs plan to let him ride the bench for the next few games in hopes of breaking out of this slump. Swanson likely won’t be in the lineup for Sunday’s series finale, but he could return to the lineup on Tuesday following Monday’s off-day.
Swanson has not provided much for Chicago’s offense this year. He is batting just .153 (9-for-59) with 21 strikeouts with runners in scoring position, has a .125 batting average (4-for-32) in late and close games, and is slashing .119/.220/.286 with 14 strikeouts in high-leverage situations.
On top of that, his underlying metrics are a bit worrisome moving forward. Swanson currently ranks in the bottom 20% of the league in xwOBA (.292), expected batting average (.197), expected slugging (.347), and launch angle sweet-spot rate (26.8%). Even his barrel rate (7.2%) is down 4.5% from last year.
In these same metrics last year, the Cubs shortstop ranked in the 77th percentile in xwOBA (.345), 77th percentile in expected batting average (.267), 80th percentile in expected slugging (.477), 74th percentile in barrel rate (11.7%), and 74th percentile in launch angle sweet-spot rate (36.9%).
That’s a massive difference.
Swanson’s regression this season is due to his inability to hit offspeed pitches. He has a .036 batting average against offspeed pitches (changeups/splitters) and a .106 batting average against breaking balls (curveballs/sliders/sweepers). The veteran also has a whiff rate above 36% on both pitch types.
Chicago has been notorious for giving veteran players mental resets in slumps. The team did it with Seiya Suzuki a few years ago and just recently gave Ian Happ two days off during his offensive struggles last month.
The Cubs hope that giving Swanson a few days off will help him get back into the right game space and regain his confidence. He has been reeling at the plate lately and could benefit from a few days off.
