San Diego Padres outfielder Fernando Tatis Jr. has become a singles hitter, and the Padres are trying to fix that.
It’s been 214 days since outfielder Fernando Tatis Jr. last homered in a major-league game, and that’s becoming a problem for the San Diego Padres. Their record is currently 19-11, but they’re paying Tatis a huge amount of money to hit homers, not just be a productive offensive player.
Yesterday’s loss was yet another recent example of how this has looked yesterday, according to Dennis Lin of The Athletic. Reliever Ben Brown of the Chicago Cubs hung a breaking ball in a 1-1 count with the bases loaded, nobody out and the Padres trailing 5-3, and the best Tatis could manage was a sacrifice fly to center even though the exit velocity of the ball he hit was was 102.8 mph.
“I’ve been close for a while, but it’s just a sacrifice fly,” Tatis said Wednesday, slouched in his clubhouse chair after a 5-4 loss. “I just see it that way.”
It’s been a maddening month for Tatis, as Lin described it, as the Padres right fielder leads the majors with a 64.7 percent hard-hit rate, which is better than three players with double-digit home run totals--Munetaka Murakami, Ben Rice and James Woods.
But barreling up balls isn’t doing Tatis much good, as he’s hitting .250 with just four doubles and no other extra base hits. He’s struggled consistently to elevate or pull balls, and his season-opening streak of 131 plate appearances without a home run is one shy of the streak he had last summer, which was the worst of his career.
The Padres are now designing drills to help Tatis conquer his new-found status as a singles hitter, according to hitting instructor Raul Padron.
“We’re working on it. We continue to work,” said Padron, who’s putting these drills together with new hitting coach Steve Souza. “You know, being the No. 1 guy hitting the ball hard in all of MLB and not getting the result he wants, it’s kind of hard.”
Tatis has undergone surgeries on his wrist and shoulder, and he also served a PED suspension, but the Padres insist it’s not about that.
“It’s about timing,” Padron said. “It’s a little bit out of whack, but he’s continued to hit the ball hard. Good things are going to happen. … You just got to hang with it a little bit and put your work in every day, and eventually it will be happening for him.”
The Padres want Tatis to get out in front of vulnerable pitches more, but the process isn’t that simple. It’s dangerous to mess with an effective swing from a player who’s generating hard contact, and Souza and Padron know it.
“The hardest thing about when you go through a stretch like this is to not try and do more,” Souza said. “When (Tatis) hits the ball, it’s like a hot knife slicing through butter, and it goes a long ways. The problem with any hitter in this room, not just Tati, is when you try and hit it far. That’s when you end up breaking down mechanically.”
That’s not happening yet, but Tatis is frustrated. It’s hard to keep doing hard work and not get results, but that’s where he’s at right now, and he knows this.
“Just not happy,” Tatis said. “I’m going through it, and I’m just trying to figure it out.”