Dustin Pedroia gets a new grip
Can a new type of bat grip keep Dustin Pedroia healthy and improve his performance? Chris Towers investigates at the Fantasy Baseball Today blog.
Red Sox second baseman Dustin Pedroia is enjoying a bounceback season, and if you believe a Yahoo.com article Wednesday, it is no coincidence. Pedroia's hand and wrist issues appear to be in the past, and Pedroia may have found a reason why: a new, state-of-the-art bat.
Pedroia is hitting .353 over his last 28 games, and it may not just be an example of arbitrary endpoints painting a pretty picture. According to the story, Pedroia made the switch to a new bat with an ax-style handle. He isn't the first major-league player to toy with this type of bat, but he might be the first to make it a permanent switch.
The article cites a study -- paid for by the bat manufacturer, for what it's worth -- that "the axe handle bat puts the wrist in a more neutral position at the onset of the swing. Also, by eliminating the impingement caused by the back protrusion of the round knob, the same amount of wrist flexion moves the barrel a greater distance. These two factors combine to provide the hitter with 15-20 degrees of additional bat whip and a larger window of opportunity to accelerate the bat. This additional whip can be used to generate greater bat speed at the point of contact with the ball."
It is fair to wonder if this is just a coincidence, of course, and the numbers bear that out somewhat. A one-player sample size over a few dozen games won't prove anything, but we can test a few of these claims to see if Pedroia is truly taking advantage of the supposed benefits. We can't measure bat speed directly, but there are a few ways we can approximate it; if a batter is generating more speed with his swing, he might be expected to swing and miss less and hit the ball harder, right?
Take a look at Pedroia's production, from the start of the season through May 21, and then from that point on:
Through May 21: .270/.352/.415 in 183 PA; .281 BABIP; .145 ISO, 11.5 K%, 10.9 BB%, 4.9 Whiff percentage; 87.6 MPH average exit velocity
Since May 22: .353/.391/.504 in 128 PA; .384 BABIP; .151 ISO, 13.3 K%, 5.4 BB%, 5.8 Whiff percentage; 88.8 MPH average exit velocity
So, he's hitting the ball a little bit harder, while sacrificing a ton of plate discipline at the same time. Can that slight uptick in batted-ball velocity really be the reason his balls in play are so much more successful? It's certainly possible, but I'm not sure I would bet on it, given that so little else about his game has improved in the time we're talking about.
Of course, the article makes other claims as to the bat's ergonomic qualities, which might actually be the more important note here. Pedroia's biggest issue hasn't just been his lack of productivity over the last few seasons, but also his inability to stay healthy. Even if Pedroia's new bat isn't the reason he is hitting the ball so well lately, if it can help him stay healthy, it might be worth its weight in gold anyways.
All told, it is fair to be skeptical about viewing this bat change as a panacea. Pedroia hasn't been much different as a hitter since he made the switch, he's just been a bit luckier on balls in play, it seems. This doesn't seem to be a new and improved Pedroia, then.
However, if the bat makers claims that it can help prevent hand and wrist injuries are to be believed, there might be value in taking note of this just for the potential increased chance Pedroia stays healthy. It's hard to take much, if anything, concrete from this, but it is certainly worth keeping an eye on how Pedria fares, or if he even sticks with the bat long-term.
