Delmon Young

by DedicatedFollowerOfFashion on Jul 5, 2008 12:43 PM EDT

6 hits in his last 9 plate appearances, but his hot hitting goes farther back, in his last 15 games, Delmon has had 5 3-hit games (his state line reads .390/.429.576/1.005)

If you want to back farther, I'll go back to June 1. Since then Delmon has played 25 games and had 101 plate appearances and 33 resulted in hits (12 XBH and a stat line of .344/.366/.531/.897)

So my question I pose to you: Will Delmon keep getting those hits (hopefully for extra bases) or is this just a nice hot streak and the hits will dry up soon and we'll all go back to throwing foam objects at the TV screen whenever he is up

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It'll keep going.

He’s been a much better hitter since…what…around May 20? May 22? He’s a great natural hitter, which of course means he needs some luck to go his way in order to post a good batting average, but hopefully as he continues to find his power stroke and hit a few more line drives he can keep it up. I’d also like to think that at some point he can start taking more walks…instead of getting 40 a year, maybe get 60-70. That’s optimistic of me, I know, but I can’t help it.

He’ll hit a cold snap again eventually, but I think the hitter we’ve seen the last month and a half is much closer to the real Delmon Young than the one we saw for the first seven weeks of the season.

by Jesse on Jul 5, 2008 12:58 PM EDT reply actions

I didn't

I didn’t know you were doing position breakdowns. This could of been discussed in the OF section. lol

But yeah, it would be nice to see Delmon take a walk. Maybe its been discussed and I forgot, but when Delmon walks, its seems like he said to himself before the at bat ‘Delmon, you are talking a walk’ and keeps his bat on his shoulders, and every other at bat he swings at the first pitch. Maybe thats just the growing pains the Twins fans will have to put up with for a while.

I was excited when the Twins got him, and it was getting really hard to cheer for him about about a month ago. So Im glad he is going in the right direction

by DedicatedFollowerOfFashion on Jul 5, 2008 1:22 PM EDT up reply actions

He was shown to be more patient this year.

You can probably attribute the upgrade to a better series of luck, but last night… that was awesome, that was what most Twins fans were expecting back when that trade went down.

by CARXRiedmann on Jul 5, 2008 1:26 PM EDT reply actions

It was an awesome shot...

...the second it left the bat, you knew it was out. Just a screaming liner that went into the seats, it was out of the park in a hot tick. It’s nice to see him pull the ball like that, because that’s where a lot of his power can come from—mistakes inside.

by Jesse on Jul 5, 2008 1:27 PM EDT up reply actions

Hot tick?

Is that like in a jiff? I’m keeping track of all the times you get you use British idioms.

"You're thinking too much. Just have fun." -- Bennie "The Jet" Rodriguez in Sandlot

by cmathewson on Jul 6, 2008 10:08 PM EDT up reply actions

Last two homeruns

Were both on slow curve balls on the inner half of the plate. As a whole though he’s hitting much better against right-handed pitchers which actually makes sense because most of his hits come from flicking his wrists at pitches middle to the outer half of the plate. Until he starts using more of his legs and and lower body to drive the ball, I doubt he’ll develop into anything more than a position filler in the lineup. Obviously the tools are there, but the skills are still pretty weak at this point. I recently looked at his spray charts from this year and last. The scary part is that he’s regressed significantly from last year. There’s been an improvement in the last couple of weeks, but last year balls were flying all over the field. This year everything as been to the right side, hit with very little authority.

Gardenhire's major league career: Banjo hitting, futility infielder who couldn't lick it.
Rick Anderson's major league career: Strikethrower who never made it happen with his sub 90's fastball.
Really gives a new definition to living vicariously through other people, don't it?

by caseintheface on Jul 5, 2008 3:11 PM EDT reply actions

He made a great adjustment on

Were both on slow curve balls on the inner half of the plate

Are you saying that’s an easy pitch to hit? On his July Fourth Roman candle, he adjusted nicely, was clearly expecting fastball and made a helluva adjustment to ding that thing off Byrd.

by Sev on Jul 6, 2008 12:30 AM EDT reply actions

I'm saying it's an easy pitch to turn on

Once he shows the ability to turn on a fastball on the inner half of the plate, we’ll know he’ll be progressing. For the time being his approach and feel for hitting at this point is pretty poor.

by caseintheface on Jul 6, 2008 10:37 AM EDT up reply actions

Defense?

His defense is awful. When he does make mistakes, he does not hustle to make the play. Saturday night he made 2 glowing mistakes and luckily Slowly and Gomez kept it from being a disaster. I rather have Kubel or Monroe out there than Young. When Cuddy gets back I would love to see him in right and Spann in left with Young as a DH.

by langer125 on Jul 6, 2008 2:02 PM EDT reply actions

I wouldn't mind seeing that...

...although when Cuddyer gets back, he needs to hit. You could always try putting Delmon in right field while Cuddles is out to see if he feels a bit more natural there, since that’s where he played for Tampa.

by Jesse on Jul 6, 2008 2:20 PM EDT up reply actions

This reminds me of..

During the beginning of the season they were considering putting him in center, good times.

by CARXRiedmann on Jul 6, 2008 3:20 PM EDT up reply actions

First of all

Then what do you do with Kubel? I think Young’s defensive inadequacies are overblown because he looks so damn clunky out there and he has misplayed a few balls. I think with some experience he’ll be fine out there. HIs arm and speed are too significant of tools to give up on him as an outfielder. I’m all for giving him breaks and having Span out there for a night or if he keeps the hitting up put Kubel out in left and have Young DH for a night.

To me the real turning point was when Delmon took a day off on May 29th. He had just finished having a horrible week and then after being benched for a day has hit 345/365/518. The other odd thing is he was walking a lot in May and then that just disappeared as he started to hit. So if the guy can hit like this while not trying to take walks I’ll take it over a guy who hits for crap and gets a few more walks.

Peyton's good but have you ever heard of Jeff George?

by halfchest on Jul 6, 2008 8:07 PM EDT up reply actions