Moshe and commenter Trevor seem to take some issue with my assessment of Jackson’s power potential as Jeter-like. A lot of people I think have the misconception that Jackson is a 25+ HR threat. Jackson’s opposite-field swing is what prevents this from happening. A closer look at his spray charts from Minor League Splits tells us a little bit about Jackson.
Jackson’s 2008 campaign with the Trenton Thunder:
[image title="austin-jackson-spraychart-trenton" size="full" id="2765" align="center" ]
And his 2007 half-season break out with the Tampa Yankees:
[image title="jackson-spray-chart-tampa" size="full" id="2767" align="center" ]
We we can see here is that Jackson throws most of his fly balls to right field, but only hits the ball hard enough to put it out of the park when he pulls it. In fact, the weakness of his opposite-field fly balls hurt him considerably at Double-A last year, as many of them fell for outs. He sprayed more fly balls toward the middle and to left to compensate. These charts might indicate that he should pull the ball more, but I’m not hitting coach. But, right now at least, Jackson just doesn’t put up enough fly balls to left field to hit 20+ home runs.
Jackson hit .282/.354/.417 with 9 home runs, 5 triples, and 33 doubles with Trenton and .346/.400/.571 with 10 home runs, 6 triples, and 15 doubles for Tampa in half a season.
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10 Responses to Austin Jackson Continued: How Much Power?
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TIQ IQ
Very good chart, it should have some fans looking closer at all the A-Jax rhetoric. When some were saying how good he was going to be…others were saying he would be much closer to Bambi (Bernie) when he 1st came up. As you stated earlier, he is an athlete (as Bernie), learning to play baseball at the highest level in the world. Let’s all hope he can become an acceptable if not better CF for the Yanks, he has his job cut out for him.
Usually I am very optimistic, A-Jax hasn’t shown me a lot, he has shown flashes but, not the basics one needs to be proficient…meaning (I guess) he is always having to think of what to do instead of being instinctive, as the best of the rest are.
New Yankee Stadium should help his opposite field HR’s. lol
Seriously, he’ll likely get stronger as he gets older (he only weighs 185) and should be able as he builds up strength, be able to hit HR/doubles to the right field with authority.
That’s the hope. Bernie had similar issues at this age. Maybe you’re right about Yankee Stadium – especially now that it looks like a home run haven.
But he still has the potential to hit more homers if he makes the adjustments in his swing. Is that a correct assessment?
Probably. I think its hard to ask a player to make that kind of adjustment at Triple-A though. But again, I’m no hitting coach.
Jeter-like power would be acceptable coming from a CF. More importantly, if he can get his OPS around .850, he would be elite for the position. So if he’s more of a doubles hitter like Jeter, that works as well.
BTW-Many of the guys ESPN has listed as CF’s aren’t, at least defensively. McLouth, Swisher and Hamilton are really corner outfielders who played center out of necessity, and did so poorly.
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/stats/batting?split=0&league=mlb&season=2008&seasonType=2&sort=OPS&type=reg&ageMin=17&ageMax=51&state=0&college=0&country=0&hand=a&pos=cf&startDate=null&endDate=null&minpa=0
Kid has to get stronger. Otherwise, the chart makes a compelling point. Montero on the other hand. scary.
Montero had a huge day today too. He was a triple away from the cycle in 4 at bats. He’s up to .395/.452/.658 on the season. Pretty insane.
Great stuff, EJ. I think this definitely suggests that we would need to see further development of his swing and added strength before we can hope for more than 10-15 homers.
New comp: How about Aaron Rowand with a bit more OBP?