FG on Fox: Adam Dunn’s (mostly failed) tweaks
Now that he’s nearing 35, Adam Dunn may not be the same fearsome offensive force he was earlier in his career. So he’s experimented with a few tweaks to his game over the last couple of years. Mostly, they didn’t work. But he did retain a few aspects of those experiments that benefit the veteran to this day.
The first idea might have been the worst idea. In Spring Training last year, Adam Dunn decided to be more aggressive on the first pitch. The result was disastrous, as he got 50% worse at getting into counts that were in his favor.
“That didn’t work for me,” the slugger admitted before a game with the Giants in August. “I get myself into a lot of bad counts anyway, that was not good for me.” 2013 was the second-worst year of his career by most offensive stats.
With a phone full of pictures of pitchers' fingers, strange beers, and his two toddler sons, Eno Sarris can be found at the ballpark or a brewery most days. Read him here, writing about the A's or Giants at The Athletic, or about beer at October. Follow him on Twitter @enosarris if you can handle the sandwiches and inanity.
Learning to pitch, on the other hand, was a championship-defining move.
http://www.fangraphs.com/not/dangerous-experiment-a-roster-of-25-adam-dunns/
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