Ike Davis Looks to Connect

Over the last few years it’s become pretty well accepted that a strikeout isn’t dramatically worse than any other kind of out for hitters. But that being said, making contact is still almost always better than not making contact. There might be a rare instance in which you’d prefer to swing through a pitch because the next one is going to be right in your wheelhouse, but on balance, making contact when you swing is the goal. As such, a high contact percentage is a valuable trait.

Of course, not all contact is created equal and you don’t necessarily want to maximize your contact rate at all costs if it means you won’t be hitting with the same authority. If you can make contact without it turning into weak contact, that’s probably what you want to do.

Every year, I like to look at the biggest gains and losses in particular statistics and contact rate is always one that’s pretty interesting. You can luck into a nice BABIP or wind up with a few extra home runs without changing your game, but a significant change in a plate discipline stat is usually not occurring at random. The change might not always help you predict the future, but it’s unlikely a big spike in contact rate is simply noise.

Among players who had at least 300 PA in 2013 and 2014, two stood out as having the biggest contact rate improvements. Yasiel Puig and Ike Davis both had improvements of 7% or more while no one else topped 6.3%. Puig is a story for another day, but Davis’ 7.4% contact rate increase from 2013 to 2014 is worthy of further consideration here.

Davis was a high draft pick in 2008 and made the back half of a few top 100 prospect lists in his day, so the fact that he hasn’t shined at the major league level and found himself to be the odd man out with the Mets last year was a bit of a surprise. He’s been worth about 6 WAR in 2,138 PA, which is somewhere in the gray area between failing out of the big leagues and being good enough for an everyday job. Given his profile, it’s probably best to think of Davis as a platoon first baseman or designated hitter.

Early in his career, he showed impressive pop, but his high isolated power numbers have given way to pedestrian marks during his last two seasons. Davis has a nice walk rate and the raw power you need to handle a corner, but amid injuries and struggles, Davis has fallen toward role player rather than solid contributor.

Nearly 28, Davis is starting to drift into the world where the fans have begun to give up on his potential. Steamer forecasts a 117 wRC+ from Davis but the fans are only sold on a 102 wRC+ for 2015. He’s been around long enough and failed to break out enough times that Davis has become an afterthought for most. Except Billy Beane and the Athletics, who may have seen something worth taking a chance on from Davis in 2014.

That 7.4% contact rate increase was the biggest in baseball among players with 300 PA in each of the last two years, and while it didn’t come with great results (Davis had a 108 wRC+), Davis struck out less in 2014 than ever before and showed signs that the new discipline might be here to stay.

We already know that Davis made more contact when he swung last year, but it’s also true that Davis swung considerably less often as well. This indicates that Davis identified the pitches he was previously swinging at but couldn’t hit and stopped going after them last year.

And this checks out when we take a peek at his heatmaps from 2010-2013 and 2014. Davis was never known for chasing wildly, but last year he isolated the parts of the zone he attacked, focusing much more on pitches up in the zone.

This is interesting for a couple of reasons. First, it’s a good reminder that there’s more to pitch selection than laying off pitches outside the zone. There are certain parts of the zone hitters can handle better than others and Davis certainly seems to have located his.

Second, Davis’ strength is actually the upper middle part of the zone, which is where a lot of the modern hitters are struggling most. While many batters are swinging and missing at high strikes, Davis was swinging at missing at the low strike. Now that he’s made the decision to lay off those pitches, he’s making a lot more contact.

Now with the tools we have at our disposal, we can’t say for sure that this is going to be a beneficial strategy in the long run. Davis is putting more balls in play, but it’s also possible that Davis was going for a feast or famine approach with the low strikes and by deciding to avoid them, he’s going to lose a step in the power department.

It’s too early to answer that part of the question. Davis made a real change in his approach during the 2014 season and the primary effects are quite clear. More contact and fewer strikeouts. But contact and strikeouts don’t exist in isolation and we need to see more to determine if these changes are going to allow him to add more offensive value. His 2014 numbers were much better than his 2013 numbers, but some of that was simple regression to the mean.

Davis was a different hitter, but we don’t know if he will be a better hitter because of it. There are people on staff and around the web more qualified to analyze swing mechanics, but it certainly looks to me like Davis’ natural motion lends itself to better cover the upper half of the zone.

Compare that to the king of crushing the low pitch and you might see it too. The pitch locations are all pretty similar but the trajectory of Davis’ upper body is much different than Trout’s.

Baseball is a game of adjustments and Davis’ ability to counter when pitchers get wise will be crucial. Making more contact is a good thing and for Davis the question is simply how much this particular improvement is going to help him provide enough offense to stay in the lineup on a regular basis out west.