Two Ways Dansby Swanson Is Being Pitched Like a Slugger
Dansby Swanson is dapper. Dansby Swanson is exciting. Dansby Swanson should have great plate discipline and a good hit tool. And Dansby Swanson is a major leaguer. These things are all true. Dansby Swanson may also be a slugger in the future, but he’s not yet. That’s weird, though, because he’s being pitched like a slugger in two key ways.
It’s early going, of course. And things will change. But let’s see where Swanson would sit right now on a couple lists, if he qualified. Look at his percentage of first strikes.
| Name | First-Strike Percentage |
| Dansby Swanson* | 48.7% |
| Bryce Harper | 50.3% |
| David Ortiz | 50.8% |
| Gregory Polanco | 51.4% |
| David Freese | 52.6% |
| Brett Gardner | 53.0% |
| Brian McCann | 53.8% |
| Danny Espinosa | 53.8% |
| Carlos Santana | 54.0% |
| Charlie Blackmon | 54.1% |
He’s not getting first-pitch strikes right now. Oh, and he’s not seeing many four-seamers, either:
| Name | Four Seam Fastball Percentage |
| Dansby Swanson* | 25.8% |
| Marcell Ozuna | 29.4% |
| Marwin Gonzalez | 29.6% |
| Marcus Semien | 29.6% |
| Kyle Seager | 29.7% |
| Kendrys Morales | 29.9% |
| Danny Valencia | 30.2% |
| Mark Trumbo | 30.2% |
| Salvador Perez | 30.9% |
| Rougned Odor | 30.9% |
It’s weird. The batter to whom Swanson is most similar in these two regards is Brian McCann, who’s right behind Odor on the four-seam fastball list. Brian McCann is a patient slugger! Dansby Swanson is just a baby, man.
I asked the 22-year-old about this statistical anomaly, and he laughed. “That’s a funny breakdown, I wouldn’t have pieced that together without you saying that,” he told me before a game against the Giants. He agreed that it seemed intuitive that a young hitter would see more fastballs early on until he proved he could hit them, a fact that’s mostly backed up by the data, but he didn’t know why he wasn’t getting the normal treatment.
He only had a couple ideas for the reasoning behind pitchers giving him a free ball and avoiding the four-seam. “Part of it is just who I’ve seen,” he thought, though he’s seen quite a few different pitchers by now. “I’m also hitting in front of the pitcher. They’d like to see if I’ll get myself out first, and if I’m on, they can get the pitcher.”
That seems possible, but it’s not really how it plays out in the National League. Check out the first-pitch and four-seam rates by batting order in the table below. With the help of Jeff Zimmerman, we’ve taken the pitchers out, so don’t focus too much on that ninth spot.
| Batting Order | Fastball% | F-Strike% |
| 1 | 65.4% | 55.7% |
| 2 | 64.8% | 54.9% |
| 3 | 62.5% | 53.9% |
| 4 | 61.6% | 53.3% |
| 5 | 62.2% | 54.3% |
| 6 | 62.8% | 54.7% |
| 7 | 63.4% | 55.0% |
| 8 | 64.4% | 56.1% |
| 9 | 68.6% | 59.8% |
It looks like the trend is clear. As you get closer to the pitcher, you see more fastballs and more first-pitch strikes, not fewer. Well, more correctly, as you get further from the middle of the order, you start seeing those things. So Swanson’s limited diet of fastballs and first-pitch strikes isn’t because of his spot in the batting order.
Whatever it is, it’s not really changing the batter’s approach much, yet. He’s known as having good plate discipline, and he’s generally been taking the first pitch. He’s swung at 24% of the first pitches he’s seen, which is pretty much the median in baseball in any given year. He’s profiting off of the free ball one he’s gotten 50% of the time so far.
As for the lack of fastballs, this mimics something he already saw when he got to Double-A. “So many breaking balls,” he agreed, but not necessarily because he couldn’t handle it. Those pitchers just had better command of their breaking balls, so they threw them more.
His response to the lack of fastballs and first-pitch strikes will be the same it has been so far. “Learning how to stay within yourself and doing what you do best well, and not worrying about what they’re going to do,” is what he’s trying to do now. “Focus on yourself and keep your preparation in mind. Being clear in the head.”
If that sounds like he won’t keep track of the breaking-ball percentage he’s seeing, you’re right. “I’m a thinker so I don’t want to overthink,” he laughed. “If you think, it’ll distract you and just take you away.” Especially since this could all change in another two weeks.
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.
The whole batting 8th thing makes sense, especially since he’s already probably one of the better 8th hitters in the NL.
I’ll attribute it to batting eighth, but not because I think he’s a good eighth-place hitter (yet). I think it’s the combination of batting eighth and the fact that pitchers don’t know what he’s about, yet. There’s no “book” on him, and as a rookie with the pitcher behind him, they’re just seeing if he’ll chase bad pitches.
Batting ahead of the pitcher only occurs about twice per game. Typically, the third time through the order the pitcher is replaced with the best available hitter. The way the table is presented implies that the pitcher is always in the batting order.
Conventional wisdom is that rookies see a steady diet of fastballs until they prove they can hit them, right? So this does seem a bit unusual.
Yeah I added a link for that, I think the data backs it up.
I’m troubled by the quote “I wouldn’t have pieced that together without you saying that,” I mean, what kind of support do teams offer their players on a daily basis? if you’re on a major league roster, shouldn’t you or your team be reviewing every ab in an effort to improve?
Chipper Jones, who had a reputation late in his career of being one of the very smartest hitters, simply would not believe that he got the fewest first pitch strikes on the Braves. This was a matter of fact, and he simply did not believe it when told. He still did alright.
http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=10101
Thanks for bringing up this old one. Still fun after having read it before. The screenshot of Chipper is great and as a Phillies fan this line brings back fun memories, “there are dead people who could knock in 80 runs hitting fourth in that Phillies lineup”. Those were the days!
We did talk about the resources available to him, but that’s when he said the line about being a thinker and not wanting to get lost at the plate. I actually agree that you don’t want to be thinking at the plate, you need to be reacting. But I think I’d still be trying to read up so that I generally had an idea of what pitchers were trying to do to me, yeah.
With the head of hair Lieutenant Dans has been blessed with, he could easily pass for a former Princeton Lacrosse All-American. <3 <3 <3
Could players like Carlos Correa, Nomar Mazara, and Francisco Lindor coming up from the minors and having immediate success be changing the way teams approach highly-regarded rookies in their first few weeks of the major leagues?
Correa and Mazara both came up with a good bit of power in their games, but Lindor was interesting in that he didn’t hit for power until he reached the majors. His two highest ISO’s are from his two seasons in MLB. It would be interesting to see how Lindor was pitched upon his arrival, and whether there are any similarities to what Swanson is seeing now.
Yeah, I’m largely going to write this off as strange small sample size aberration. Its a fun one though. You have a young hitter, less than a month on the senior circuit, currently with an Isolated Power of .028 and teams appear to be giving him the slugger treatment. We got Dansby’s reaction, but I would be interested in seeing the reactions of some of the teams he’s faced to this data.
As a Dback fan, PLEASE don’t give us any more Dansby Swanson articles. It makes me sad…
After a slow start, Ender Inciarte has accumulated 2.6 WAR. He has a 138 wRC+ in the second half with a .359/.410/.479 line.
You could’ve been meaner and just gave him Shelby Miller’s stats.
Let me make you feel better about that trade: while Dansby and Inciarte are clearly future stars and are tearing it up, Aaron Blair sucks and has an MLB ERA of over 8 and a WHIP of 1.774. The good news is that this is worse than Miller’s lower ERA of over 7 and measly 1.745 WHIP! Don’t you feel better now?