Yasmany Tomas Is Finally Pulling the Ball in the Air

A poor base-runner and fielder who strikes out a lot and also doesn’t walk much needs to have a batting average like Tony Gwynn — or otherwise hit for a ton of power — to be a worthwhile player. This is the plight of Yasmany Tomas. He doesn’t run well and plays poor defense at one of the less challenging positions. He strikes out in a quarter of his plate appearances while walking just once every 20 times up. Expecting a Tony Gwynn batting average is impossible, and, up until a few weeks ago, Tomas wasn’t bringing much power either. The entire package rendered him a replacement-level player at best.

With eight home runs in the last ten games, however — and 12 in the last 19 games — Tomas is providing a glimmer of hope that he will not be a $68.5-million bust since signing with Arizona Diamondbacks before last season.

In 2015, Tomas parlayed an elevated .354 BABIP into just a .273 average, due largely to the strikeouts. The lack of walks led to an on-base percentage of only .305 on the season. He didn’t bring much power either, recording only nine home runs and a .128 ISO. The final product: an 88 wRC+ and -1.3 (that’s negative 1.3) WAR. Tomas got off to a good early start last season by taking the ball the other way. Of course, doing so muted his best tool, which was — and remains — his raw power. Out of the 211 hitters last season who recorded at least 400 plate appearances, Tomas’ 31.7% pull rate was 192nd, just ahead of Alcides Escobar. Outside of great all-around hitters like Ryan Braun and Paul Goldschmidt, the hitters around that range consist mostly of speedy, slap-happy type hitters. Not the type of company Tomas would want to keep, in other words.

Compounding Tomas’ pull problems last season was his inability to get the ball in the air. Tomas’ 54.9% ground-ball rate was 12th highest in MLB last season, and his 23.2% fly-ball rate was 15th lowest. Again, those numbers are more common among slap hitters who lack Tomas’ raw power. His problems last season were evident in his spray chart, seen below.

chart (13)

Note, on the pull side, how there’s roughly one black dot (home run) for every two blue dots (fly balls in the outfield). If he could pull the ball in the air, there was a decent chance — again, with his raw power — that Tomas would be able to hit it out. But the changes were few and far between. Tomas recorded a total of 297 batted balls last season but pulled just 94 of them (31.6%). Of those, only 17 (18.1%) were fly balls. Twenty-four percent of his pulled fly balls left the park, but because he gave himself so few opportunities, his power numbers were weak.

For context, consider: the league-average fly-ball rate is about 34%; league-average pull rate, 39%. Here, for example, is the spray chart of Russell Martin, who was roughly average in both fly balls and pull rate last season.

chart (14)

Martin pulled a ton of ground balls last year and his rate of fly balls pulled was similar to Tomas’, at 18.9%, but by giving himself so many more opportunities, he hit a ton more home runs, aided by a 46% HR/FB rate to the pull side.

Moving forward to this year, however, Tomas has changed his approach, taking advantage of his best physical tool. Mind you, the improvements weren’t immediately evidencet. The first half of the season seemed a lot like 2015 for Tomas. He was striking out and walking at the same rates. He hit a few more home runs and his ISO moved up to .189, but his BABIP returned to a more normal .299 and his line on the season was .253/.298/.442, good for just an 89 wRC+. Add in his defense and base-running and Tomas was once again below replacement at -0.4 WAR on the season.

While much easier to see with hindsight, the power for Tomas was coming around. At the halfway point, his pull rate was slightly up above league average, at 41%, while his fly-ball percentage crept up closer to league average, at 30%, in the first half. Those numbers enabled Tomas to hit more homers and produce an above-average ISO, even if his overall production was still mediocre. In the second half, Tomas has taken those numbers to new heights.

In the second half, Tomas is pulling the ball 49% of the time and his fly-ball rate is up to 36%, numbers that look a lot closer to teammate Jake Lamb‘s figures instead of Jean Segura’s. With increased opportunities to hit home runs, more balls are flying out of the park, using his previously untapped raw power. Sixty percent of Tomas’ pulled fly balls have left the park this season, creating a spray chart much more like Russell Martin’s above. And Tomas has recorded well above the league-average 35% home-run rate on pulled fly balls. It shouldn’t be a surprise that Tomas has increased his average exit velocity from 90.2 mph last year to 92.1 mph this season. On fly balls, that difference is even more stark, moving from 89.1 mph last season to 94.0 mph this season, per Baseball Savant. Here is Tomas’ spray chart from this year.

chart (15)

Tomas is still taking the ball to the opposite field, but he has gotten fantastic results from pulling the ball. Over the last 30 days, Tomas’ 12 homers are tops in MLB, just ahead of pull-happy slugger Brian Dozier’s total of 11 and the 10 homers posted by each by Mookie Betts, Edwin Encarnacion, Jedd Gyorko, and Brad Miller. His 199 wRC+ is “just” sixth over the last month, due to his inability to take a free base, but in just 30 days he turned a -0.6 WAR to a positive 0.6 WAR and increased his season wRC+ up to 112. While that might not be much overall, it is a positive development for a player who seemed like a waste of space and money for the first year and a half of his career.

Is anything different that has helped him be able to pull the ball more? Look at this home run from last season:

Now look at this recent one off a Noah Syndergaard fastball:

In the footage of the homer from last year Tomas has a high leg kick, and it ends up looking slightly disjointed, like the arms don’t quite match up with his legs. In the video of the home run from this year, Tomas has very little leg movement, and his swing looks more fluid, as his entire body works in sync to get the bat on the ball. A little less movement could be helping Tomas’ timing at the plate and allowing him to get the bat on the ball in better position to do some damage. Whether it’s the leg kick or not, whatever he’s been doing seems to be working.

Unfortunately for Tomas, he still has many indicators of being a mediocre player overall. His strikeout rate is still high and pitchers generally don’t pitch throw him strikes. Only 43.7% of the pitches he’s seen have been in the zone, the seventh-lowest mark in MLB. He’s right there with some really dangerous hitters — Chris Davis, Bryce Harper David Ortiz, and Giancarlo Stanton among them. If he opted not to swing as freely, we would be talking about an elite bat. However, Tomas’ 43% O-swing rate is fifth highest in baseball, and even in the last 30 days during this streak, that number hasn’t changed. It would seem this hackers gotta hack.

Tomas’ new trend of pulling the ball in the air and hitting for more power is definitely a welcome sign for Arizona. That 60% HR/FB rate on pulled pitches isn’t likely to continue, but if he can keep pulling the ball, he will still have healthy power numbers when that figure drops. Pitchers might need to adjust and give Tomas even fewer pitches to hit. If Tomas keeps swinging, it might be hard for him to continue to post above-average numbers. He will need to adjust back if he want to continue hitting well. He has not yet shown the ability to take pitches, but he has adjusted to the league overall and begun to pull the ball to use his power. His ceiling is going to be limited by a low on-base percentage and poor defense, but if he hits with enough power to make him an average player over the next four years, that is probably enough to justify a contract that looked like a disaster just last month.





Craig Edwards can be found on twitter @craigjedwards.

3 Comments
Oldest
Newest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
High Stinky Cheese
7 years ago

Random take away from this article: Mike Trout’s lowest wRca+ in a full season is higher than Tony Gwynn’s highest.

tz
7 years ago

On a related note, Trout has had at least a 1.0 WAR in 23 of the 28 calendar months he’s been a full-time major leaguer. (His WAR totals in the other five months were 0.9, 0.9, 0.8, 0.8, and 0.4)