It’s one thing to have good plate discipline.
It’s another to be able to mash the pitches that come into your hot zone at a level that no one else can match.
That’s the thing about the success of Milwaukee Brewers first baseman Eric Thames. When a pitch is there to be hit, he crushes it.
Let’s put that into numerical terms. The average major leaguer has hit a home run once for every 98 pitches he sees between his knees and the numbers on his baseball jersey. Thames has all 10 of his home runs on pitches in that area. He has averaged one for every 27 pitches thrown to that area.
That’s a ridiculous pace and one that will be almost impossible to maintain over a full season. When Chris Davis had his 53-homer season, he hit all his home runs against pitches in that area as well. He averaged one home run for every 39 knees-to-number pitches.
The other thing that Thames is doing that is ridiculously impressive is that he’s putting up a high homer volume with two strikes. He has seven two-strike home runs this season. That’s currently more than 19 teams.
The average major leaguer homers once every 119 two-strike pitches. Thames has seven home runs on 96 two-strike pitches.
If a pitcher makes a mistake and throws Thames a hittable pitch with two strikes, sometimes that will be enough. Thames actually misses on those knees-to-numbers pitches about once every five swings. The average major-league hitter fares a little better than that.
But Thames' ability to do damage when he does make contact (seven homers on 68 knees-to-numbers two-strike pitches) is in a different stratosphere from everyone else. The average player hits a home run for every 85 two-strike pitches thrown from the knees to the numbers.
