Over the next two days I want to take a look at two of the smallest guys in the game: Dustin Pedroia and Jose Altuve. They may not be perfect, but they are certainly doing well for their size! Let’s take a closer look.
(The Muddy Chicken himself)
The one thing Pedroia does that is different from anyone else I’ve seen is the distance of his stride.
And to be honest, I’m not sure how I feel about that. I think his leg kick is a great way to establish timing. However, I feel like sometimes he gets so far out that he loses some of his leverage. Let’s take a look:
Here he is timed up on a fastball:
We see him do a good job of controlling his bodyweight and not allowing himself to be late on a fastball. He gets the foot up early, sees fastball, times it well and gets the head out.
Here he is grounding out on a CB:
This curveball is very well placed, obviously. We see Pedroia try to go down and get it but he is unable to maintain his barrel for that long and ends up rolling it over.
Finally, here he is getting a base hit on a CB:
This off speed pitch wasn’t placed quite as well and the pitcher paid for it. Pedroia is able to maintain his leverage long enough to hit a line drive through the left side.
So, back to the original question: Is his stride so long that it causes him to mishit more balls than he should? I think it does. It looks to me like the length of his stride occasionally causes him to lose the back hip. When you lose the back hip, you lose the barrel. Now, with that being said, would Pedroia be a better player with a better swing? I don’t know. His swing fits him perfectly. Pedroia is this guy who is insanely competitive. He doesn’t care if it looks pretty. He doesn’t care if it looks smooth. All he cares about is performing at a high level for his teammates come gametime. He’s not thinking about his swing, he’s just competing with what he has, which is pretty good to start with.
Here is the lesson that we should take from watching Pedroia hit: You don’t have to be perfect. Worrying about making your swing better is not always a good thing. Pedroia’s mind is probably his biggest asset. He doesn’t have anymore physical ability than anyone else out on the field. If we were to try and change his swing so it “looked” better, we would potentially be messing with his most important tool, his mind. I’m willing to bet that Pedroia has never actually looked into the details of his swing. Instead, he has a set of cues that he uses to establish feel and he just goes off of that.
In the end, different things work for different players. Part of being a coach/player is understanding that. Knowing when to tinker and when to leave alone will separate yourself from those who feel something is always wrong. I encourage you to get to know yourself/your players better so that you understand this aspect just a little bit better.
Thanks for reading! Tomorrow we will look at another small guy, Jose Altuve. Stay tuned.