A Deep-Dive Into Seattle Mariners' Offensive Habits
The Seattle Mariners' offense is currently in the midst a historically-bad season.
The Mariners have struck out 11 or more times in 12 consecutive games and have a strikeout rate of 28.2% this season — which would be the worst in MLB history, according to insider Luke Arkins.
Seattle recently completed a nine-game homestead against the Minnesota Twins, Baltimore Orioles and Toronto Blue Jays on July 7. It went 3-6 and averaged 2.78 runs a game while allowing 3.56 runs a game. Simply put, that's not sustainable for a team looking to win the American League West.
So, what's been the problem? What's been preventing Seattle from getting that ever-elusive run? According to some stats from Baseball Savant, the answer could be multi-layered.
Mariners manager Scott Servais mentioned before a July 4 game against the Orioles that the big thing for Seattle was to get the ball in play. A good way to judge how often a team is generating optimal contact is by looking at barrel percentage — a stat that divides barrels (a ball hit at least 90 miles per hour with a launch angle of 26-to-30 degrees) by balls put in play.
In one game against the Twins on June 28 — the Mariners had a barrel percentage of 0%. That was the only game they won with a barrel percentage below 10% They were under 10% in four of their nine recent home games. In their other two wins against Baltimore on July 4 and the Blue Jays on July 5, they had a barrel percentage of 21.1 and 10.0, respectively.
So from one point of view, when Seattle is generating contact, it isn't optimal. And that's an important note: When it is generating contact.
Looking at some of the Mariners top players, whiff rate is a statistic that really stands out — and not in a good way. Whiff rate divides swings and misses by total number of swings.
Julio Rodriguez has a whiff rate of 31.1% — which ranks in the 13th percentile in the league, according to Baseball Savant. Cal Raleigh has a whiff rate of 30.3%, Jorge Polanco is at 31.4%, Ty France clocks in at 23.8% and Luke Raley is at 34.5%,
Josh Rojas is actually one of the few Seattle player well above average in whiff rate and is in the 65th percentile in the league at 21.6%.
The Mariners aren't generating a lot of optimal contact. Overall hitting needs to improve — so does situational hitting. Seattle left 10 runners on base per game, according to teamrankings.com, during its season series against Toronto. All of those games were one-run contests.
The Mariners need to improve recognition at the plate, generate more contact on their swings and take advantage of the runners they get on base.
Seattle will have a chance to start doing just that staring at 6:40 p.m. July 9 against the San Diego Padres.
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