Joel Laflamme

I mean, April was horrible.

May, he had nine home runs in that month.

So out of the 11, one in April and one in the first half of June, that kind of tells you a lot.

And June before that, you know, for Duran, the chase has been pretty consistent this year, chasing pitches, especially breaking balls, not knowing what he's seeing up there.

Swinging and missing a ton.

Chad Tracy dropped him out of the leadoff spot.

He'd been leading off for the last six weeks since Roman Anthony went down.

Now they have Mickey Gasper and Masataka Yoshida kind of alternating in that role against righties.

So definitely just trying anything to get the offense to spark.

When Durant's at his best, he's a guy that, you know, the hustle doubles, the going the other way can occasionally run into one.

To me, you know, he's not a threat to hit.

30 homers in a season.

You know, when you have nine in a month, I guess it becomes possible.

But he's kind of your dynamic spark plug leadoff guy.

That's what he was two years ago when he was one of the better players in baseball.

But he's just been lost.

And I think, you know, this is a guy to me.

who really is impacted by the fact that they fired all the coaches.

I mean, they fired two of the hitting coaches that Duran worked closely with, as well as, you know, they let Ben Rosenthal, not Ken Rosenthal, but Ben Rosenthal, an assistant hitting coach, go last year, who Duran had a good relationship with.

And then Kyle Hudson is personal kind of outfield guru who's really close to also get fired along with everyone else.