BIB on the Go: Zach Eflin On Modern Hitting & His Second Go Round In Free Agency
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What insights does Zach Eflin share about modern hitting?
Yeah, there should be some passion. This doesn't have to be boring, boring, boring.
You don't get bored by baseball. Okay, one thing the game needs is more people like you, you, you. Still have grown men run around tight hands.
It's Mookie Betts. It's Daniel Bard. It's Steve Aoki. It's Sal Tlamacchia. This is Brock Holt. Hey, this is John Lester. Baseball is baseball. Baseball isn't boring.
Welcome to Baseball Isn't Boring. Here's your host, Rob Radford. Zach Afflin. who is another guy who is secure in himself, who knows what's what, who knows how to get through a season, who knows what it's like to be good. And he's been battling injuries the last couple of years. I get it. But when he's good, when he's healthy, he's good. He's really, really good. And he's always, always good on the podcast. So we pick up sort of what we talked about with Bassett about the dynamic. One of the things I find fascinating about the dynamic of where actually Major League Baseball hitting is going. And that is, you know, why don't teams value lineups better? that just make pitchers' lives miserable when it comes to making contact and not swinging the miss and not striking out.
So I get to that and to Zach, and then we get into his offseason and free agency because, you know, anytime you go through a free agency, some uncertainty, then there's a story to be told, and Zach expertly tells it. All right. Again, I appreciate everybody. App BB isn't boring. App BB isn't boring. Jetting around all over Florida. It's a good time. It's one of the great things about doing this podcast is that I get a chance to talk to a lot of interesting people. And I feel like driving up to Sarasota, that was just another example of exactly that. I get a chance to talk to some really interesting people. All right, here's Zach. All right, there's no human being on the planet I'd rather be talking to more than Zach Eflin right now.
Always really a pleasure to talk to you. And one of the things I want to talk about is is the way that baseball is going in terms of, this is going to be weird, but offenses, and it's top of mind. I just talked to Chris Bassett about, for you, for pitching to offenses, how it's changed in the last couple years. Because we look at what the Blue Jays did, right? It's contact, it's contact, it's contact. Leading up to last year, everyone's like launch angle, hit the ball in the air.
How has Major League Baseball's approach to hitting evolved?
Yeah. I know what the hitters are saying, but for you, how has it changed?
Yeah, I think it really all depends on what team you play, right? I think the old school mentality is kind of a lost art. It's still sprinkled in every now and again, but those pesky hitters, the hitters that work the count, that make it a tough A-B for you where you're out there grinding in the 95-degree summer day in Baltimore, those are the really hard ones, you know? You know, it kind of goes back and forth, like I said, to different teams, but, you know, there for a while everybody was about to launch angle, like you were saying, and you could get by with throwing a four-seam at the top of the zone or get them to chase low because they're seeing red and they want to swing, you know, and then you face those teams like the Blue Jays that are just trying to
expose you, extend the ABs, take a backside single, backside double, move the guy over, get him in. It really just comes down to the fundamentals of baseball. Typically, the better teams you see are the better fundamental teams in the league. I feel like the Dodgers kind of have it all. They have the power, the slug. you know, get guys and move them over. Like, they just do it. But to see the Blue Jays, you know, put on a run like they did last year was special. It reminded me of our run in Philly that we had. You could tell the guys were super close, and they were doing anything they could to win the game, and that's truly why we're here. That's what we're all about is anything you can do to win the game, bring it on, you know?
It's funny because... The more pitchers I talk to, they say the same thing.
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Chapters
4 chaptersSpeakers
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