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I almost feel bad for writing this because I don’t want to get ahead of myself but it appears that Jason Heyward is “fixed.” I put fixed in quotation marks because I don’t think there was a major problem with him last year but due to his horrendous offensive numbers in 2016, Heyward took it upon himself to “fix” his own problem — his swing.
I’ve written extensively on the revamping of Heyward’s swing this winter and into Spring Training but I have to be honest, none of that really mattered until I saw his swing versus big league pitching. If the first six games are any indication of what Jason Heyward Cubs fans are going to see this year, it appears to be a night and day difference from the Heyward we saw last year.
Heyward signed an eight-year, $184 million dollar deal in the winter of 2015 which appeared to be a great signing due to his steady offensive numbers. If you take away an injury plagued 2011 season, the lowest Heyward had slashed in his career was .254 (2013)/.335 (2012)/.384 (2014). To put Heyward’s 2016 into perspective, even his aforementioned career lows were still at least 20 points higher than his slash line of .230/.306/.325 last year.
Disappointing to say the least.
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However, Heyward has started 2017 the way most Cubs fans had envisioned him playing in 2016. As of today, he’s slashing .333/.391/.429 through the first six games of the season which is a goddamn revelation for Cubs fans to see.
Yes, I understand that the sample size is VERY small but after going through all of 2016 watching Heyward struggle, I’ll take what I can get.
Yesterday’s game gave us further proof that Heyward is close to being back to his old self.
He’s absolutely crushing the ball.
Jason Heyward today:
99.5 mph triple
96.8 mph lineout
100.5 mph groundout
99.8 mph single
96.3 mph flyout
All hit probabilities > 30%— MLB Statistics (@MLBRandomStats) April 9, 2017
Per Jesse Rogers, Heyward accomplished something he had done only 17 times all last season — hit five balls with an exit velocity of 95 mph or higher.
Last year Heyward hit countless slow rollers to second base so the fact that he’s even hitting the ball hard has to be seen as progress. Realistically, he should have been 5-5 yesterday but was robbed of a hit on two separate occasions.
Once again, I understand we’re REALLY early into the season but you have to give credit where credit is due.
Now let’s hope he can keep it up.
