Can Jason Heyward Fucking Hit Ever

[World's #1 Astros Fan]

A photoshop of Jason Heyward's face in place of Jack Nicholson's peering through the axe-made hole in the door from "The Shining" please.  I can't believe he's come all the way back to 2016 Heyward after all this.

[Chuck to Chuck]

Has there ever been a player that was hitting .268/.353/.431/.784 with an OPS+ of 114 for his first 3000 ABs of his career through age 25 who then went in the shitter this bad? .239/.310/.344/.654 OPS+ 73.  Drops of -.029/-.043/-.087.

[World's #1 Astros Fan]

Has there ever been a player that was hitting .268/.353/.431/.784 with an OPS+ of 114 for his first 3000 ABs of his career through age 25 who then went in the shitter this bad? .239/.310/.344/.654 OPS+ 73.  Drops of -.029/-.043/-.087.

If you scale it down to 2,300 Plate Appearances you might have a comp in Ellis Valentine.

[SKO]

Has there ever been a player that was hitting .268/.353/.431/.784 with an OPS+ of 114 for his first 3000 ABs of his career through age 25 who then went in the shitter this bad? .239/.310/.344/.654 OPS+ 73.  Drops of -.029/-.043/-.087.

If you scale it down to 2,300 Plate Appearances you might have a comp in Ellis Valentine.

In Ellis case it sounds like he was undone by a series of injuries and he apparently had some substance abuse issues. What's bizarre about Heyward is that nothing physical seems to have changed, he just sucked. Whatever the Cubs did to try and "unlock more power" in his swing before 2016 seems to have broken him forever.

[World's #1 Astros Fan]

Has there ever been a player that was hitting .268/.353/.431/.784 with an OPS+ of 114 for his first 3000 ABs of his career through age 25 who then went in the shitter this bad? .239/.310/.344/.654 OPS+ 73.  Drops of -.029/-.043/-.087.

If you scale it down to 2,300 Plate Appearances you might have a comp in Ellis Valentine.

In Ellis case it sounds like he was undone by a series of injuries and he apparently had some substance abuse issues. What's bizarre about Heyward is that nothing physical seems to have changed, he just sucked. Whatever the Cubs did to try and "unlock more power" in his swing before 2016 seems to have broken him forever.

Actually Ellis may have been done in by 1 particular injury--when he was beaned in the face.  When he came back he had the half-a-facemask thing and in spite of the added security was never the same hitter.  The suggestion at the time is that Valentine never "got over" the beaning. 

Hasn't the same been suggested for Heyward?

[Quality Start Machine]

Has there ever been a player that was hitting .268/.353/.431/.784 with an OPS+ of 114 for his first 3000 ABs of his career through age 25 who then went in the shitter this bad? .239/.310/.344/.654 OPS+ 73.  Drops of -.029/-.043/-.087.

If you scale it down to 2,300 Plate Appearances you might have a comp in Ellis Valentine.

In Ellis case it sounds like he was undone by a series of injuries and he apparently had some substance abuse issues. What's bizarre about Heyward is that nothing physical seems to have changed, he just sucked. Whatever the Cubs did to try and "unlock more power" in his swing before 2016 seems to have broken him forever.

Actually Ellis may have been done in by 1 particular injury--when he was beaned in the face.  When he came back he had the half-a-facemask thing and in spite of the added security was never the same hitter.  The suggestion at the time is that Valentine never "got over" the beaning. 

Hasn't the same been suggested for Heyward?

He was still a 6 win guy with St. Louis, post-beaning.

[World's #1 Astros Fan]

Has there ever been a player that was hitting .268/.353/.431/.784 with an OPS+ of 114 for his first 3000 ABs of his career through age 25 who then went in the shitter this bad? .239/.310/.344/.654 OPS+ 73.  Drops of -.029/-.043/-.087.

If you scale it down to 2,300 Plate Appearances you might have a comp in Ellis Valentine.

In Ellis case it sounds like he was undone by a series of injuries and he apparently had some substance abuse issues. What's bizarre about Heyward is that nothing physical seems to have changed, he just sucked. Whatever the Cubs did to try and "unlock more power" in his swing before 2016 seems to have broken him forever.

Actually Ellis may have been done in by 1 particular injury--when he was beaned in the face.  When he came back he had the half-a-facemask thing and in spite of the added security was never the same hitter.  The suggestion at the time is that Valentine never "got over" the beaning. 

Hasn't the same been suggested for Heyward?

He was still a 6 win guy with St. Louis, post-beaning.

Yeah, I knew the story didn't totally line up.  Fuck.

[SKO]

Has there ever been a player that was hitting .268/.353/.431/.784 with an OPS+ of 114 for his first 3000 ABs of his career through age 25 who then went in the shitter this bad? .239/.310/.344/.654 OPS+ 73.  Drops of -.029/-.043/-.087.

If you scale it down to 2,300 Plate Appearances you might have a comp in Ellis Valentine.

In Ellis case it sounds like he was undone by a series of injuries and he apparently had some substance abuse issues. What's bizarre about Heyward is that nothing physical seems to have changed, he just sucked. Whatever the Cubs did to try and "unlock more power" in his swing before 2016 seems to have broken him forever.

Actually Ellis may have been done in by 1 particular injury--when he was beaned in the face.  When he came back he had the half-a-facemask thing and in spite of the added security was never the same hitter.  The suggestion at the time is that Valentine never "got over" the beaning. 

Hasn't the same been suggested for Heyward?

He was still a 6 win guy with St. Louis, post-beaning.

Yeah, I knew the story didn't totally line up.  Fuck.

I try not to be one of the guys that assigns too much credit or blame for anything to a hitting coach but I do think it is really worth asking if John Mallee maybe just fucked him up forever by adding that toe tap and all of the crap to unlock his power in 2016. Even this offseason when they "rebuilt" his swing they supposedly tried to get him to mimic Rizzo, to go back to his mechanics from 2012 when he hit 27 homers, etc. I think maybe they could have just let him go back to whatever it was he was doing in 2015, forget about getting more power out of him etc. 2015 Heyward was a really fucking good hitter, even if he only hit 14 homers or whatever.

[Quality Start Machine]

Has there ever been a player that was hitting .268/.353/.431/.784 with an OPS+ of 114 for his first 3000 ABs of his career through age 25 who then went in the shitter this bad? .239/.310/.344/.654 OPS+ 73.  Drops of -.029/-.043/-.087.

If you scale it down to 2,300 Plate Appearances you might have a comp in Ellis Valentine.

In Ellis case it sounds like he was undone by a series of injuries and he apparently had some substance abuse issues. What's bizarre about Heyward is that nothing physical seems to have changed, he just sucked. Whatever the Cubs did to try and "unlock more power" in his swing before 2016 seems to have broken him forever.

Actually Ellis may have been done in by 1 particular injury--when he was beaned in the face.  When he came back he had the half-a-facemask thing and in spite of the added security was never the same hitter.  The suggestion at the time is that Valentine never "got over" the beaning. 

Hasn't the same been suggested for Heyward?

He was still a 6 win guy with St. Louis, post-beaning.

Yeah, I knew the story didn't totally line up.  Fuck.

I try not to be one of the guys that assigns too much credit or blame for anything to a hitting coach but I do think it is really worth asking if John Mallee maybe just fucked him up forever by adding that toe tap and all of the crap to unlock his power in 2016. Even this offseason when they "rebuilt" his swing they supposedly tried to get him to mimic Rizzo, to go back to his mechanics from 2012 when he hit 27 homers, etc. I think maybe they could have just let him go back to whatever it was he was doing in 2015, forget about getting more power out of him etc. 2015 Heyward was a really fucking good hitter, even if he only hit 14 homers or whatever.

I know it would be fucking awesome to have 8 guys in the lineup capable of hitting 20+ HR, but maybe we should be happy with 6 (once Happ hits one more), and just have other guys get on base.

[SKO]

Has there ever been a player that was hitting .268/.353/.431/.784 with an OPS+ of 114 for his first 3000 ABs of his career through age 25 who then went in the shitter this bad? .239/.310/.344/.654 OPS+ 73.  Drops of -.029/-.043/-.087.

If you scale it down to 2,300 Plate Appearances you might have a comp in Ellis Valentine.

In Ellis case it sounds like he was undone by a series of injuries and he apparently had some substance abuse issues. What's bizarre about Heyward is that nothing physical seems to have changed, he just sucked. Whatever the Cubs did to try and "unlock more power" in his swing before 2016 seems to have broken him forever.

Actually Ellis may have been done in by 1 particular injury--when he was beaned in the face.  When he came back he had the half-a-facemask thing and in spite of the added security was never the same hitter.  The suggestion at the time is that Valentine never "got over" the beaning. 

Hasn't the same been suggested for Heyward?

He was still a 6 win guy with St. Louis, post-beaning.

Yeah, I knew the story didn't totally line up.  Fuck.

I try not to be one of the guys that assigns too much credit or blame for anything to a hitting coach but I do think it is really worth asking if John Mallee maybe just fucked him up forever by adding that toe tap and all of the crap to unlock his power in 2016. Even this offseason when they "rebuilt" his swing they supposedly tried to get him to mimic Rizzo, to go back to his mechanics from 2012 when he hit 27 homers, etc. I think maybe they could have just let him go back to whatever it was he was doing in 2015, forget about getting more power out of him etc. 2015 Heyward was a really fucking good hitter, even if he only hit 14 homers or whatever.

I know it would be fucking awesome to have 8 guys in the lineup capable of hitting 20+ HR, but maybe we should be happy with 6 (once Happ hits one more), and just have other guys get on base.

Yeah, I mean I understand the experiment, just like when they tried to teach Castro how to take pitches and walk/drive the ball in 2013. It was worth a shot. The second it failed so miserably though they should have done just what Renteria did with Castro in 2014 and told him to just go back to whatever felt right. They tried to tweak his 2015 swing to get more power in 2016, and broke it. Then when they tried to fix it they looked back to film of the year when he hit 27 dingers and asked him to do that again. They didn't just tell him to go back to what felt right the year before.

[Saul Goodman]

What's Heyward's slash line since this thread started?

.270/.352/.302/.654

Shitty.

Now .243/.329/.271 since this thread began. Sad part is if you go back to July 23rd, it gets worse (.212/.291/.263/.554). He's every bit as putrid as he was last year, if not worse, and without a 200 game lead in the division to make it tolerable I'd sure like Joe to decide to sit him sometime before the middle of October this year.

Even with his puny 1.2 WAR, Joe really doesn't have a lot of options out there. Although, with Zobrist's wrist seemingly healthy, putting Zobrist in RF while Heyward takes a few days off might not be the worst idea in the world.

Zobrist is starting to hit, that opens up a lot of options. Could put Zobrist in RF, Happ/Almora platoon in CF. Could put Zobrist at 2B, La Stella at 3rd, Kris in the OF. If Russell is gonna be back soon that allows more flexibility with how they use Javy. Lots of Heyward-less options out there.

My vote, which doesn't matter, goes for playing La Stella more. He's red-hot right now. Bring in Heyward with late leads and move Bryant back to 3B but get that stick in the lineup please.

[Quality Start Machine]

What's Heyward's slash line since this thread started?

.270/.352/.302/.654

Shitty.

Now .243/.329/.271 since this thread began. Sad part is if you go back to July 23rd, it gets worse (.212/.291/.263/.554). He's every bit as putrid as he was last year, if not worse, and without a 200 game lead in the division to make it tolerable I'd sure like Joe to decide to sit him sometime before the middle of October this year.

Even with his puny 1.2 WAR, Joe really doesn't have a lot of options out there. Although, with Zobrist's wrist seemingly healthy, putting Zobrist in RF while Heyward takes a few days off might not be the worst idea in the world.

Zobrist is starting to hit, that opens up a lot of options. Could put Zobrist in RF, Happ/Almora platoon in CF. Could put Zobrist at 2B, La Stella at 3rd, Kris in the OF. If Russell is gonna be back soon that allows more flexibility with how they use Javy. Lots of Heyward-less options out there.

My vote, which doesn't matter, goes for playing La Stella more. He's red-hot right now. Bring in Heyward with late leads and move Bryant back to 3B but get that stick in the lineup please.

I know they're different guys, but my fear about LaStella getting more than spot starts and late-inning pinch hitting is that he turns into Mike Fontenot 2.0.

[World's #1 Astros Fan]

Back-to-back multi-hit games, solid contact, line drives and hitting to all fields.

So are we just getting fooled again or can Slappy ride this the rest of the year?

[SKO]

Back-to-back multi-hit games, solid contact, line drives and hitting to all fields.

So are we just getting fooled again or can Slappy ride this the rest of the year?

some of those hits have been very cheap. I mean I hope he can keep hitting but I'm not sold yet that anything other than BABIP has changed for the most part. I'd also like to see him learn how to take walks again.

[Chuck to Chuck]

Back-to-back multi-hit games, solid contact, line drives and hitting to all fields.

So are we just getting fooled again or can Slappy ride this the rest of the year?

some of those hits have been very cheap. I mean I hope he can keep hitting but I'm not sold yet that anything other than BABIP has changed for the most part. I'd also like to see him learn how to take walks again.

His exit velocities have been fine for school zones.