.

I've said, many times, that when it comes to these kind of prospects ...

• In the Mariner org
• Not nationally well-known

... that I'd rather have Gordon's and Spectator's evaluations, than anybody else's on the internet.  

So it's weird-and-wonderful that everybody else on the internet dismisses Ji-Man Choi as no prospect*, and our guys tell us that Choi is absolutely the M's best prospect with the possible exception of D.J. Peterson.  

How could you have that much of a disconnect?  It's partially explained by the fact that people want power from a first baseman.  But as G points out, that doesn't hold them back on other, similar prospects, the way it does Choi.

.

Yoda

After getting The Truth on Choi from Gordon this morning, we wandered over to YouTube to take a peek at Choi's swing.

The moment that Choi took his stance, we got the echoes of Chris Snelling.  Yoda had that same balanced, tense, 50-50 weighting with overly-tight arms held high, and a similar body type.  

Then Choi took his swing and it was Snelling.  Same KBIZLT swing, same short arc with truncated followthrough.  Same quick launch, same SLOOWWWWW throughspeed.  All the same things happened on this swing and on other swings.  Here, lemme separate it out to the quick scan ...

• LH, 50-50-foot stance
• Tight, twitchy body and arms, especially at pitch release
• Unimpressive "normal person's" body
• Read the pitch, let it travel deep
• Quick launch
• Agonizingly slow bat throughspeed
• KBIZLT, almost to a fault

(With "KBIZLT" we are referring to a bat that's in the zone a long time, not because of throughspeed but because (1) the swing arc is on the plane of the pitch and (2) the hitter's hands are inside the ball, giving him an angle when jammed.  The bat is parallel to the pitching rubber at impact, on inside and outside pitches.)

......

Whether you sign off on the overall Yoda comp or not, there can be no question that the two players approach the problem in the same way.  It's not clear whether Choi quite has the Edgar-like forearms that Snelling used to SNNNAPPPP the bat late, and drive offspeed pitches with authority.  But everything else is the same approach.

If so, this would explain Choi's ability to hit pitchers --- > who are better than him --- > without sufficient preparation.  He simply has a lot of time at the plate, with this approach.  And a lot of margin for error, with the KBIZLT.

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JKD and Slow Bat Speed

Bill James has been banging the drum on this issue, and I don't know that he doesn't have a point... 

...

Mets' TV analyst Bobby Ojeda tonight praised Ike Davis's ability to keep his bat in the strike zone for an exceptionally long period of time, which frankly seems crazy to me, having been brought up to think that quickness, speed, bat velocity etc through the zone was paramount. Do you have any idea what Ojeda might have meant? Have you heard of a bat moving for a long time through the zone being a good thing?

Asked by: sgoldleaf

Answered: 4/22/2012

Yes, I know exactly what he means, and I think he's right.   Tony Gwynn is the best example; part of Gwynn's theory of hitting was to keep the bat in the strike zone as long as he could.   If the bat is moving as fast as it can, it moves to and moves past the point at which it can make contact with the pitch very rapidly.    If you slow down the bat--and Gwynn basically dragged the bat through the strike zone--you have a much wider window of potential contact.

 

It is my opinion that modern emphasis on bat speed is extremely unwise and extremely destructive.   On a few hitters actually benefit from having good bat speed, that being those few who can both swing hard and make contact.   Everybody else would be better off to slow their bat down and keep it in the strike zone much longer.    But. . .people are just crazy about bat speed, about hitters who "the ball jumps off his bat."  I think it's wrongheaded.  

 

There's a great advantage to a QUICK bat; there's a great advantage in getting the bat into position to hit as quickly as possible once you decide to swing.    But bat SPEED is trading power for strikeouts.  Slow the bat down and make contact; you're better off. 

 

...

Bill, and everybody else I've ever read outside SSI, doesn't quite get ahold of the key distinction here, a Bruce Lee JKD distinction beween "response" speed and "through" speed.  But he is spiralling in towards the realization that some players -- such as Chris Snelling, Tony Gwynn, and Wade Boggs -- have quick hands but slow swings.

A slow bat LAUNCH is death.  End of story.  But!  A slow bat THROUGHSPEED is fine.  It means you aren't going to hit 20 homers, but it might also mean that you hit .368 a lot of the time, like Tony Gwynn did.  

More importantly, Bill is the first to grasp the point that --- >in terms of solid contact, slow throughspeed can actually be an advantage.

............

Gwynn created 6.6 runs per 27 outs, career, and that's through age 41.   One year, he created 10.0 per 27 outs.  Ji-Man Choi doesn't need to be Tony Gwynn to take 5,000 at-bats in the majors.  The issue here is .300 hitters with slow throughspeed.

Players in this hitting category include

• Tony Gwynn
• Rod Carew
• Wade Boggs
• Al Oliver
• Paul Molitor (statistically.  Molitor had fast throughspeed, but was a smaller guy)
• Pete Rose
• Shin-Soo Choo (as Gordon pointed out)

Choo used to let the bat fly; as time has gone on, he has chosen to sweep the bat through the zone and rack up .423 OBP's.  This idea of "quick response, slow throughspeed" is weird to baseball people.  It's second nature to martial artists.  Especially when blocking, be quick but don't hurry.

If you don't quite get this idea of being (1) snake-quick but (2) not fast?  Think about Ichiro's singles to left field in his prime.  Get it?  "Got it."  Good.

.........

A baseball team, having Paul Molitor in its minor league system, is going to worry about the position later.  Pundits on the internet will fret about whether that's the profile you want at 1B/DH.  As G says, scouts inside the org will go, "Man Alive!  We got Paul Molitor!"  And if Paul Molitor is your DH, you'll be okay, it seems to me.

It's quite true that, in the last ten years, not many teams have gone with Paul Molitor types at first base or DH.  But it is also quite true that there are a whale of a lot of 1B's who don't give you 6-7 runs per 27 outs.

Cheers,

Dr D