You guys all put together a sentence better than I do, so here is a somewhat stream of consciousness post. Or, things I think I think.
So Franklin isn't a big guy. Big whoop. You know who wasn't a big guy? Mays. Aaron. Am I comparing Nicky to these all-time greats? No way. But you don't have to be the size of Michael Morse to hit the ball out. Bat speed and squaring it up will do it.
The graph of Nick's hotzone confirms what my eyeballs are telling me. Franklin handles the high inside pitch better than any lefty I can recall. Most lefties traditionally are either low and inside "loop swing" maulers or gap-power hitters that send the pitch back wherever it was pitched for a single or double. But high and tight fence-clearing power? That's rare. Franklin recognizes a hanging curve up in his eyeballs, pulls in the hands, gets on top of it and whacks it 15 rows deep to right center.
Did you see the slo-mo of his second home run? His top hand looked like it was barely touching the bat at impact. You could see air between the palm and the bat. Relaxed hands, not squeezing so hard you get sawdust. Makes your wrists looser and easier to snap them through.
I am of course curious to see how the league adjusts, and how Franklin adjusts to those. My take is that Nick comes out on top of that test.
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