What’s up, y’all? Your boy is back and he’s fresh off breaking the Joe Panik signing! Thanks for all the support. To give back to you guys, I went on Twitter and asked which player you were most interested in reading an in-depth article about. Expectedly, I got some pretty funny responses, Bill Pulsipher being my favorite. Out of all of the responses, the one name that kept popping up was my guy J.D. Davis. So here we are. If you want to read about J.D.’s life story, check out his Wikipedia page, but if you want to dive into how one of BVW’s best offseason acquisitions turned into a threat at the plate, you’re in the right place.

The Breakdown

It’s really amazing the season Davis has put together in such a limited amount of playing time. In just 312 plate appearances, not only does J.D. have 14 bombs, but he’s also 83rd in the entire MLB in barrels with 25. For a batted ball to constitute as a “barrel,” it must have an exit velocity of 98 mph or higher while having a launch angle above 26 degrees. To put that stat in perspective, MVP candidate Ronald Acuna Jr. is second in the bigs with 53 barrels, in 553 plate appearances. Crazy, right? Also, J.D. is hitting the ball all over the diamond. Check out this spray chart.

He’s hit more opposite-field home runs this season than he’s pulled! You can’t even shift this dude! Listed at 6’3, 225 lbs, that’s not normal for a guy of this stature. He hits the ball hard and his plate discipline has improved immensely, with an O-Swing% of 26.1 compared to the league average of 31.4 (for those who don’t know, O-Swing is the percentage of pitches a batter swings at outside the zone). Incredible.

Statcast Hero

I touched on some Statcast numbers in the paragraph above, but I’d be remiss not to mention a couple of more. This image here may surprise you.

As you can see, Davis’ Statcast numbers are jumping off the page. He’s sitting in the 94th percentile or above in almost every major Statcast category. For a guy who had just five major league home runs coming into 2019, that is absurd. It’s no fluke either. Unbelievably, J.D.’s expected numbers (or his “X” numbers) are even greater than his surface numbers!

Interestingly, even with his high BABIP, he’s still run into some bad luck. DO NOT make the mistake of thinking this is going to end any time soon. I’m talking to you Mickey.

Batting Stance

Full disclosure, I’ve never been a hitting coach, never wanted to be a hitting coach, and couldn’t be a hitting coach if I tried. That being said, after studying hundreds of J.D. at-bats, I created a couple of GIF’s to compare his stance during his Houston days to his Mets days (also full disclosure, I’m not the GIF-making world champion).

It may be a little tough to see to the naked eye, but I took some stills from these two at-bats because something stood out to me right away. Did you see it?

You can see pretty clearly that his hands are in different spots. That also causes the plane of his bat to be in a different position. As far as his stance, everything stayed the same from his Houston days except for his hand placement. With the Astros, his hands were level to just above his chin line but in his tenure with the Mets, he holds his hands just under his chin. It may seem like such a small adjustment, but I can’t find any at-bat at any level where Davis held his hands below his chin before coming to New York.

Like I said earlier, I’m no hitting coach but it seems a little too coincidental that after the change was made is when J.D. finally found his stroke in the bigs. Hopefully one day soon, I will have the opportunity to talk to Davis and ask him about it.

Summary

I just realized that this whole piece probably made me seem like some sort of J.D. Davis fanboy. Now, I feel obligated to say one negative thing about the guy. Between third base and left field, Davis has totaled -14 DRS (defensive runs saved) this season. As horrible as that is, he is still a plus player at just 26 years old with a WAR of 1.7. Davis can mash, and I really don’t expect that to stop any time soon.

I hope you guys enjoyed this deep dive and if you want more content like this just shoot me a message on Twitter @MikeAnthony3416. Looking forward to the playoffs! That’s right, I said it. #LFGM