Alex Bregman Sets the Offensive Tone for the Red Sox

Since the season began, Alex Bregman has been a man on a mission. We knew that Bregman fit into the lineup well and would offer an offensive spark that had been missing in previous seasons, but we had no idea just how much of an impact he would have so early into his tenure in Boston. Currently, Bregman leads the team in batting average (.320), RBIs (21), OBP (.393), OPS (.956), slugging (.563), WAR (1.6), and is tied for the team lead in home runs with five. He’s been an absolute juggernaut at the plate so far this season.

Arguably the most surprising aspect of it though is that while Bregman is performing well at home, he’s also knocking the cover off the baseball on the road. Bregman made sense for Boston because his swing would play incredibly well at Fenway Park. So far this season he has a higher road average, slugging percentage, and OPS. It doesn’t seem to matter where the Red Sox are playing, Bregman is going to produce.

If we dive a bit more into the numbers, we start to see some trends developing that explain why Bregman has been so successful early in the season. First, he’s absolutely crushing sinkers when they are thrown to him. On that pitch alone, he’s hitting .423 with a .731 slugging percentage. Luckily for him, he’s seeing sinkers almost as much as he’s seeing four-seam fastballs. It has become a trend in recent years for pitching programs to have their starters develop a sinker in the minor leagues and if that trend continues, expect Bregman to light the world on fire as he barrels them up. 

The other indicator that shows us why Bregman is having such prolific success is his plate discipline. So far, Bregman has seen 53% of his pitches in the zone. Of that 53%, he’s swinging at 61.1% of those pitches. When he swings at those pitches, he’s making contact an astonishing 91.9% of the time in the zone. On top of that, he’s only swinging at the first pitch of an at-bat 17.1% of the time. He’s making pitchers work, getting deep into counts, and making sure he sees what pitches the catcher is calling most often. The Red Sox really haven’t seen this type of plate discipline since JD Martinez left the team, and like Martinez, Bregman will likely take some younger hitters under his wing and showcase his approach to them.

It's a bit of a cliché to talk about someone who "lengthens in the lineup", but that's always been Bregman's best skill. Sure, he may not walk as much as he did in his prime with the Houston Astros, but a player who is in the 98th percentile in chase rate is going to force pitchers to dig deep into their bag of offerings to get him out. The more pitches any one hitter sees, the harder it becomes for a pitcher to make it through a lineup multiple times.

Alex Bregman has been better than advertised on offense so far with the Boston Red Sox. If he keeps this up, and there's reason to think he can, given that he has historically gotten off to slow starts, then we’re likely looking at a team that can compete for the AL East title once the dog days of summer are upon us.