Dillon Lawson, Red Sox Assistant Hitting Coach, Can Help Team Avoid Major Slumps

A few weeks ago, Boston decided to hire Dillon Lawson to the major league coaching staff after his one-year stint as the team’s minor league hitting coordinator. Before coming to Beantown, Lawson spent five years in the Yankees organization, holding various offense-related roles in the major and minor leagues, including his two-year tenure as the big league hitting coach. He also worked as a hitting coach at a few levels of the Astros’ system before that.

Despite journeying to different organizations with different hitting philosophies, Lawson has made it a point in his career to help hitters control the zone. That means lowering chase rates, upping swing percentages on pitches in the strike zone, and working advantageous counts. With the team’s announcement that Luis Ortiz would not be returning next year, Lawson’s promotion was a perfect match of need and fit.

Most fans will probably remember Lawson for being the first coach Yankees GM Brian Cashman ever fired in the middle of a season (in July 2023). However, people likely don’t recognize that the Yankees’ offense actually struggled more under replacement hitting coach Sean Casey (92 wRC+) than it did with Lawson (96 wRC+). 

Lawson did oversee Aaron Judge’s all-time great 2022 season (62 home runs, 210 OPS+), and the Yankees made the ALCS that year, eventually falling to the Houston Astros. That season, the Yankees finished first in the major leagues in home runs (254), though their team-wide batting average of .241 was middle of the pack. The team also had a bit of a strikeout problem that year, finishing 18th with 1,391. However, they did make up for that with a league-leading figure in walks (620).

After being fired by the Yankees, Lawson refocused his efforts on helping players achieve better hitting habits, which in turn should limit the kinds of prolonged slumps that doomed the Red Sox late last season. Prior to the 2024 All-Star break, the Red Sox ranked eighth in the majors in homers (113), tied for fifth in batting average (.254), sixth in OPS (.746), and 15th in walks (299). However, their standing as the third-worst strikeout team would prove to be a bad omen for the second half, where they dropped in batting average (.249, tied for 10th) and OPS (.731, eighth). Of course, they continued striking out at a problematic clip, leading the AL with 640 following the Midsummer Classic.

It’ll be up to the hitting staff to help tone down on those rally-killing punch outs, as well as the front office, which needs to bring in some veterans capable of wearing opposing pitchers down. Lawson’s emphasis on damage-causing contact on pitches in the zone should hopefully cause a ripple effect in the lineup where players are more selective in their approach at the plate. As the 2022 Yankees proved with Lawson at the helm, home runs are great, but their benefits are neutralized by waves of strikeouts.

The Red Sox should have no problems fielding a competitive offense again in 2025. Whether or not that unit can avoid prolonged slumps could be the difference between the team making the playoffs, or another October spent watching the festivities from home.