I wish I had a dollar for every time I've heard Aaron Boone say "control the strike zone" since he became Yankees manager.
I asked him last week how and why that became such an important phrase for him, one that he once called a "bumper sticker" for his team's offensive philosophy.
"I just feel like to be a really good offense, or individually a really good offensive player, it's hard to be that when you don't control the strike zone," Boone said. "Because ultimately good pitchers, the best pitchers -- big-league pitchers -- can exploit that over time. And if you control the strike zone, coupled with talent and maybe power, that's a dangerous combination.
"You're going to have your outliers obviously, guys that are free swingers that are good hitters. But by and large, the teams that are (really good) offensively control the strike zone. And so it's something that's important to me."
OK, so it's not a unique concept. I just am struck by the way Boone phrases it and repeats it like Apollo Creed kept repeating to Rocky Balboa, "eye of the tiger, eye of the tiger" in "Rocky III."
So I decided to ask some Yankees what "control the strike zone" means to them.
AARON JUDGE
"What does it mean to me? Just swing at pitches I can drive. That's the biggest thing. That's how I've always looked at it is to swing at pitches that I can do damage on. And most likely if I'm swinging at pitches that I can do damage on, they're most likely in the zone. If it's a pitch that I don't think that I can hit with authority then it's probably a ball or it's at the bottom of the zone or half a ball off. So for me, it's always been about trying to find a pitch I can do damage on. And if I'm doing that, then I'm controlling the zone.
"He's been talking to us about that since '18. That was one of the first things he kind of told us, one of the first meetings he had. 'Hey, I want you guys to really control the strike zone.' And I thought we have a team that's capable of doing that. Because that kind of feeds into our mindset of passing the baton. My idea is I'm going to control the strike zone and go up there and look for a pitch I can do damage on. OK, I didn't get one? Hand it off and go to first, let (Luke Voit) take care of it, let DJ (LeMahieu) come up and do the same thing. You're not going to pitch to DJ? Gonna control the zone, let the next guy up. Then all of a sudden Gio (Urshela) comes up and gets a big hit because he's looking for a pitch to do damage on. So it kind of just feeds into the mentality that we already have on this team."
AARON HICKS
"For me, it would be early in the count get good pitches to hit. And try to pretty much lay off all the pitches that come in chase counts like 1-1 and 2-0. Those happen to be more chase counts than any of them. Being able to get yourself in a positive count is pretty much what that means to me."
Murti: "2-0 is a chase count?"
Hicks: "Yeah, 2-0 has been more of an off-speed count or something like that. Normally it used to be a guaranteed fastball, but not so much anymore. It all depends on how you attack the fastball and if you hit the fastball well, so I tend to get more off-speed in that count than fastball.
"It's about staying within your approach, not swinging at fastballs in and being more aggressive over the middle to outer part of the plate. It's just stuff like that to kind of keep you in a position to be successful."
BRETT GARDNER
"I think it means two things. I think it means be aggressive within the strike zone, obviously when you get good pitches to hit, try and be ready to hit 'em. And obviously stay under control enough to where you take pitches that are outside of the strike zone, try to limit the number of chases that you have and the number of free strikes you give the opposing pitcher. It's obviously much easier said than done, but that's kind of the name of the game.
"It's just something that we kind of preach around here. We obviously have a talented group, and a lot of our young hitters can really impact the baseball. Just try to all across the board, up and down the lineup we take a lot of pride in making opposing pitchers work, and if we can be aggressive within the strike zone, we can make some good things happen."
DJ LEMAHIEU
"Just hitting your pitch, not chasing. Probably just having good, relaxed at-bats. I think hitting is hard, but if you can look for a certain location or a certain pitch and be ready for that, stuff like that helps us mentally rather than go up (try to) crush the ball. Sometimes that's not always the best way, right? Look for your pitch and do the best you can."
GARY SANCHEZ
"Going back to last year, I felt like guys were just executing a pitcher's pitch all the time on me. Those sliders down and away and out of the zone, I was swinging at those. So when he mentions that, it's about controlling the zone and staying away from swinging at those pitches. Because at the end of the day, they have to come into the strike zone, and if I force them to do that, I just have better results when I'm swinging at pitches in the strike zone.
Murti: "And what about as a catcher?"
Sanchez: "As a catcher, it's the other side of the coin. I'm behind the plate to gain strikes. And those pitches that are borderline that I can frame and receive them in a way that I can gain that strike. By doing that we can allow our pitchers to get ahead."
CC SABATHIA
"Just try to be aggressive in the strike zone, throw all my pitches. Be around the zone, try to get swings early in the count, get some weak contact and try to get deeper into the game and save the bullpen a little bit. That's always the goal."
AROLDIS CHAPMAN
"To me, to control the zone as a pitcher is to be able to execute the pitch that you want at the location you want. Sometimes you just want to throw a strike. Sometimes you want a borderline pitch. And sometimes you really just want to throw a ball in certain situations.
"As a pitcher when you say you are controlling the zone, at the same time you're controlling the game. That's something that I've been working on this year, to try to get ahead of batters really quick, have more options and ways to attack them. Yea, that's the mentality."
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