Even A.J. Hinch is a little startled. It's one thing for sluggers to swing and miss, quite another to do so at historic levels. Tigers All-Star Riley Greene leads the majors in strikeouts and is on a dangerously close pace for the most strikeouts in a season in MLB history.
While Hinch balks at the word "concerning" to describe what he's seen from arguably the Tigers' best hitter, "obviously I don’t want this guy swinging and missing and punching out," he said. Greene is striking out more often than he's getting on base.
"The concerning part is because it doesn’t have to be part of his game. When we look at Riley Greene and his impact over the course of the year and you look up at the scoreboard, if we didn’t list the strikeouts, you’d be like, ‘Man, this guy is having an incredible season.’ All-Star, big production hitting in the middle of the order -- and then the strikeouts creep up. I didn’t really see it coming to this extent," Hinch said Wednesday on 97.1 The Ticket.
Greene, who got the night off Tuesday amid an extended slump, has struck out 150 times in 111 games. Mark Reynolds set the single-season MLB record with 223 strikeouts in 2009, followed closely by Adam Dunn with 222 in 2012 and Chris Davis with 219 in 2016. Reynolds' strikeout rate in 2009 was 33.7 percent; Dunn was at 34.2 percent in 2012, Davis at 32.9 percent in 2016.
Greene checks in at 32.3 percent this year, a pretty drastic spike from 27.5 percent over his first three seasons. He's been particularly strikeout-prone of late, while hitting .182 since the All-Star break.
"He’s going to be better for it," said Hinch. "I’ve seen players in my time who have gone through these stretches, whether it’s selling out for power, or getting a little bit into swing mode, and when the team was struggling he’s trying to do too much because he knows he’s the center part of our lineup. All those things kind of hit him and he’s had a really hard time getting out of it. I think he will. He’s too talented and too good of a hitter not to. We’ve tried to get him to take a deep breath."
That was the point of resting him Tuesday, though Hinch said he still would have used Greene in the ninth had the Tigers brought the tying run to the plate in their 6-3 loss to the Twins. He is, after all, the team's most dangerous hitter, third in the American League in RBI (84), fourth in homers (26) and fifth in slugging (.507). This is the same guy who was batting .298 with a .904 OPS about a month ago.
"Obviously I still want him as a huge part of this, but the mental break I’m hoping will lead to him just (focusing on) ball in play moving forward. And then when he does that, he’ll hit it to the 20th row or he’ll hit an opposite-field ball that continues to carry out of the ballpark," said Hinch. "We need Riley Greene, he knows that. Right now, it’s been a little rough."
The other troubling aspect of Greene's season at the plate? He's hitting .212 with a .586 OPS against left-handed pitchers, which calls into question his viability as an everyday player. He was much more competitive against lefties over his first three seasons when he generally wasn't hitting for as much power.
Asked if the Tigers have to consider starting Kerry Carpenter against lefties instead of Greene, or at least platooning the two, Hinch said, "I think those are all fair questions, and we’ll see how it plays out." Carpenter is batting .231 with a .680 OPS against left-handed pitching this year, an improvement over his career splits.
Hinch said that both Greene and Carpenter will likely sit Sunday when the Tigers face Angels lefty Yusei Kikuchi, "but you’re always paying attention to what it does to your lineup and what that advantage is to having either guy off."
"The one thing that Riley has consistently given us is defense. And with Carp, I’ve had a hard time keeping him on the field. So, there’s other things than the one at-bat against lefties that I have to weigh, but we’ll see how it plays out. It’s all about the group that I have on the bench and the confidence we have that they’re the better matchup at the beginning of the game and then finding Carp an at-bat in there or finding Riley an at-bat off the bench."