We may never find out what Casey Schmitt thinks about his aversion to walks. Is it a philosophical thing? Instinct? Last night, he finally drew a walk for the first time since May 24th. In his post-game interview with NBC Sports Bay Area, there was an opportunity for a question about his approach to hitting that could’ve addressed the walk situation in a positive way, but instead, the broadcast went in a different direction:
KYLEN HILLS: Casey, gotta ask about a unique stat that you probably haven’t heard yet, but, you’ve hit seven first inning home runs, which is the most of any Giant in the last 50 years through this point in the season not named Barry Bonds. What is it about the first inning? Can you give us any insight?
CASEY SCHMITT: You know, honestly, I thought this was gonna go a different way. I thought you were gonna say the at bats until I got a walk again [laughs]
KYLEN HILLS: [laughs] Come on. We wouldn’t do that to you. We’ve got your back.
CASEY SCHMITT: Yeah, I didn’t know that. That’s pretty cool. That’s a cool thing to know. But, uh, yeah, I mean, I’m just trying to get on base. I’m not trying to swing for the fences or anything. I’m trying to stay within myself every single at bat.
A wonderful moment that tells us everything and nothing at the same time. What does Casey Schmitt think about drawing a walk? Or, at the very least, why does he try to avoid them? I have some theories:
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His favorite TV show is Hacks
Sure, the title could be a reference to hacking at pitches, but the spirit of the show is being your unapologetic self no matter what the world throws your way. A comedy about two women from different generations trying to understand each other just enough to get what they want. Maybe Schmitt really likes Jean Smart or her chemistry with co-lead Hannah Einbinder. But the message of getting what you want by going after it, well, yeah, that would certainly diminish the value of a walk in the eyes of a hitter.
Threats
At the beginning of Spring Training, Buster Posey brought into the clubhouse those items or people most important to the players. Casey was all, “Wait, what’s my dad doing here?” before Buster calmly explained that he was only going to allot a certain number of walks this season and that players who go over their allotments would be forced to watch something terrible happen to someone they love.
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Instinct
When Casey Schmitt sees a baseball coming right at him, his internal monologue sounds like comedian Tim Robinson’s screaming voice and all he can think is “F**K, F**K, F**K — A BASEBALL’S COMING AT ME!“ And later he explains, ”It was coming right at me — like, RIGHT at me — 110, 120 miles per hour. It could’ve taken my head clean off.“
Hunter Mense
Okay, seriously, it’s got to be the approach the team imported from Canada’s Toronto Blue Jays in the form of the World Series team’s assistant hitting coach. Mense has brought a swing-first approach to the roster, it seems and it’s clear that it’s working. Since May 1st, the Giants are fourth in wRC+ (110) and fifth in batting average (.259). What’s interesting to note about him is that he’s a huge advocate of swing decisions, an obsession over which got the last President of Baseball Operations fired from the Giants. So, has he instilled something in Schmitt or given him a permission structure for giving into his baser swing instincts?
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I guess we’ll never know! The team-owned media has his back! Walks are taboo? We can’t talk about them? Yeah, I guess that home run stat is pretty cool because being mentioned in the same breath as Barry Bonds is extraordinarily notable…
But, bro. Bros…
As Steven mentioned in his recap, “Schmitt worked a walk for the first time since May 24th — the longest span by a Giants player since Hal Lanier in 1964.” And, if you tweak that search to be any Giant of the Oracle Park era, you find that in the Oracle Park era, Schmitt’s 169 PA walk-less streak is second only to pinch hitter extraordinaire Shawon Dunston’s 246 PA streak (105 games!) that stretched from May 2001 to July 2002.
So, on the one hand, Schmitt can hang with a Barry Bonds stat. On the other hand, he’s in the same group as career .529 OPS Hal Lanier and career .712 OPS Shawon Dunston. And these players of recent vintage:
But then you see Jung Hoo Lee on this list with Pablo Sandoval, Hunter Pence and even Marquis Grissom, and suddenly the lack of walks doesn’t feel quite so dire. Even Donovan Solano. I would not deprive a Giants fan of their Donnie Barrels love.
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The career walk rates of everybody I just mentioned: 6.4%, 7.1%, 7.4%, 6.2%, 6.2%, and all of them with sub-20% strikeout rates (some greatly under that). Schmitt’s career rate of 4.7% and 22.1% strikeout rate check in as higher than this group, but this season, he’s at 2.2 BB% and 19.3 K%.
The reason why it’s worth pointing out is that this simply isn’t sustainable. The reason why walks matter is because it increases the rate by which a batter does not make an out. The lower the “out” rate, the higher the rate of runs scored. Yes, hits are more valuable, but treating on base as zero sum is foolish. The value of not making an out is greater than making an out, after all.
Schmitt has drawn 8 walks in 357 plate appearances. Let’s just say he gets to 600 plate appearances and ups the walk rate a bit to 2.5%; so, 15 walks to end the season. According to Baseball Reference, that’s only happened 27 times in the history of Major League Baseball (unless I’m entering the filtering options wrong).
The most interesting part is that the most recent 10 range from 1966-2017, but between the most recent 10 and the remaining 17, there’s a 31-year gap. Anyway, if Schmitt is able to pull this off, he’ll join these players:
It’s an interesting group. Alcides Escobar was 30 and would play just 3 more seasons. Tim Anderson was at the beginning of his career, and would have a great run after his 606 PA & 13-walk season from 2018-2022 without drawing many walks (.297/.329/.455 — 4.0 BB%, 21.5 K%), but he’d play just 3 more seasons after this run (.232/.269/.270 in 855 PA). Ben Revere played just 3 more seasons, too. Deivi Cruz played five more, but this was his last good season (.264/.293/.384, 3.5 BB%, 9.7 K%). So, let’s hope that this is more Tim Anderson than any other player worth comparing him to on this list.
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It’s really tough to compare eras, too, but except for 2013-2015, the league walk rate since 2000 has been consistently around 8.5%. This season, it’s 9%. If you step back to last century and look at 1966-1990, it’s still around 8.5%, with the exception of a 3-year run when it was about 7.7%. So, historically, Schmitt is an outlier, and not in a way that typically signals long-term success.
But we have other measures, too. He’s making contact as frequently as Mike Trout and Junior Caminero (79.7%), for instance. It helps that he’s swinging more than average (54.6% — 12th-most in MLB), but he’s also swinging out of the strike zone more than average (39.9% — 13th-worst in MLB, 11th percentile), which isn’t great. Still, he’s not swinging and missing a lot (11.1% — between James Wood at 11% and Ohtani at 11.2%) and he’s seen the fourth-most rate of pitches (44.4%) in the strike zone compared to any other hitter in the sport.
The batted ball results are undeniable…
In his minor league and college careers, he walked around 8.5% of the time, which would be the league average if he could bring that sort of discipline to the major leagues. It’s entirely possible this season is motivated by some tricky psychologically: he knew he needed to hit to stick and he’s done exactly that. Once he settles into a position, will that consistency allow him to give himself the power to lay off some pitches?
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On the other hand… if it’s working, why not keep doing it? The theory of why I’m engaging in any concern here is simply that plate discipline and swing decisions have been historical drivers of future success and if Schmitt will be sticking around for a while, I think I’d like to have some sense that he might be one of the players who makes the team better in the future. But for now, all of this is working for him, so, I guess I need to sit back and appreciate this breakout season.
