'It shows he's a really good hitter': Bryan Reynolds rakes even as Pirates scuffle at plate

Mar 12, 2024

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Bryan Reynolds doesn’t have an explanation for how he was riding a 10-game hitting streak while the rest of the Pittsburgh Pirates were scuffling at the plate, especially during their five-game losing streak.

“I think hitting can be contagious both ways,” Reynolds said. “It’s hard to hit when nobody else is.”

Somehow, Reynolds has been doing just that. He slashed .368/.429/.579 over their five losses while the Pirates hit a paltry .167/.251/.256 as a team. Reynolds accounted for four of their nine doubles in that span.

Pirates manager Derek Shelton, a former hitting coach, credits the pitching of their opponents but also believes his batters are in-between and taking awkward swings as a result.

“It’s challenging at any point when you get out of sync offensively and one guy stays really consistent,” Shelton said. “That’s the thing: We’ve got to get back to having more consistent at-bats.”

Reynolds, who signed an eight-year, $106.75 million contract extension, has been streaky this season. He got off to a hot start by hitting safely in the first nine games while batting .480 with four home runs, 12 RBIs and nine runs to earn MLB Player of the Week honors. He followed that by batting .178 (8 for 45) over the next 12 games. Since April 22, Reynolds is slashing .417/.465/.667.

Through 31 games, Reynolds ranks sixth in the National League in batting (.322), ninth in RBIs (23) and 10th in slugging (.568).

“What I did at the beginning isn’t sustainable, so if I can have spurts like that, then just normal spurts throughout, then it will even out to be pretty good,” Reynolds said. “If I can stay right here as my baseline, then mix in some hot spells, that’s a good recipe for success.”

Speaking of spells, Reynolds is going through a dry spell of sorts. After hitting five home runs in the first seven games, including four in a three-day span, he hasn’t homered since April 7.

The homerless streak hasn’t caused Reynolds to lose his sense of humor.

“I’ve just got no pop, so when I get one it’s a double,” Reynolds deadpanned. “I don’t know if I’ll ever get another one. I’ll just keep hitting doubles, I guess.”

The Pirates aren’t about to sound alarms that Reynolds hasn’t homered in a 25-game stretch, given that he is tied for second in the NL and fourth in the majors with 12 doubles, nine coming in the past 10 games.

“That is the least of my concerns,” Shelton said, with a hearty laugh. “There’s a lot of things on my mind. Bryan Reynolds, when he hits his next homer, is not a concern of mine.”

For Reynolds, the home runs can come at the expense of doubles, and vice versa. He hit 19 doubles and a career-best 27 home runs last season, a year after hitting 35 doubles and 24 homers. Reynolds had 37 doubles and 16 homers as a rookie in 2019, then had more homers (seven) than doubles (six) in the pandemic-shortened 2020 season.

“The difference between home runs and doubles, there’s such a fine line there,” Shelton said. “You’ll see guys one year hit a bunch of homers and hit no doubles and then the next year, everybody says, ‘Hey, where’d all the homers go?’ And he hits 15 more doubles.

“Sometimes, it’s just a matter of a fraction of an inch or two, or half inch, or the ball going out of the ballpark or being a double. The most consistent thing is hitting the baseball hard, and that’s what Bryan does and that allows him to get the extra-base hits.”

Per Statcast, Reynolds ranks in the 95th percentile in average exit velocity (93.2 mph), the 91st percentile in hard-hit rate (52%) and the 89th percentile in barrel percentage (16.0). Last year, Reynolds explains, he didn’t hit the ball as hard but hit it higher instead of low line drives.

“If you get doubles and RBIs, the homers will come,” Reynolds said. “For me, homers come in bunches a lot of times. I’m still getting the same pitches, still hitting the ball hard. It just hasn’t been at that launch angle. As long as I’m hitting doubles, it’s fine.”

Shelton had a very simple answer when asked why Reynolds has been the exception: “It shows he’s a really good hitter.”

Shelton swore he wasn’t being facetious, noting that Reynolds was overshadowed last month because of the offensive surge sparked by new additions like Andrew McCutchen, Carlos Santana and Connor Joe.

“Being a really good major-league hitter means that you’re going to swing at the right pitches,” Shelton said. “If you don’t swing at the right pitches, you don’t offer at it. That’s not easy to do. … He’s a really good major-league hitter that handles at-bats. The one thing that we’ve gotten caught up in all around is we talk about Cutch’s at-bats, about Santana’s at-bats, about Connor Joe’s at-bats. We just expect Bryan Reynolds to have those at-bats. But his at-bats are really good on a nightly basis. It’s just that those other guys are new to our club.

“That’s why we wanted Bryan Reynolds to be here for a long time.”

Kevin Gorman is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Kevin by email at [email protected] or via Twitter .

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