Corey Patterson Batting Over .300

graphs_300_batter_season_5_full140280_20060523.pngMy whipping boy in the off season went 3-3 with a home run, 2 stolen bases, and 2 walks last night to raise his batting average to just over .300 for the season. Corey Patterson must have made some significant changes to go from hitting a horrible .215 to a good .306 in just one season, right?

Well, the main thing Patterson has done is actually make contact with the ball. Last season he struck out in 26% of his at-bats and this season he’s only striking out 17% of the time. However, it’s not all good news since he still can’t (or won’t) decipher when pitches are in the strike zone. He chases “bad pitches” over 30% of the time making him one of the 10 most aggresive swingers in baseball. While he has made real improvement and can probably be elevated from “whipping boy” status, I just don’t buy him as a .300 hitter.





David Appelman is the creator of FanGraphs.

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steverino
17 years ago

That “chasing bad pitches” percentage suggests that a bit of luck is involved in his strikeouts currently being lower than usual, and that it will catch up with him somewhere as the season moves forward . . . so I’m not buying him as a .300 hitter yet either. The still-weak .330 OBP does not bode particularly well either.