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A Bo Bichette at-bat is an interesting thing to watch. His swing is the most all-out thing you are ever going to see. I am amazed he doesn’t hurt himself. I guess the line is that he doesn’t get cheated, but he doesn’t seem under control.
Bo is hitting .283/.332/.484 with 15 home runs, 65 runs scored, 53 RBI, and 12 steals (and he hasn’t been caught yet, he seems to have taken Cavan’s streak over). He’s striking out at about the same rate as last year21.9%) but walking more (6.1% up from 3.9). Fangraphs has him at a 2.4 WAR, Baseball-Reference 2.9.
Defensively, FanGraphs has him at a -6.2 UZR (last year, he was 5.9 to the positive). He has made 11 errors, 6 fielding, 5 throwing. 6 of the errors came in April. He’s calmed it a bit since then.
I do think that, in the long run, he would be better off as a second baseman, but that will have to wait until we have someone else who will be here for more than a season. The way he hits, he’s got plenty of value even if he isn’t a great defensive player.
Buck and Pat make a big deal out of his ‘two-strike approach,’ and he does foul off many pitches. I think it is unfortunate that many of the pitches he fouls off are well out of the strike zone, but he does seem to get in that mode where he will swing at everything once he gets to two strikes.
After two strikes, he is hitting .187/.223/.240 (for comparison, as a team, after two strikes, the Jays are hitting .177/.240/.270). So he isn’t doing better than the average Blue Jay in that spot. But that’s not going to stop Buck and Pat from talking about it.
Anyway, even with the less-than terrific defense and a two-strike approach that really doesn’t seem to be helping him hit all that well in that spot (but I guess it drives up pitch counts), a WAR of 2.5 by mid-season is pretty terrific.
Sometimes I wonder how he will age with that all-out swing. Is it something that will serve him well when he gets into his 30s, but that’s in the future.
Poll
For the first half, I’d give Bo Bichette an
This poll is closed
-
21%
A
(179 votes) -
47%
B+
(393 votes) -
24%
B
(207 votes) -
4%
B-
(34 votes) -
0%
C+
(8 votes) -
0%
C
(4 votes) -
0%
C-
(1 vote) -
0%
D+
(0 votes) -
0%
D
(0 votes) -
0%
D-
(1 vote) -
0%
F
(4 votes)