A Selective Ryan Howard is a Dangerous Hitter

No Phillies player has a lower contact percentage on pitches outside the strike zone than Ryan Howard - and it's not close (43.3% to Mayberry's 55.8%). No National League player tops Ryan Howard in this specific case of futility. Howard also sees fewer strikes than any other Phillies hitter.

These stats back up what we already know about Howard: he seems to make up his mind to swing or not before the pitch is thrown, he rarely hits non-strikes hard, he rarely gets strikes, therefore he rarely hits the ball hard, rarely walks, and often strikes out. Something like that, right?

Tonight, Phillies fans saw a different Ryan Howard. It helps when the opposing pitcher leads the league in HR allowed, but it also helps to swing mostly at hittable pitches. The first Vine (sorry for the poor quality) displays Howard seeing six pitches and only swinging at one off the plate.


He went down in the count 0-2 after being ahead of a changeup (but it was a strike, so that's kind of okay at this point - baby steps). He battled the rest of the way and eventually got a fastball up in the zone and crushed it for a home run.

Howard's second AB, shown below, shows Howard going from 1-0 to 1-2 to a walk.


The two pitches that he swung at were likely off the plate, and all three balls that he swung at in his first two at-bats were thigh-high and a few inches inside. For some reason he loves that pitch this season, but I'm not sure why as it's either going to be a swing & miss, pulled foul, or dribbled into the shift. He hasn't shown the bat speed in 2013 to turn on that pitch and hit it over the fence.

Regardless, the result of Howard's patience, laying off four pitches outside the strike zone, including three in a row and the last one looked like a typical Howard strike-out pitch, was a walk. Walks, despite what Ruben Amaro Jr. says, lead to runs and this lineup can use them any way they can get them.

It's too early to declare Howard's power to be back, and we'd be naive to think he's changed his approach at the plate - after all, Haren couldn't be more perfect to hit. But, perhaps we're looking at progress, perhaps as fans we can hope change is occurring. If Ryan Howard has this approach every night, he will be a force in the lineup, even if not 100%, because hitting strikes are fun, and walking is even better.