FanPost

Gordon Evolves

All last year and early this year, Alex Gordon had trouble with pitches away. He either swung and missed them entirely or tried to pull them and grounded weakly or occasionally popped up. Only his superior talent allowed him to succeed occasionally with this flawed approach.

ThEarly this year he seemed determined to take pitches away. This resulted in numerous called third strikes early on. Then, in the last few games, something changes. He drove one 410 feet to left against Detroit, and afterwards began to stroke the ball to the opposite field with regularity. Today, a pitcher finally came inside to him and he crushed it. Has our golden boy turned a corner?

Going with the pitch away is like throwing the jab for a boxer; keep on connecting with it and your opponent will eventually say "Ow! That hurts! He's not going to do that again." That's when you start to see pitches on the inner half again. Alex has the bat speed to look for the pitch away and still cover the inner half. I hope this half-assed analysis is right; this could be the start of something big.

This FanPost was written by a member of the Royals Review community. It does not necessarily reflect the views of the editors and writers of this site.