An Early Review of the Toronto Blue Jays’ Hitting

Batting Approach

My objective is to outline Toronto’s 2024 hitting approach and then evaluate how Toronto’s hitters have adhered to that approach.

The first step is determining the Blue Jays’ approach for the 2024 campaign. To that end, I accumulated some quotes.

• “A guy having his plan, executing it and staying with it. That ends up being a competitive at-bat,” Mattingly said. “What do you want to do with this [pitcher]? What are you trying to do? How are you trying to get him there? Then, stick with that. You’re not going to cover the whole zone. You’re not going to cover every area, every pitch. We’re going to try to minimize where we’re trying to handle. We’ll hopefully cover the areas that are guys’ strengths, try to get the ball in those areas and go to work.” According to Cavan Biggio, “competing, getting a good pitch, driving the ball and doing what we really need to do.”
• Baseball America’s Geoff Pontes reports that, regarding draft and international prospects, “Toronto has targeted hitters with low K and high BB profiles.”

From those comments, my summary of Toronto’s 2024 hitting approach (until the count reaches two strikes) is as follows:

• Minimize swings on pitches out of the strike zone.
• Limit the number of swings on pitches that you cannot make hard contact. In other words, do damage on pitches.
• Take walks.
• Minimize strikeouts. That is to say, make contact.

Please note that this is a broad assessment of Toronto’s hitting strategy. Players like Bichette are free-swinging hitters, and the Blue Jays are probably willing to let him freelance a little, given his track record. Having said that, what numbers would be consistent with my description of Toronto’s approach?

• Low Chase%
• High pitch per plate appearance
• High BB%
• Low K%
• High in-zone contact rate
• Low Whiff%
• High xISO (xISO is xSLG minus xBA)

Table time!

Table 2 summarizes Toronto’s rankings in metrics that correspond with the noted batting approach. The highlights are as follows:

• The Blue Jays have minimized swings on pitches outside the strike zone (low Chase% overall and with less than two strikes).
• Last season, Toronto did not chase pitches out of the zone much on a relative basis. In all counts, their 26.0 Chase% ranked as MLB’s 4th-lowest.
• Thus far in 2024, Toronto’s pitch per plate appearance (“P/PA”) is 4.03, MLB’s 5th-highest. Last season, the Blue Jays averaged 3.89 P/PA, tied for MLB’s 18th-highest mark.
• In 2023, Toronto’s BB% was 8.8%, good for MB’s 12th-highest.
• Toronto’s batters did not post high K% numbers in 2023 (20.9%, MLB’s 6th-lowest), and that performance continues in 2024.
• From an in-zone contact perspective, Toronto’s 2023 In-Zone Contact% (all counts) was 82.3% (T-11). That rate has improved to 83.4% (T7) so far this campaign.
• This season, Blue Jays’ batters have generated a 22.7 Whiff%, lower than 2023’s 24.0% (MLB’s 6th-lowest).
• The one area in which Toronto’s batters have not executed the hitting plan well is making hard contact. The 0.123 xISO lags 2023’s 0.162 mark (T-16).

According to my Blue Jays’ hitting approach description, Toronto’s batters have not executed the element of above-average hard contact. The reasons for the disappointing level of “damage” on pitches may include personnel limitations, poor swing mechanics, an early-season slump (just missing pitches per John Schneider and others), and other reasons. This aspect can be examined more closely when batter sample sizes are larger.

The Last Word

After a slow start, Toronto’s hitters have performed above the MLB Average. Their 106 wRC+ is the 6^th-highest in the American League.  Due to below-average batting in RISP situations, Blue Jays’ batters reside outside of Top-20 in run production. However, people should refrain from making a final judgment concerning RISP results at this date because of the in-season randomness of RISP wRC+ numbers and the small sample size.

From a batting approach perspective, Toronto has largely executed its described hitting strategy. In relative terms, the team does not chase pitches out of the zone, is patient (high P/PA) and makes contact. The one negative is the lack of hard contact, which is an area for improvement.