TEMPE, Ariz. — Since Brady Anderson’s last year as a full-time member of the Baltimore Orioles’ front office in 2019, he had worked on the fringes of the sport, helping individual hitters here and there.
When the Angels offered him a job to dive back in full time, as their hitting coach, he accepted with the belief that he was “ready to devote everything in my life to this.”
The challenge he accepted comes with a significant hurdle.
He’s now in charge of a group that struck out at a historically high rate last season, which means that is question No. 1 for anyone interested in Anderson’s plans.
Anderson bristles at the notion of any one-size-fits-all philosophy to correcting the problem of strikeouts. In fact, he said it’s best not to emphasize that specific problem at all.
“Maybe your zero-strike approach is wrong if you need to drastically change it with two,” Anderson said.
Anderson said reducing strikeouts is a side effect of improving hitting, rather than a goal in itself.
“Strikeouts are problematic, there’s no doubt,” he said. “But you clean up mechanics, you clean up how a player sees himself, get a player to relax a little bit more.”
Anderson also said that he disagrees with the direction of the game, in which followers of advanced metrics have claimed that a strikeout is the same as any other out.
“For the mathematical equation part of it, they have to account for a strikeout as just an out,” Anderson said. “But when you’re watching in real time, if you’ve been on teams or coached teams or been around teams, if you have multiple players with high strikeout rates, you can see that leads to team slumps.”
The Angels struck out 1,627 times last season, second worst in MLB history trailing only the Minnesota Twins’ 1,654 in 2023. The Angels’ 27.1% strikeout rate last season was highest in the league. They also ranked 25th in runs last season, despite being fourth in homers. They were dead last in batting average and 28th in on-base percentage.
The Angels last season had only two players come to bat at least 200 times last season with a strikeout rate better than the major-league average of 22%. They were Nolan Schanuel (13%) and Luis Rengifo (19%). And now only Schanuel remains.
The worst offenders among the everyday players were Mike Trout (32%), Logan O’Hoppe (31%) and Jorge Soler (30%).
Anderson, who struck out 16% of the time during his 15-year major-league career, said the key is to figure why players are striking out, and it’s not always the reason people assume.
“It might not necessarily be they’re trying to hit home runs,” Anderson said. “It might just be that they’re late and they’re trying to catch up. If they’re late, you try to get them on time. If they are going out of the zone, you try to show them how much damage they do in the zone.”
Anderson said the players who don’t strike out – like Schanuel or non-roster invitee Adam Frazier – simply have a natural talent that can’t be taught.
“Genetics are interesting,” Anderson said. “To the highest degree, hitting is visual. You don’t know what another player sees.”
Anderson said some players simply see certain pitches better than others.
“There’s different skill sets that people bring,” Anderson said. “And you try to optimize them.”
Optimizing the skills of the hitters the Angels have will be vital for Anderson. The Angels have essentially the same roster of hitters as they had last year, so their only hope for improving is getting more out of them.
“I think they’re all going to be better,” Anderson said.
One of the most intriguing individuals is O’Hoppe, who had had torrid months in which he looks like an elite offense catcher, and then other slumps in which he produces almost nothing and strikes out routinely.
That looks familiar to Anderson.
“I experienced highs and lows to an unusual degree as a major-leaguer,” Anderson said. “Usually the people that experienced the lows that I had don’t last, and the people that experience the highs that I had don’t have those lows. So I can relate. It could be anxiety. Could be stress. There’s other things than creating a perfect swing. Logan is super skilled, beastly strong. I like where he’s headed.”
Zach Neto, on the other hand, has shown steady improvement throughout his first three seasons in the majors.
“Wind him up and watch him go,” Anderson said of the shortstop. “He’s going to keep getting better … If he just stayed exactly how he is, you’d love the guy, but he’s going to keep getting better and better.”
Schanuel has shown himself to be an excellent hitter, although without the pop that most corner infielders have. Anderson said he’s not interested in changing anything about Schanuel to get more homers.
“Pure hitter,” he said. “Line-drive hitter. He doesn’t need to try to lift, ever. Stays in the gaps. He’s perfect. Requires very little help on my part other than keeping him where he needs to be.”
Jo Adell enjoyed a breakthrough season last year, hitting 37 homers. He also had a .236 average, a .293 on-base percentage and 26% strikeout rate. Although the assumption from those numbers is that Adell needs to shorten his swing and not try to hit homers, Anderson disagrees.
“I don’t consider his swing long,” Anderson said. “I consider it long in an appropriate way. You need some length to generate speed. You can’t generate speed in a short distance. The bat needs to travel … You’re going to see a lot more advancement in his skill level. He was pretty raw a couple years ago. People weren’t sure what he was going to be, and now he’s sort of coming into his own.”
As for Trout, Anderson said he’s anticipating improvement from what he did last season. A three-time MVP who has a career .976 OPS, Trout had a .797 OPS last season.
“Mike’s skills are there,” Anderson said. “They’re there. People will see.”
NOTES
Right-hander Ben Joyce, who is rehabbing from shoulder surgery, said he’s scheduled for his next bullpen session Wednesday. Joyce said he’s still just throwing fastballs and changeups, not his slider. “It’s been going well,” he said. “Just kind of progressing every time. Just trying to increase the intensity. Add pitches into the mix. It’s been feeling good. Responding well. I’m happy with it.” …
Right-hander Nick Sandlin, who is coming back from arthroscopic elbow surgery, had his first bullpen session Tuesday in which he threw all of his pitches. “Continuing to add all the pitches and add to the pitch count and just build up to where I feel good enough to face hitters,” Sandlin said. “It’s going as planned. Getting better for sure.” …
The Angels added minor-league right-hander Jared Southard to big-league camp. Southard pitched a scoreless inning, with two strikeouts, in the Angels’ exhibition Sunday. He threw 12 strikes in 16 pitches, with a fastball at 96-97 mph. “He pitched really well the other day and (general manager) Perry (Minasian) wanted to get a better look at him and he’s here,” manager Kurt Suzuki said.