The Padres may have had a better offseason than most folks realize.<\/p>\n
Leadoff man Ramon Laureano said his promising start to this season owes in part to his work with Steven Souza Jr., whose hire in November registered only a small blip on the media-and-fan meter.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m very glad I\u2019m with a hitting coach like that,\u201d Laureano said Saturday. \u201cIt\u2019s beautiful. It\u2019s a blessing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Laureano said Souza\u2019s recent experience as a big-league hitter \u201chelps a lot,\u201d as does his knack for distilling much information into kernels of wisdom.<\/p>\n
Souza has brought increased clarity to how Laureano attacks each plate appearance.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s been filtering to me like a 5-year-old,\u201d the leadoff man and left fielder said, \u201cand I like it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Laureano, 31, had a fine two months with the Padres last season after arriving in a summer trade with the Baltimore Orioles.<\/p>\n
Souza, 36, was an opponent to Laureano within a six-team big-league career that ended in 2022. The former outfielder and designated hitter was a special advisor of hitting development with the Tampa Bay Rays before Padres rookie manager Craig Stammen hired him.<\/p>\n
Laureano said Souza impressed him from the start, chatting him up soon after he was hired to replace Victor Rodriguez, who left to become the hitting coach for the Houston Astros.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe speak the same hitting language,\u201d Laureano said. \u201cHe knows we\u2019re living in an evolution in baseball now, when it comes to pitching. Velocity. Spin. Angles. Extension. The whole analytics metrics. He helps a lot with it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Laureano has been the Padres\u2019 most entertaining hitter through three weeks.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s hunting pitches to good effect and using a handsy swing to smack an array of pitches with power.<\/p>\n
The 5-foot-9 right-hander\u2019s improved knack for \u201clagging the bat\u201d makes hitting connoisseurs swoon.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s able to lag the bat just like the best in the game,\u201d Souza said.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou have to lag the bat in the zone. You don\u2019t want to drag the bat. There\u2019s a big difference between dragging the bat and lagging the barrel back through and letting it pick up speed as you go. He knows that. That\u2019s the goal every day.\u201d<\/p>\n
Laureano\u2019s right-handed pull power suits Petco Park. He has lifted four home runs over the left-field wall this season, recalling Kyle Higashioka\u2019s quick acclimation after coming over from the Yankees.<\/p>\n
In a sign of smart preparedness, he is handling some difficult pitches. None was more testy than a tailing fastball from Mariners closer Andres Munoz that Laureano pulled for a double Wednesday, fueling a five-run ninth inning that decided the game.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe has the ability to \u2014 because his hands are independent from his shoulders \u2014 to move the ball around,\u201d Souza said.<\/p>\n
Entering Saturday\u2019s game, Laureano was batting .290 with four home runs, four doubles, a triple and an adjusted OPS that was 48% above the big league average.<\/p>\n
Souza said the success has begun with Laureano\u2019s mental approach.<\/p>\n
\u201cNumber one,\u201d he said, \u201che\u2019s very intelligent.\u201d<\/p>\n
Twenty games have been played.\u00a0Like every team, the Padres have hitters who\u2019ve not yet found peak form.<\/p>\n
Fernando Tatis Jr. is hitting the ball hard, but had no home runs entering Saturday. Jake Cronenworth\u2019s numbers are way down<\/p>\n
On balance, though, the Padres\u2019 offense gets a passing grade. It stands 14th of 30 teams in runs scored, helping the team begin with 13 wins and seven losses. The turnover among Padres hitting coaches in the Petco era argues for caution, but Souza is off to a promising start.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Padres may have had a better offseason than most folks realize. Leadoff man Ramon Laureano said his…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":678849,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2407],"tags":[5,853,4,43,137,18,4339,4338,185],"class_list":{"0":"post-678848","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-diego-padres","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-latest-headlines","10":"tag-mlb","11":"tag-padres","12":"tag-san-diego","13":"tag-san-diego-padres","14":"tag-sandiego","15":"tag-sandiegopadres","16":"tag-sports"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116429498032955875","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/678848","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=678848"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/678848\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/678849"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=678848"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=678848"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=678848"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}