Everyone is Talking About Matt Shaw’s Progress, Yet Somehow It Still Feels Underdiscussed ...Middle East

There’s not much to praise about the Chicago Cubs’ offense of late, which you already know. I’m here to praise the other thing you already know: Matt Shaw’s second half explosion.

Shaw went into the All-Star break in the kind of deep funk that left you questioning just how up and down his season would be, whether another detour to the minors would be necessary, and how badly the Cubs needed to add Eugenio Suarez by the Trade Deadline. These weren’t necessarily unreasonable overreactions, given the swings in his season thus far, the difficulty in young position players to establish themselves right away in the big leagues, and the opportunity to upgrade the offense.

If you had predicted at that moment that Shaw would transform into almost the only thing about the Cubs’ offense you wouldn’t want to see doing anything different, well, then it would’ve been lottery scratcher time.

Matt Shaw’s Improved Approach and Improved Results

Since the break, Matt Shaw has hit .328/.349/.770/208 wRC+, with a 3.2% walk rate, a 19.0% K rate, a .310 BABIP, a .443(!) ISO, a 41.7% groundball rate, a 34.7% hard hit rate, and a 10.2% barrel rate. You can probably see some of the seams there in the underlying metrics, but it’s unquestionable that he’s been *much* better than he was earlier this year, and he has clearly deserved *a great deal* of the successful results.

I’m sure there are other changes under the hood, and we’ve seen some discussed with his approach, setup, and swing, but the biggest differences are the most obvious: he’s pulling hard fly balls. That’s it. That’s the thing. His fly ball rate is up to 43.8% after the break (35.0% before), and his pull rate is up to a whopping 51.0% (31.7% before).

Listen, I’m oversimplifying to a degree, but this is not a new conversation. For guys of Shaw’s size and ability, you *TYPICALLY* don’t see a ton of productive power to the opposite field in the big leagues. You see a lot of slap hits, yes, and an occasional ball down the line or into the gap. But you don’t see consistent extra-fields power, much less home runs. Very few hitters can sustain the kind of opposite-field power that justifies an opposite-field-oriented approach, and with apologies to Shaw, he probably wasn’t going to be that guy.

So if Matt Shaw were going to hit for power, it was going to have to come from pulling it in the air. There’s a reason guys try so hard to do it, and there’s a reason a guy like Isaac Paredes – the third baseman Shaw replaced – have made entire careers on this kind of profile. If you can be opportunistic to the pull side in the air, pairing it with a good defensive approach to avoid strikeouts and get a lot of line drives to the opposite field, you can be an offensive force. Heck, maybe Paredes should’ve been our ideal comp all along.

Now, here’s where it gets much less simple: it’s easy to describe this approach, but it’s a heckuva lot harder to execute it against the best pitching in the world. To do it in your rookie season? With as little pro experience as Matt Shaw has? While playing excellent defense at a position that’s still relatively new for him? While constantly adjusting his approach throughout the season? I’m actually kind of flabbergasted that Shaw has been able to have as much success has he has over the past few weeks! It probably still isn’t getting enough praise!

We’ll see if Shaw is able to sustain this – not necessarily the extreme results, but the clear approach – the rest of the way. I am loving what I’m seeing, and I would like to think we’d have noticed by now even if the results hadn’t been quite as extreme. This is a GOOD APPROACH for Matt Shaw.

Now, more praise:

Entering today, the top hitters in MLB in the second half (minimum 50 PA). pic.twitter.com/7jYo5tCVU7

Matt Shaw has more HRs than Cam Smith this season. He also has 100+ less plate appearances. t.co/8rXXTSSJSJ

Matt Shaw, folks. pic.twitter.com/qR0a5u9Qqk

What an incredible stretch for Matt Shaw. Team gambled on not making move at 3B at deadline and boy has that paid off. And what a credit to Shaw’s work, adjustments, and patience through a very up and down start to the year. Amazing stuff and huge for the org going forward.

Like having the mental fortitude/resiliance to start the year in Tokyo, be sent down, come back up and struggle and still push through with several swing changes etc all as a 23 year old rookie…just quite impressive. Deserves every bit of success he’s having right now.

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