Christian Yelich had to get away.
Yelich didn’t pay attention to anything baseball-related this offseason, opting to spend time with family and friends including a vacation to Park, City Utah with infielder Mike Brosseau. (Via Adam McCalvy.)
This quote stuck out to me for Yelich who is trying to rebound from a sub-par 2022 season.
“It’s different for everybody and I think you should take advantage of it. I think it’s healthy and in turn, could make you better at what you do for a job.” (Via Adam McCalvy.)
Well safe to say Yelich’s focus away from baseball, has made him better at baseball.
Yelich has nine hits and smacked his first home run yesterday against the St. Louis Cardinals. It’s safe to say that Yelich won’t ever put 2018- 2019 home run numbers, but, if he can drive the ball as he did in those years, he’ll still be a valuable piece to this team.
So far, most of his hits have come from driving the ball to left or center. Yelich has a .556 average when hitting it to left field and a .429 when driving the ball to centerfield (Via FanGraphs.)
The issue is where would Yelich be most effective. He’s put up good numbers in the leadoff spot and based on the roster construction, He will be batting leadoff most days as Milwaukee currently doesn’t have a true leadoff hitter on the roster.
The other component is out in the field. Prospect Sal Frelick has been impressive so far in Triple-A Nashville so if Frelick continues his hot start, would they consider moving him to Yelich’s spot in left field and have him DH on certain days?
Overall, Yelich isn’t back to being the player we saw in those two years, but he’s a guy who can hit to the opposite field, and with the shift no longer being in play, Yelich should have over 100 hits this year (He did have 145 in the 2022 season so his hits should increase this season.)
So far, Yelich has two things going for him; a blazing hot start and a top-tier social media presence.
This thing has to be messing up a bunch of people views now, but the W grows. @brewers pic.twitter.com/aa3oF8YiHh
— Christian Yelich (@ChristianYelich) April 8, 2023
