Milwaukee Brewers outfielder Joey Wiemer had many ups and downs during his 2023 rookie season. Overall he had a slash line of .204/.283/.362 with 13 home runs, 42 RBI, and a 76 OPS+. When recently asked about his performance last year he described it as “not great”.
Over the off-season Joey Wiemer has made adjustments to his swing. In footage available his approach seems simplified and more natural. Throughout most of last year he would appear to be swinging as hard as he could and trying to force action at the plate. This year his swing and approach is going to be much different.
Joey Wiemer reveals one goal regarding his swing change.
Making more contact was a point of emphasis this off-season for Joey Wiemer. In 2023 he struck out 28.3% of the time and struggled mightily against off-speed pitches.
“Trying to get the ball in play more. More contact. Just letting my natural levers and tools do the work as opposed to trying to force it.”
How did Joey Wiemer describe the changes in his swing? He indicated that it’s not a complete overall, but there is a lot of new stuff in this much simplified and shorter approach.
“It’s not a complete overall. I can’t get away from the things that make me me. There’s a lot of new stuff to it. Much simplified. Much shorter. Definitely a tweaked approach.”
Joey Wiemer is embracing the Milwaukee Brewers “you be you” hitting philosophy
This off-season Brewers hitting coordinator Brenton Del Chiaro spoke on the organization’s “you be you” hitting philosophy. This concept is apparent as Milwaukee has several players with unique swings/movements. The coaches goal when considering swing adjustments is to make sure that they fully understand a players movements, what they are trying to accomplish, and they mainly leave it up to the individual athlete to figure out how they want to get there.
All of these principals were apparent in Joey Wiemer’s above quotes as he fully acknowledged that he needed to let his natural levers and tools do all the work, but that he couldn’t fully get away from thing that had made him successful in the past. It will be interesting to see if this simplified swing helps increase his contact rates and ability to put the ball in play, which is what he stated the main goal was.
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