PEORIA, Ariz. — It was an almost imperceptible delay and only a slightly more evident slowdown.
But it made quite a bit of difference for 38 games in a season like no other, one that gave promise to the idea Eric Hosmer can be as significant to the Padres on the field as he is in the clubhouse.
“Tempo,” Hosmer said Wednesday, smiling wide, as if the word were magic.
It sort of was for him. It helped turn one of the game’s most prolific groundball hitters into a guy who sprayed line drives and fly balls all over the yard.
Slowing down allowed him to stay back, see the ball longer and had the side effect of keeping his back side more grounded as he struck the ball.
“He wasn’t rushed,” Padres hitting coach Damion Easley said simply.
Oh, Hosmer’s swinging motion can still cause whiplash just watching it. That thing is violent, like something out of a “Braveheart” battle scene.
And his pre-swing leg kick is still pronounced, like what might be seen on a dance floor at a wedding. But now he begins it a rabbit’s heartbeat later and it lasts about that much longer.
Study video of him hacking any one of dozens of balls into the ground in 2019 and then look at video of the many balls he put in the air in ’20, and it is evident.
“It gives you the space to let that ball travel,” Easley said. “Then as you are starting your swing — we always say stay behind the ball — it allows you the space to stay behind the baseball and therefore get the barrel out front and the ball get in the air.”
Hosmer, who will reach the coveted 10 years of service time early this season, has always been able to bruise a baseball. He routinely ranks among the top 20 to 50 in the majors in average exit velocity. (He has been as high as eighth, in 2016.)
It’s just that the ball was also left with skid marks more often than not.
From his rookie season of 2011 through 2019, Hosmer’s ground ball rate of 54.5 percent was 19th highest in the majors. From 2018 to ’19, his first two seasons with the Padres, no one hit the ball on the ground more frequently than Hosmer at 58.2 percent.
Last year, his ground ball rate was 46.2 percent. Had Hosmer had enough plate appearances to qualify, that would have ranked 44th highest.
One example of the difference putting the ball in the air can make:
