Inside Baseball

Jay Walkers  

With a get-on-base mantra, red-hot Toronto is running up the score

By Daniel G. Habib

Vernon Wells's natural impulse is to swing early and often, but in Toronto, where on-base percentage is king, the 24-year-old centerfielder is learning to be patient at the plate. "Every time I walk," he recently told general manager J.P. Ricciardi, "I think of you." At the urging of their statistically savvy G.M., the Blue Jays have made plate discipline their organizationwide hitting priority, encouraging players to work deep into counts, take walks and wait for pitches that can be driven for extra-base hits.

Led by the powerful Delgado (above) and the patient Wells, Toronto had won nine of 11 through Sunday. Ronald Martinez/Getty Images

The formula has worked for the Blue Jays (32-26), who moved to within two games of the Yankees in the AL East after sweeping the second-place Red Sox last weekend. Through Sunday, Toronto led the majors in runs (6.2 per game) and on-base percentage (.358) and was second in slugging percentage (.479). (The Blue Jays have had to rely on their offense, because their pitching ranked 11th in the AL with a 4.90 ERA.) "We're not reinventing the wheel," says Ricciardi, whose club had also drawn 199 walks, "and we're not asking guys to go up and look for walks. We're asking guys to be selective, which is what all the great hitters are."

In an effort to improve plate coverage, hitting coach Mike Barnett instructs the Blue Jays to try to hit middle-to-opposite field during batting practice. Barnett often asks players to stand in the batter's box during a starter's off-day bullpen session to improve the players' sense of the strike zone and pitch recognition. As a result, Toronto's offense has proved to be efficient at keeping innings alive by reaching base and at chewing through starting pitchers by going deep into counts. Opposing starters this season have recorded an average of 16.2 outs per game against the Blue Jays, the lowest in the majors.

First baseman Carlos Delgado embodies the patience-and-power package. An anomaly in the club's low-budget lineup because of his $17 million-a-year contract, Delgado has been producing at the highest rate of his career. At week's end he was tied for second in the AL in home runs (16), led in RBIs (57), walks (40) and slugging percentage (.657).

Delgado credits his success in part to small adjustments to his swing mechanics early this season. He stands taller in the batter's box, and the timing of his hand movement is different. Delgado moves his hands backward before he swings, and then, instead of starting his swing as the pitcher's arm comes forward, he begins once he sees the pitcher's throwing hand break from the glove.

Two offensive categories in which you won't find the Blue Jays among the leaders are stolen bases (11) and sacrifice bunts (two) -- the lowest numbers in the majors -- because they have no interest in conceding outs to manufacture one run at a time. They prefer to wait for big innings. "You have to work the lineup a little bit more in the National League," says manager Carlos Tosca, "but in the American League this is the kind of offense you have to have. Five- and six-run leads are nothing."

In many respects outfielder Frank Catalanotto, who signed as a free agent for a paltry $2.2 million for one year in the off-season, is a prototypical Blue Jay. He's defensively versatile, playing both leftfield and right, and has a hefty .368 on-base percentage. Yet he's also responsible for Toronto's two sacrifice bunts; he tried one on his own and was credited with the other after advancing a runner while attempting to bunt for a base hit. Catalanotto quickly grasped that he was off-program. "We don't do a whole heck of a lot of bunting," he says, grinning. "Those might be the only two we get all season."

Issue date: June 9, 2003

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