TORONTO — With 2.5 seasons of huge league baseball beneath his belt, Anthony Volpe stays an enigma on the plate.
Now 24, Volpe has seemingly gone backwards and forwards between attempting to be a speedy singles-slapping hitter and a slugger prepared to sacrifice strikeouts for house runs. The outcomes have been wildly inconsistent, with short-lived peaks and extended valleys contributing to a profession 86 wRC+ coming into the Yankees’ sport towards the Blue Jays on Monday.
Volpe, a right-handed hitter with a 90 wRC+ this season, pulled the ball repeatedly over three video games in Atlanta over the weekend. On Friday, he drove a pitch to deep left-center, however the Braves’ Michael Harris II made a fairly operating catch. Saturday noticed Volpe report the primary multi-homer sport of his profession after depositing two balls within the left discipline seats at Truist Park. He additionally had a protracted sac fly to the left facet of heart discipline. On Sunday, Volpe singled to left and hit just a few groundouts to his pull facet.
With Volpe contemporary off the All-Star break and a earlier 35-game stretch that noticed him submit a .494 OPS courting again to June 7 — the day after Boston’s Walker Buehler hit him within the elbow with a pitch — it was affordable to surprise if he had determined he needed to begin pulling the ball extra over the break.
“No, not necessarily,” Volpe replied after his energy surge on Saturday.
“When I’ve [pulled the ball] and been successful, I’ve never been trying to do it necessarily,” he stated. “I feel like you put yourself in good position, and that just unfolds and happens naturally. So just focus on stuff I can do. Obviously, that’s the result you want.”
Volpe then added, “When I try to do that, you guys ask me why I don’t go opposite field and stuff like that.”
Volpe has been the topic of a lot debate, with followers, pundits and reporters usually questioning which aforementioned model of himself he ought to decide to.
It was simply final week that Alex Rodriguez sarcastically declared that he prefers the singles model of the shortstop.
“With his great legs, my job would be, ‘I don’t want to hit home runs. I want to hit low line drives, hit groundballs all over the place, force the defense to make errors, become an incredible bunter,’” the once-prolific house run hitter instructed The Michael Kay Present. “I’d like to have 8-12 bunt hits, because a bunt base-hit for Volpe is like a double. It’s OPS, right?”
Talking of OPS, Volpe entered Monday with a profession mark of .705 on balls with a launch angle lower than 15 levels. He had an OPS of 1.003 on balls with a launch angle better than 15 levels.
Volpe’s xwOBA, which measures high quality of contact, was .324 with a launch angle beneath 15 levels. It was .416 with a launch angle better than 15 levels.
Nonetheless, A-Rod desires Volpe to ditch his uppercut swing, make the most of his pace extra, enhance his contact charges and put extra stress on opposing defenses. There are many followers who agree, after which there are lots who’d want Volpe pursue slug as a result of they’ll see that he merely doesn’t possess the bat-to-ball abilities of somebody like Luis Arraez.
Volpe, nonetheless, doesn’t suppose chasing energy is the reply, neither is he seeking to be a singles hitter. Slightly, he believes that pop, particularly to his pull facet, will include good positioning and timing.
“That’s the objective, and that’s what we’re all trying to do,” Volpe stated. “Everyone’s different in how they get to that spot.”
Discovering that constantly, after all, is one other story, which Volpe is aware of all too nicely.
Now in his third season, he has acquired unwavering help from the Yankees group, together with Aaron Boone and Brian Cashman. However together with his protection and baserunning regressing this season and his bat nonetheless beneath common, he completed the primary half as a goal for impatient onlookers.
Volpe is conscious of the criticism, although he’s tried to not let it affect his confidence.
“I go through the team, so when we win, I’m happy,” he stated. “When we lose, I’m not. So anything other than that, I know what I gotta do. I have high standards for myself, and any of the stuff on the outside doesn’t even come close to the standard I hold myself to.”
Initially Printed: July 21, 2025 at 7:26 PM EDT
