NEWSLETTER
Kris Bryant had himself a night last night.
He has rightly received plenty of attention for his hustle single on a routine grounder to third base, which you can see here. Bryant also tripled:
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That was impressive for so many reasons. First of all, Noah Syndergaard located that 96mph fastball exactly where he wanted to on the outer third of the plate. Secondly, Bryant put his standard, easy swing on the ball – going with the pitch – and had enough on it to nearly take the ball out of the park. Thirdly, right field at Wrigley, down the line, is very deep, and Bryant did that opposite field. Finally, Bryant hustled right out of the box, and converted that into a triple even though Curtis Granderson fielded it relatively cleanly.
Also, Bryant homered later in the game:
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And if you’d like to see the Statcast version of the homer:
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That was an ugly pitch, and Bryant did with it what you hope he does every time someone accidentally gives him a belt-high fastball over the heart of the plate.
On the night, Bryant was 3-4 with that triple and homer plus a walk. Heck, the hustle infield single may have been even more impressive than either of the extra-base hits.
With that one big game, Bryant raised his OPS nearly 100 points from .784 to .876.
I think it’s even more fun to go back to when Bryant hit his first big league homer on Saturday night, and see how these four games have impacted his numbers. In that stretch, he’s gone 5-15 with three homers, a triple, three walks, and six strikeouts. In the process, his …
Among all NL batters with at least 100 plate appearances, Bryant now has the 13th highest wRC+. At third base, his numbers trail only Matt Carpenter.
