Jackson Holliday shows an improvement in attacking fast balls

Toronto – Kevin Gausman’s fastball was sitting on the inner third of the plate height and served as an invitation for Jackson Holliday. Last year, when Holliday reached the majors with the Orioles, the infields did not punish the criminal parking spaces with almost the price he did in the small leagues.

That was last year. And although the 2025 season is two days old, his inside-out swing against Gausman’s heating is a strong indication that Holliday is more prepared for his first full season in the majors.

Holliday, with a toe-tap mechanic, took over mostly because of his difficulties in catching up the fast ball, Gausman’s pitch turned and rattled into his left seat. It was his first Homerun of the season and it was one of the most impressive swings of his career so far.

“My buddy wrote me an SMS and said:” What was that? “, Said Holliday, who had surprised himself from his consideration towards the field.” I said: “This is a good question. I don’t really know.” But hopefully if I can stick to this approach to put line trips into the gap, I will be in a good place. “

Even if this ball would not have left the farm-one of the few bright spots in Baltimores 8-2 loss in the Rogers Center against the Blue Jays in Toronto-is the hard contact against heating in the strike zone.

Last season, Holliday produced negative runs of 1.98 runs over fast balls per 100 parking spaces last season. In 74.3% of the cases in which he had joined four-souls, he made hard contact against fastballs, but the results were still scattered because his breath quota was 32.9%.

His zone hief rate was even more worrying. Holliday swung and missed 24.3% of cases against every field in the zone last season. According to Statcast, this rose to 26.2% of his fluctuations against in-zone fasting.

This is an area in which Holliday began towards the end of last season when he put his leg kick for a tap that he believed that he would improve his timing. Holliday is ready to jump on a fast ball.

“This is the goal, especially if you get into the hits of the hit,” said Holliday. “It is a kind of main reasons why I went to the toe tap and tried to reduce swing and miss and foul balls and squares the ball as far as possible, especially in Hitter.”

For many rackets, off-speed parking spaces cause the most problems. In 2023, Gunnar Henderson, for example, took about two months before he started punishing break balls in the zone. These will still challenge Holliday (he scored against Ballen against Ballen last year), but this learning curve makes its production all the more important.

The development of Holliday is one of the most important stories about Orioles. When he arrived in the majors for the first time, he only gave 10 games around. The 21-year-old scored two goals during this time while he was 18 times. His custody improved over the course of the season, but he still scored in his last 50 games .218 with 51 strikeouts.

However, Holliday attacked his work outside of the season with a combination of speed training, weightlifting and beef wood meat on the menu. He ended the last season with £ 188 and completed 200 in spring training. He hit the ball harder on average, he said, and he showed this power on Friday.

With 109 miles per hour, Hollidays Homer was the second highest ball of his career in front of Gausman, and on July 31, the exit speed of 109.2 miles per hour was just missing. He also traveled the far most away from his hits.

“It was really, very impressive,” said manager Brandon Hyde. “Really talented guy. He is super young. He still learns the big leagues and takes Kevin Gausman so deep, it is impressive.”

What made it all the more impressive than the 439-foot explosion of the past year was that it was not on its train side. He was sitting on a fast ball in a bat, got one and tore him deeper when he imagined it.

“I have excited it and said:” Hopefully that has a chance, “said Holliday.

With more such swings, it is Holliday that has the chance to turn fast balls into his imagination.