Justin Upton is finally living up to expectations with the Tigers
For the first two months of the season, Detroit Tigers outfielder Justin Upton was one of the worst hitters in baseball. That’s not an understatement. His numbers, both traditional and advanced, were all near the bottom of the league.
This was fairly shocking. Over the course of his career, Upton has put up fairly consistent numbers. From 2013 to 2015, Upton hit between 26 and 29 home runs and posted an on-base percentage between .336 and .354. Over those years, he posted similar walk rates, strikeout rates and slugging percentages.
Based on how he played the first two months of the season, you would have thought Upton was a 35-year-old clinging to his major-league career, not a 28-year-old in his baseball prime. The outfielder hit just .217/.264/.324, with three home runs, during that period. That’s a far cry from what the Tigers expected when they signed Upton to a six-year, $132 million deal.
As of late, however, Upton is showing signs of life at the plate again. It may have taken a while, but he’s finally performing like everyone expected.
Upton’s turnaround will be the focus of Yahoo Sports Free MLB Game of the Day on Wednesday. Upton and the Detroit Tigers will take on Robinson Cano and the Seattle Mariners. The game, which starts at 7:10 p.m. ET, can be streamed on Yahoo’s Sports Home, MLB index, video home and right here in this very post. Local blackouts apply.
Throughout the month of June, Upton has pretty much returned to form. In 85 plate appearances, he’s hitting .289/.365/.553, with six home runs. He’s still walking at a good clip, and his strikeout rate has fallen back to his normal levels after an early-season spike.
Admittedly, this is an incredibly small sample. But the reason it’s more trustworthy that most is that this is basically the player Upton has been throughout his career. We have 10 years of data that suggest Upton will perform like this as opposed to how he performed over the first two months of the season. And, given that he’s only 28, his early-season decline always seemed puzzling. This wasn’t a player suddenly losing all his skills due to Father Time, this was a guy mired in a terrible slump.
Upton’s surge couldn’t come at a better time for Detroit. With J.D. Martinez sidelined for six weeks with a broken elbow, the team needs Upton more than ever. While the club can’t fully replace Martinez’s production, having Upton live up to expectations can somewhat mask his absence from their lineup.
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Despite the fact that Upton’s end-of-season numbers are normally consistent, his in-season performance can be streaky. He’s the type of hitter who can go on a monstrous tear for a month and then suddenly stop hitting everything for weeks.
Upton’s early-season slump was much worse than normal, and may prevent Upton from ending the season with his normally consistent numbers. Still, if he can perform as expected from here on out, the Tigers will feel much better about the remaining five years on his contract.
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Chris Cwik is a writer for Big League Stew on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @Chris_Cwik
