Yankees At-Bat of the Week: Gleyber Torres (9/11)

Gleyber Torres may or may not be hitting his stride. This Sunday at-bat was one of the most confident I’ve ever seen from him.

Torres took aggressive swings with conviction. That’s always been a weakness of his when he finds himself in prolonged slumps. He will continuously take swings with no intent even in advantage counts. To see him taking aggressive swings all day was promising. Now, let’s dive into the 10-pitch at-bat.

I love to see Gleyber look aggressive. It was clear that he saw the ball well all day. In this first pitch, he came out swinging to continue to put a crooked number up. This is what we should hope to see from Torres on a consistent basis, no matter the competition. 0-1 count.

This was an equally aggressive swing on another pitch in the middle of the zone. While I would have liked to see Torres do damage and put this in play with authority, this is still a good swing and made me hopeful that the 25-year-old was feeling it. Yes, it’s an 0-2 count, but I still think that Torres was in the driver’s seat, based on the previous home run earlier in the game and the quality of swing on two different pitches.

This was a well-executed pitch that I would expect Torres to chase off-balance when his timing in his in a blender. He tracked this one the entire way though, another good sign. It was just a few inches off the plate, but the fact that Gleyber took such a good swing on the prior pitch told me that he was picking up the slider spin early on. In this 1-2 count, I was unsure what the Rays’ pitcher-catcher tandem would do.

Ooof. A backed-up slider leading to an even count against a hitter who clearly has your number that day just is not ideal. This was as easy of a take as you could imagine and a nice giveback to Gleyber. We have ourselves a 2-2 count.

Oh boy. Another great swing from Torres that he was so close to sending over the right-field wall. It’s not very clear to see, but I think he was actually early on this swing. I’m almost positive that his split-second early swing led to him just missing the ball dead on. It was another great location, but it seems like it just does not matter! Gleyber is on these pitches. Run back the 2-2 count.

Ew. This was one of the most worst displays of receiving I’ve ever seen. Talk about getting beat by a pitch. This actually had the potential for a front-door backwards K, but with the way that Christian Bethancourt caught this ball, there was no chance. Torres made a good decision taking this, as it was off the plate. They’re switching speeds and locations, so it’s tough to know where they’ll go next, but wherever it is, Gleyber will see it.

This is another “A” swing in a two-strike count. Coaches usually say the first two are for you, and the last one is for the team, but when you see the ball like this, you can take healthy hacks for yourself over and over again. This was a bad location, and Gleyber just missed depositing it, but it is what it is. He was still on everything and had the confidence to hit another pitch.

ACK! You only get so many chances. Another mistake that Gleyber took a great swing on but was justttt under. It’s only a matter of time, right?

Yeah. Torres really was seeing everything. When you’re feeling good enough to even put together a late, spoil swing, you’re seeing the ball well. I was really rooting for him to put one of these in play. With these incredible swings, you hope that at least one results in a hit.

We saw this one coming from a mile away! After being early on almost every other fastball in the at-bat, it made sense that one on the inner third was the one to leave the park. This was one of Torres’ best at-bats all year long, and I’m hoping that it’s a sign of what’s to come for the rest of the month and postseason.