Article: Park Factor: Did Twins Hit Home Run With Byung Ho?

[jimbo92107]

What's interesting is the coming adjustment from pitchers. If Park is blasting breaking balls over 400 feet, guess what they'll stop throwing him? That means they have to start throwing Park fastballs or change-ups in those same situations. If Park can hit a few of those over the fence, we may have a new nickname: OT Park, as in Out of The Park.

[jimbo92107]

 

I look forward to seeing what happens when he connects with a 95+ fastball, personally.

When that happens, the upper decks could become a dangerous place to sit.

[lukeduke1980]

I am Gyung Ho for Byung...Ho

[Steve Lein]

Personally, I think it's a great sign that he's crushing breaking balls. He will learn to catch velocity (if that's even really a problem yet) as he see's more of it. Plus, fastballs are easier to hit most of the time, right? I think this bodes well for his future. He may never have a high average, but I think they've definitely got something here. And as the graph shows above, he's a 'complete' hitter in that he takes the pitches where they're thrown, and is capable of putting them out everywhere as we've now seen.

[gunnarthor]

Velocity won't be a problem.  That's just a timing adjustment and all ballplayers make those as a matter of course.  The hard part for him will be the adjustments to breaking stuff and he looked pretty good on this hometand against that.  

[USAFChief]

 

Velocity won't be a problem.  That's just a timing adjustment and all ballplayers make those as a matter of course.  The hard part for him will be the adjustments to breaking stuff and he looked pretty good on this hometand against that.  

I'd say you have that exactly backwards.

 

It's velocity that eventually dooms all ballplayers, whether that be when they step up from coach pitch to little league, from college to pro, or as a MLB player's career winds down.  It's not that hard to hit breaking stuff, once you learn to recognize it.  Having the hand-eye coordination to handle velocity isn't something that can just be learned, you either are born with it, or you drop out of baseball at some point.

 

He has handled breaking pitches just fine in Korea, we'll see if he can consistently catch up to the additional velocity he's going to see in the big leagues, without having to cheat.  To me, it looks like he's going to be just fine, but if he fails, it'll be velocity, not breaking balls that dooms him, IMO.

[Taildragger8791]

If I remember right, didn't he smoke a few good heaters in spring training? I thought I remembered reading that he didn't appear to have any issues catching up to the mid-90s fastballs he was seeing in mid- to late-March.

[Pardon My Dinger]

 

I am Gyung Ho for Byung...Ho

Stay away from my bit.

[diehardtwinsfan]

 

If I remember right, didn't he smoke a few good heaters in spring training? I thought I remembered reading that he didn't appear to have any issues catching up to the mid-90s fastballs he was seeing in mid- to late-March.

 

He did.  Not sure it was on a 97 mph pitch, but he hit some out at 93.

[USAFChief]

I grow more impressed with Park by the game. He'll K, a lot, but he mostly forces pitchers to get him out on pitches in the strike zone, and when he connects, he hits the ball hard. Need to keep him in the lineup.

[Riverbrian]

 

I grow more impressed with Park by the game. He'll K, a lot, but he mostly forces pitchers to get him out on pitches in the strike zone, and when he connects, he hits the ball hard. Need to keep him in the lineup.

 

Yep... and we will need to figure out how to get him in the lineup when we go visit those National League Cities.