New York Mets second baseman Asdrubal Cabrera was the offensive star on Friday night in San Diego, rocketing a three-run bomb to give Jacob deGrom some breathing room on the mound.
This has become a recurring theme for Cabrera this year, who is hitting a potent .333/.379/.591 with five home runs and 15 RBI.
Back in his day, bench coach Gary DiSarcina attributed success to being out on the field pregame taking cuts and getting ready in the field.
“Quantity, quantity, quantity,” DiSarcina told Tim Britton of The Athletic. “The more swings you took, the better you were going to be. The more ground balls you took, the better you were going to be. Those days are over.”
But now, players like Cabrera are doing less pregame in order to stay fresh over a 162-game season.
“If I had to do it over again, I’d be more like these guys and take ground balls maybe every other day. Maybe just work on my backhand one day and be off,” he said. “Quality over quantity.”
Cabrera has embraced this philosophy.
He is tied for fourth in the National League with a .333 batting average, eighth in the NL with a .591 slugging percentage, is fifth in the NL with 14 extra-base hits and tied for fifth in the majors with nine doubles.
“I’ll tell you what he’s really done well: He’s limited his work before games to make sure he’s fresh during the game,” manager Mickey Callaway said. “Veteran players that are getting older, that do a good job of that, tend to do pretty well. He doesn’t ever panic if he has a bad game and hit more or something like that.
“He has a solid routine to get him prepped every day and he goes out there and gets the job done.”
Cabrera is hitting .359 (14-for-39) with five doubles, two homers and 10 RBI over his last nine games. Cabrera has hit in 11 of the 12 road games he’s played this year, going 17-for-51 (.333) with four home runs and 11 RBI.
“I try to stay healthy all year and prepare for the game,” he said. “When you play every day, it’s hard to go outside and take 40 ground balls or something like that.”
He learned this philosophy from fellow infielder Orlando Cabrera, who he played with while on the Cleveland Indians.
“I learned from Orlando Cabrera,” he said. “He always told me it’s now how many ground balls you take, it’s how intensely you take the ground balls.”
According to Britton, Cabrera usually fields 10 to 15 grounders on the first day of a series, and then chills out a little bit the next couple days.
“When they’re not doing the work out here, and it starts affecting their at-bats and their ability to be in the lineup, then you sit down and talk to them,” DiSarcina said. “You have to trust they know what they’re doing, trust their process and not get in their way.
“Cabby’s been in the game for a long time. He knows his body better than anybody and what he needs to do to get prepared.”
So far? It’s done wonders, as you can see from the stats above.
“This guy is a professional hitter amongst professionals,” Callaway said. “None of this is surprising.”
