Imagine this: World Series. Bottom of the ninth. Runners on first and second. Down by 3 runs. Mariano Rivera (or any other dominant closer) in the game for the other team. Who would you want up? For the White Sox it’s Jose Abreu. For the Reds it’s Joey Votto. For the Cubs it’s Anthony Rizzo. But the Rangers? I would argue Joseph Gallo. You see, in this situation I would like a home run. And that is what Joey Gallo does best.
Joey Gallo is the oddest player in the MLB to me, and it’s not because of the HR. It’s everything else, too. In 2017, in Gallo’s first full year as a big leaguer, he hit .209. That’s .209/.333/.537 with 41 HR. That and 196 SO. The dude hit a HR in 7.7% of his PA. But he struck out an astronomical 36.8% of the time! I was at a loss of words. I could not speak when I saw that number. In 2018 he put up the same kind of production. He slashed .206/.312/.498 with 40 HR in 500 AB. He struck out 207 times. That is a 6.9% HR rate, but the dude struck out 35.9% of his PA! In 2019 he really stepped up his game slashing .253/.389/.598with 22 HR in 297 PA, but unfortunately an injury held him out most of the year. But, 297 PA meant that he would strike out 114 times. So that’s a 7.4% HR rate, but a 38.4% K rate. That’s crazy.
Gallo is a classic Chris Davis stereotype. He strikes out, and if he’s not striking out, he’s dominating the StatCast Exit Velocity leaderboards. But what fascinates me the most is his astonishing gap between 2B and HR. Just kidding, his SO fascinate me.
Alright, I’ll meet you guys in my next article!