Evaluating and ultimately appreciating Jordan Walker’s swing

Let’s (semi-knowledgeably) talk about the single most valuable individual expression of skill in the Cardinals organization right now

I am of course not anything resembling a crude rendering of a notion of a simulacrum of a professional hitting coach. However, I have over the years made a practice of learning as much about hitting as resources and a prevailing sense of indolence will allow. In part I was able to do this when my son was playing youth baseball in Chicago. I helped coach a few of his teams and at the same time had access to a number of actual coaches and hitting instructors like Justin Stone, Mike Ryan, Rob Tong, and Joe Perona who taught modern-yet-established principles and in some instances had worked with major-league hitters. I absorbed a lot from them via close observation and very occasional brain-picking and then compared it to what other “knowers of hitting” were saying in the public sphere and what I could plainly see that the best hitters in the world were doing and have been doing for roughly a century. While my son has lamentably abandoned This, Our Baseball for the lesser pursuits of basketball and football, his time as a baseball player benefitted my knowledge base, and we can all agree that’s the most important thing. 

I’ve also made it a priority from a professional standpoint to learn about hitting so that I can watch and write about this element of the game from a reasonably informed perspective. There are, of course, legions of baseball folks who know more about hitting than I do, and no doubt some could swoop in and argue persuasively against what I take to be an immutable principle. I accept such risks when I deign to soar above my pay grade and talk about Jordan Walker’s swing. So let’s do that – talk about Walker’s swing. 

As our visual guide, we’ll use the ideal angle featured in this slow-mo video of his July 5 home run off A.J. Puk of the Marlins. Walker hit the ball a season-longest 444 feet, and it left the bat at 112.1 mph. In terms of outcomes, it was Walker at his best, and this one also happened after the Triple-A sojourn during which he tweaked his approach at the plate. That latter point is important because what we’re about to see is presumably Walker’s swing as we’ll see it in 2024 and perhaps beyond. Action-sports, color-television footage incoming: 

I don’t really care what a hitter’s setup at the plate is like. It's a matter of personal druthers informed by physical signature and the need for cues and optimal positioning leading into the first real phase. Speaking of which, that first real phase is the stride.