SEATTLE -- Nobody in baseball is slugging like Jorge Polanco right now, and as the sample size continues to grow as the calendar progresses toward May, so too does the veteran’s impact within the Mariners’ beleaguered lineup.
One day after he was named the American League Player of the Week, Polanco made a strong impression for a curtain call, crushing two homers and single-handedly lifting the Mariners to a 5-3 win over the Angels on Tuesday night at T-Mobile Park. All five of their runs were via Polanco’s homers, which led to Seattle’s MLB-best 13th victory in its past 17 games.
Polanco has now cleared the fence nine times this year, one shy of the league lead shared by teammate Cal Raleigh and former Mariners slugger Eugenio Suárez, who’s now with the D-backs.
Polanco is just short of the threshold to qualify for league leaderboards, but among players with at least 70 plate appearances, he leads MLB in slugging percentage (.819) and wRC+ (260, where league average is 100) -- ahead of second-place Aaron Judge in each category, who is at .728 and 253, respectively.
“It's been a really good stretch, really fun,” the 11th-year big leaguer said. “I think this is the best I’ve felt.”
The biggest factors in his rise have been the refined approach and new batting stance to augment it.
As MLB.com’s Mike Petriello detailed, Polanco last year had one of the sport’s most open stances, at 37 degrees (where 0 degrees would be totally neutral, or feet parallel to one another and aligned on a direct line to the pitcher's mound). But this year, he’s widened his stance by nearly six inches while closing it almost entirely to neutral.
These changes were installed in Spring Training with guidance from Mariners director of hitting strategy Edgar Martinez and hitting coach Kevin Seitzer.
“Guys that start open can have a tendency to turn too much and maybe block themselves, stride in at times, and not be consistent with their direction,” Seitzer said. “I like simplified -- when guys get in a good position when they get into their weight transfer, they get to their heel plant, they're in a good position to fire from their body position and into their hands.
“He's in a good place, but I think staying in line really simplifies stuff to where there's less margin for error.”
Yet the new mechanical setup was just as much related to Polanco’s comfort when coming off offseason surgery, as he said earlier this month: “I changed it because of my knee.”
The middle-of-the-field approach, however, was “built from last season,” he said Tuesday.
“When Edgar got here, he just preached on that approach,” Polanco said. “Everybody knew who Edgar was, so we just listened to him, trying to work on that. So I took it into the offseason.”
Polanco nearly had a third homer on Tuesday, too, when hitting a 388-foot flyout in the fifth inning to the wall in right-center, which center fielder Jo Adell jumped against while making the catch. Statcast said that one would’ve left the yard in 18 of MLB’s 30 ballparks, but perhaps the marine layer held it back on a night where it was 54 degrees at first pitch and mist lingered in the area all afternoon.
Speaking of MLB’s least hitter-friendly ballpark, Polanco had as brutal of a transition here as any of the established veterans that Seattle has acquired in recent years, which makes his April ascent that much more fascinating.
Nothing -- the home environment or his limited health -- has contained him so far this season, which includes the oblique/side issue that’s precluded him from batting right-handed for the past three weeks, unrelated to the offseason knee surgery that limited him in Spring Training.
Polanco has begun taking swings from the right side in batting practice and taking infield reps -- mostly at second base -- though he’s yet to do either in a game since April 6, slotting into Seattle’s semi-permanent role at designated hitter since.
Even with the Mariners’ crowded group on the injured list, the one thing he’s able to do well -- hit lefty, and with power -- has been a huge reason they’ve not just remained afloat, but ascended into first place in the American League West. The Mariners also lost utility man Dylan Moore to the IL earlier Tuesday and saw outfielder Luke Raley scratched just before first pitch.
Yet they are 69-7 since the start of last season when scoring at least five runs -- even if they all come from one player.