{"id":103764,"date":"2025-07-10T14:55:14","date_gmt":"2025-07-10T18:55:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/?p=103764"},"modified":"2025-07-10T14:55:14","modified_gmt":"2025-07-10T18:55:14","slug":"blue-jays-hitting-coach-david-popkins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2025\/07\/10\/blue-jays-hitting-coach-david-popkins\/","title":{"rendered":"Blue Jays Hitting Coach David Popkins Is the Real Deal"},"content":{"rendered":"

Someone who deserves more credit for the Blue Jays’ success this season is new hitting coach David Popkins<\/a>. The Blue Jays hired Popkins to be their hitting coach on October 21, 2024. He has helped players transform their approach, swing, and offense by allowing them to return to their previous dominant form at the plate.<\/p>\n

Hiring Popkins was one of the best moves the Blue Jays made. \u201cMy philosophy is built off of creativity,\u201d Popkins said. \u201cWe’re trying to become the most creative lineup at scoring runs in baseball.” Since joining<\/a>\u00a0the Blue Jays, his first task was earning the trust of the hitters. This was a solid strength of his when he was part of the Minnesota Twins organization. He worked with star shortstop Carlos Correa, and that’s when he was able to make some magic happen. Popkin’s job has been to reignite the Blue Jays’ offense that has been flat over the last two seasons.<\/p>\n

Popkins Transforms Blue Jays Offense<\/h2>\n

Popkins Approach<\/h3>\n

There\u2019s no hitter on the roster more emblematic of this new identity than Ernie Clement<\/a>. For the longest time, almost nobody talked about him, yet he\u2019s quietly become one of the most valuable assets on the team. Sporting a .298 average, low strikeout rate (9.8%), and a WAR (2.5) that has him keeping up with big-name players. Clement has come a long way since being on the Cleveland Guardians. While he isn\u2019t a launch-angle guy, he’s a grinder. Overall, Popkin\u2019s approach of empowering players to be themselves without obsessing over the exit velocity leaderboard has given Clement the space to come alive offensively.<\/p>\n

Since getting consistent reps, Addison Barger<\/a> has shown the power-pop many predicted (.447 slugging in the past 3 weeks). But it\u2019s his pitch selection that\u2019s been most impressive. His ability to spoil tough pitches and get into a hitter’s count is the type of subtle skill that isn’t often discussed but is a winning component across 162 games.<\/p>\n

According to Sportsnet’s Shi Davidi, Popkins\u00a0was also helping Daulton Varsho rediscover his swing<\/a> back in May. \u201cEvery time a player has success, there are typically clues that are left behind \u2014 success tends to do that,\u201d Popkins explains. \u201cAnd it’s trying to see in these multiple windows in different periods, how he has moved, and are the moves similar? Like, hey, when he moves small into his backside, it’s been good this year, this year, and this year. Completely different swings, but the same movement. You collect as many of those as you can, and you see the starting point that’s natural to him.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Last Word On Popkins<\/h3>\n

Popkins wasn\u2019t hired to teach these guys how to swing. All in all, he was brought in to help them read pitches better and know when to swing. In addition, how to build an identity at the plate. As we get closer to the All-Star break, we\u2019re seeing the downstream effects of revamped hitting.<\/p>\n

Notably, they are chasing less, hitting with runners in scoring position more, and showing lots of success with comeback victories. They haven’t relied on slugging their way out of trouble. But by performing through tough at-bats and placing pressure on pitchers.<\/p>\n

Main Photo Credits: Nick Turchiaro-Imagn Images<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Someone who deserves more credit for the Blue Jays’ success this season is new hitting coach David Popkins. The Blue Jays hired Popkins to be their hitting coach on October 21, 2024. He has helped players transform their approach, swing, and offense by allowing them to return to their previous dominant form at the plate. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4831,"featured_media":103869,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7,1071],"tags":[28344,716,3315,28346],"class_list":["post-103764","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bluejays","category-mlb","tag-addison-barger","tag-carlos-correa","tag-daulton-varsho","tag-ernie-clement"],"modified_by":"Evan Mazza, Site Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103764","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4831"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=103764"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103764\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":103871,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103764\/revisions\/103871"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/103869"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=103764"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=103764"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=103764"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}