And that’s bad news for him and the Reds"Jose Peraza swings a lot.

We knew that when he consistently checked in with walk rates below 5 percent when he was in the minors Freddy Galvis Jersey , and we’ve more or less come to accept it when his walk rates dipped even further as he began getting regular big league playing time. Last year, Peraza’s swing rate was the 42nd-highest in all of baseball. The year before, it was 26th-highest. He’s made his approach at the plate very clear, but importantly, that approach has never made him an outlier. That is, until now.After a little less than two weeks of regular season games, Peraza has the highest swing rate in all of baseball by more than eight percentage points. His O-Swing% is also the highest by more than eight percentage points. His Z-Swing% ranks 12th-highest. He has played only nine games and logged just 30 plate appearances, but the uptick in his swing rate has still been alarming. Here’s Peraza’s swing percentages year over year, courtesy of Fangraphs:Over the first four years of Peraza’s career, his swing rate has always been high, but it also hasn’t fluctuated much. In his brief start to 2019, there is suddenly a steep incline. Now, part of this almost certainly has something to do with the number of strikes Peraza has seen this season. He leads all big league hitters in zone percentage, a category he finished 59th in a season ago, and the uptick in pitches he swings at inside the strike zone is more or less right in line with the uptick in pitches he’s seen there.A funny thing about the number of pitches a batter sees inside the strike zone is that it can have a significant effect on how often he swings at pitches that are outside the zone. After all, if a hitter is seeing a lot of strikes, that tends to mean he is falling behind in more counts than the average hitter, and in turn, is chasing pitches outside the zone to keep from striking out. Swinging at lots of balls can be a result of a hitter getting consistently fooled, sure Randal Grichuk Jersey , but it can also be a result of a hitter protecting the plate when he needs to. Early in 2019, it seems that Peraza likely belongs in that second group. In 30 plate appearances, Peraza has taken a first-pitch ball in just eight of them, and has gotten ahead 2-0 just once. Just two of his plate appearances have gotten to a two-ball count at all. As a result, Peraza’s natural free-swinging tendencies have been exploited by pitchers getting ahead in the count and forcing him to climb up and down the strike zone, instead of waiting for pitches closer to the middle.Now, there is obviously a lot of caution that should be applied when analyzing a hitter’s performance over the first couple weeks of his season. Some numbers have realistic odds to stick; others don’t. Mike Trout, for example, is likely to finish among the top three major leaguers in fWAR when this season is over. Tim Beckham probably will not. But regardless of the specific numbers behind it, Peraza’s swing rate is an important thing to keep an eye on as his season progresses, because of how much his offensive production has depended on it over the course of his career. Below are Peraza’s 15-game rolling averages showing the relationship between his swing rate and wOBA dating back to 2017.For the most part, when Peraza is swinging more than usual, his offensive production plummets. When his swing rate is under control, his hitting is at its best. Even without a robust walk rate, we’ve seen how valuable Peraza can be to an offense over long stretches of a season. Over his final 102 games of 2018, Peraza slashed .305/.344/.465, good for an .809 OPS, despite walking just 4.4 percent of the time. Over his first 55 games of the season, he hit .256/.292/.324 while walking 3.7 percent of the time. Peraza’s success as a hitter doesn’t really depend at all on his ability to walk, but it does depend on him being in good counts Jose Bautista Jersey , and getting the right pitches to swing at.Peraza is far from the only hitter in the Reds’ lineup in need of a resurgence at the plate. But somehow, he doesn’t feel like as safe a bet to rebound as the likes of Joey Votto, Yasiel Puig and Jesse Winker. Going forward, Peraza’s going to rely a bit on pitchers being less effective at getting ahead in the count, but he’ll also need to show more of a willingness to take pitches around the edges, with the hopes that more mistakes will follow. It’s no grand revelation to say that someone will hit better if they are in more hitter’s counts. In Peraza’s case, though, that feels especially true. ARLINGTON, Texas (AP) — Oakland slugger Khris Davis had to wait another day for the chance to homer again against the Texas Rangers, who were rained out at home for the first time in three years.After a long rainy day in North Texas, officials called Saturday night’s game between the Athletics and Rangers nearly an hour after its scheduled start.The game will be made up as part of a split day-night doubleheader June 8, on the same day that the Rangers will retire the No. 29 jersey of Adrian Beltre. The ceremony for Beltre, who had 3,166 hits in his 21 big league seasons before retiring last November, will be before the night game. Beltre’s only World Series appearance came in 2011, his first year in Texas.In the series opener Friday night, Davis hit a tiebreaking solo homer in the eighth inning of an 8-6 win for the A’s after they overcame a five-run deficit. He has 28 homers against the Rangers since the start of the 2016 season, the most by any player against any team in that span. He has eight homers and 21 RBIs in his last 10 games in Texas.“He’s just the kind of guy that just wants to be here for his teammates, go out and perform and semi-stay out of the spotlight,” manager Bob Melvin said of Davis http://www.bluejaysfanproshop.com/authentic-curtis-granderson-jersey , the big league leader with 10 homers this season after an MLB-best 48 last season.The tarp was put on the field after the series opener in anticipation of the rain.It did rain most of Saturday, but there was a break in the wet weather during the afternoon before it started raining again about two hours before the planned first pitch. The forecast called for continued more rain deep into the night.There hadn’t been a postponement at Texas since April, 17, 2016. The Rangers haven’t played a doubleheader at home since Sept. 30, 2012.Adrian Sampson, who was scheduled to make his first start of the season Saturday night, will start for the Rangers in the finale of the shortened series Sunday.Left-hander Brett Anderson (3-0) will start Sunday as scheduled for the Athletics. Marco Estrada, who has a career-high six-game losing streak over his last 10 starts since last August, had been slated to start Saturday night.INJURED ODORRangers 2B Rougned Odor was put on the 10-day injured list with a sprained right knee.Texas announced the move earlier Saturday, a day after Odor was a last-minute scratch from the starting lineup. Odor is expected to be re-evaluated in about two weeks.Manager Chris Woodward said Odor was hurt inside about 20 minutes before Friday night’s game “stretching in here, doing something, getting ready for the game.”OLSON RECOVERYMelvin said 1B Matt Olson, who is recovering from right hand surgery, is doing everything but swinging a bat with two hands.“They’re doing strengthening stuff with the hand. Taking groundballs, doing all his conditioning, one-handed stuff in the cage,” Melvin said. “We’d all like to see him back sooner than later. Matt Olson’s a huge part of our team.”Olson had surgery after the A’s opened the season last month against Seattle at the Tokyo Dome. He felt pain near the center of palm after fouling off a pitch during an at-bat. He singled during that at-bat, but was replaced in the field after that.