Can the Pirates rely on Henry Davis' adjustments to fulfill lofty ZiPS projections?

Entering the 2024 season, Henry Davis was set as the Pirates' starting catcher after mashing pitchers during spring training. Once the regular season hit, though, Davis devolved into one of the worst hitters in baseball, leading him into an offseason where he had to make significant changes in order to remain on the map on Pittsburgh.

His problem in 2024 was his production against fastballs. Davis just could not hit them, batting .056 and slugging .083 against specifically four-seam fastballs. He saw heaters over 30% of the time, so for him to have success, he needed to improve on that greatly.

Looking at his hitting profile, all he tried to do was pull the ball in 2024. He did not have a single hit to the opposite field in his time in Pittsburgh, a significant problem, to say the least. The odd thing was, though, that he mashed Triple-A pitching, putting together a 148 wRC+ with an OPS of .956 and 13 home runs. Against fastballs at that level, he batted .347 and slugged .636, so an adjustment evidently needed to be made only at the major league level.

Rather than trying to pull everything, Davis has been working on going up the middle more, which is something he has already displayed after reporting to camp. In the article from the Pittsburgh Post Gazette talking about Davis' goals, they noted how he took a sinker from Tim Mayza into the right-center gap for what would have been a double. Of course, that is just one hit, and it didn't come against one of the game's most intimidating heaters. Still, even a singular hit represented a positive step, especially given that pitchers are usually ahead of hitters at this juncture.

Henry Davis has a lot to work on this spring training to fulfill high hopes for his production with the Pirates in 2025.

In a video the Pirates posted on Twitter/X, they showed Davis taking some swings during batting practice. The video shows a major difference from last season: no leg kick. In previous appearances, Davis relied on a large leg kick as a timing/load mechanism.

Whether or not this adjustment was just for a drill is unknown, and the important thing here is the difference in his stance at the plate.

FanGraphs has a lot of faith in him to figure it out this season, too, as their ZiPS projections envisions him to play in 99 games and become a league-average hitter at the plate. They expect him to belt 13 home runs, followed by a wRC+ of 101 and an OPS of .725. They also anticipate his defense to lead him to an overall fWAR of 1.5.

The Pirates could desperately use another bat that they can count on. They have a lot of hope still for their former number one pick, so he will definitely get a chance this season. Hopefully, Matt Hague can help him figure things out.