Bryce Eldridge’s first real stretch in the majors has already shown both sides of the rookie experience: the loud, early burst that made him look ready for anything, and the adjustment period that always seems to find young hitters once pitchers get a book on them.
The Giants’ 21-year-old has been through only 43 games in Double-A and 104 in Triple-A before reaching the majors for good, and he still won’t turn 22 until October 20, when this Giants season will be over. That kind of age and that kind of inexperience usually come with a built-in learning curve. Eldridge hit the ground running anyway.
Over his first 32 games after being called up on May 4, even with inconsistent playing time at first, he hit .324 with a .959 OPS and got on base more than 40% of the time. His strikeout rate sat at 19.8%, below league average, and his 13.5% walk rate was among the best around. That start pushed him into the NL Rookie of the Year conversation.
The last month and a half has looked very different. Since mid-June, Eldridge has hit .196 with a .636 OPS over his last 43 games, and his strikeout rate has jumped back to 31.7%.
On the surface, that looks like the kind of downturn that can swallow a young hitter whole. The deeper numbers tell a more specific story.
He’s not suddenly expanding the zone. In fact, his chase rate is down 3.5 percentage points from his first 32 games.
He’s still showing patience, and over those 43 games only Rafael Devers has posted a higher walk rate. Eldridge is also one of just four Giants players to homer at least six times in that span.
His barrel rate and average exit velocity have barely changed, which means the raw power is still there.
The problem is that he’s not turning enough of those swings into contact. Pitchers have actually thrown him more strikes over the last month and a half than they did during his first 32 games, but Eldridge has missed more of them.
His whiff rate has climbed to 28.8% from 21.4%, his zone-swing rate has dropped from 69.8% to 59.6%, and his zone-contact rate has fallen by more than six percentage points. In other words, he’s chasing less, but he’s also letting hittable pitches go by and coming up empty more often when he does swing.
Fastballs haven’t stopped being his best friend. On the season, he’s batting .333 with a .694 slugging percentage and a 67.3% hard-hit rate against four-seamers.
But opposing pitchers have leaned harder into the pitch that has given him the most trouble: the slider. Since mid-June, he’s batting .083 with a .208 slugging percentage, a 42.2% whiff rate and a 48.1% strikeout rate against sliders.
That kind of damage is going to get him more of those pitches until he proves he can handle them.
Even with the slump, Eldridge has still found ways to matter. Manager Tony Vitello has moved him into the leadoff spot over the last five games, and Eldridge also dealt with a thumb injury that kept him out of the lineup two days in a row last week. He’s become even more of a centerpiece for the Giants after the trade deadline reshaped the roster, and those kinds of changes can take time to sort through, especially for a 21-year-old.
He’s also shown he can still deliver a big swing in the middle of the rough patch, including a clutch two-run hit as a pinch hitter against the Texas Rangers’ Jacob Latz. And even when the contact hasn’t been as clean, he has still reached base safely in 58 of his last 64 games dating back to May 23.
The résumé is already crowded with milestones. Eldridge became the first Giants rookie 21 years old or younger to hit at least 11 home runs since Jack Clark hit 13 in 1977.
He also became the youngest player in MLB history and the first rookie in Giants history to hit a walk-off grand slam. His 22-game on-base streak was the longest by a Giant age 21 or younger since Willie McCovey’s 25-game run in 1959.
That’s a strong foundation for any rookie, let alone one this young. The next 44 games will be about the next step: whether Eldridge can punish strikes more consistently, do better against sliders, keep the chase rate where it is, and trim the strikeouts closer to 25%.
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