For Rays' Yandy Diaz, a key to consistency is an openness to adjust

For a guy known for the metronomic performance of the core elements of his profession - hitting a baseball consistently hard and reaching base often - Yandy Diaz has shown a willingness to adapt and adjust.

Ask Diaz about the key to his success so far this season, going into play Saturday ranked among the American League leaders with a .320 batting average (second), .398 on-base percentage (third), .504 slugging percentage (11th) and .902 OPS (eighth), and he says it's mostly in his head and his hands.

Mentally, the big change has been in his outlook.

"I think my mentality, even if I'm going on a ‘quote' unquote' bad stretch, I'm always going to have a positive mindset," said Diaz, via team interpreter Kevin Vera.

"I think that's the biggest thing, is just my mentality that I've had this season, because I always believe that I'm going to do a good job."

In making that change, manager Kevin Cash said Diaz has, in essence, been more consistent.

"He's been great," Cash said. "He's done it long enough to know that there's ebbs and flows of the season. You have not noticed that he's been quiet. You don't notice when he's knocking the cover off the ball. He's been showing up the same every single day."

Hitting coach Chad Mottola said he's noticed the difference in not just in the way Diaz - 34, and, following the December trade of Brandon Lowe, the longest-tenured Ray - handles himself, but also his relationship with the other hitters.

"I've noticed the interaction with the teammates a lot more often," Mottola said. "Yandy has always been a quiet guy. Everybody operates in their own way, whether it was (former Rays Evan Longoria, Kevin Kiermaier), whoever, and what I've noticed more is the interaction with his teammates, more sharing how to hit."

The most notable example came a few weeks ago when Nick Fortes was in an extended funk and Diaz approached him unsolicited in the cage with a few simple suggestions that helped get the veteran catcher right.

"We're all lucky to have him around, but it was more by example. Now he's been a lot more vocal on his approach on helping teammates," Mottola said. "So it's been a natural progression for him, just in the way he expresses himself, but there's been a lot more interaction. So, yes, there has been a difference."

Mechanically, Diaz has been chasing the past.

His gold standard had been his 2023 performance, when he won the AL batting title - the first in Rays history - with a .330 average, a career-high 22 homers (at the time) and a still-best 35 doubles, and posted his highest full-season on-base (.410) and slugging (.522) percentages and OPS (.932).

After seeing his average decline to .281 in 2024 and .300 in 2025, Diaz has been occasionally checking video of his 2023 at-bats and discussing it with coaches in an effort to stay closer to that form, specifically in keeping his hands higher.

"Just trying to replicate that swing from that season, that comfortable feeling, and hopefully the results follow," Diaz said earlier this season. "So that's what I've been focused on, just trying to be the best pure hitter that I can be."

That openness to more input is another sign of change.

"It's showing him '23 and realizing that's more the baseline and kind of going back to it more often," Mottola said. "He's a feel guy, for sure. So he's (usually) not much (into) video and reviewing and things like that. So, like everything, he's more accepting of this is how you grow, rather than just trusting your ability."

Another indicator of how Diaz has evolved as a hitter, since the Rays acquired him from Cleveland in a December 2018 three-way trade that also included Seattle (and two other pretty good hitters, Edwin Encarnacion and Carlos Santana), is where he hits the ball.

Specifically more in the air and more to leftfield, given his past predilection to focus on the right side of the field, with his high-contact, low-strikeout approach that seems a contradiction to his muscular, slugger-type build.

"When I first got over here (in June 2021), I feel like the groundball rate was significantly higher … but it just seems like every year he's found ways to hit balls in the air more often," pitcher Drew Rasmussen said. "He's so powerful, and he's got so much strength that he can hit a ball in the air to any part of the yard, in any yard, and have a chance to hit it for a homer."

Hall of Famer Wade Boggs is also among those impressed.

"He's a dynamic player," said Boggs, a Tampa resident. "If he continues to use the whole field it makes him very difficult to be an out. It really does."

Diaz's confidence in hitting the ball to right and right-center has emboldened him to take more chances on pulling certain pitches down the leftfield line (including five of this season's 12 homers).

Sometimes that leads to rare bad swing decisions, Mottola said, but the tradeoff is usually worth it.

"It's just him being more comfortable (doing it)," Mottola said. "We try to say it's worth one bad swing decision in driving the ball to the pull side."

More so, Cash said, it's just reacting to the pitch and doing what's best in that situation.

"He's not going up there looking to pull a ball, he's not going up there looking to hit a ball to rightfield," Cash said. "He's just looking to hit it hard, and he does it really well. ... And he does make it look easy."

Diaz's openness to change has also included strictly being the DH for the first time, with no time at first base.

Cash joked last month they'd stick with that plan since Diaz hadn't complained much yet, and there would seem to be a benefit in limiting the kind of nagging injuries that have been past issues.

Actually, Diaz said, it's been a good thing: "When I'm in that role, I'm only thinking about hitting, so I think it has helped."

There are some things Diaz doesn't budge on.

One is that he only hits in the cages rather than take batting practice on the field. Another is that he picks the design for his black face paint each game.

Of more note, he refuses to embrace the new ABS system to challenge calls on pitches, despite urging from coaches.

Given what seems a keen knowledge of the strike zone, Diaz has on several occasions given an umpire a long look, but not, as 421 other hitters have done, tapped his helmet for the computer-assisted chance for correction.

"I don't like it," he said. "When I go to home plate, I need a hit not a challenge. … Maybe in the World Series some time, but now (no)."

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This story was originally published June 20, 2026 at 11:32 AM.