Garrett Cooper is feeling like himself at the plate again. Why that’s key for Marlins
The curveball landed on the upper inside edge of the strike zone, and Garrett Cooper knew exactly what he needed to do with it. He squared up the 81.6 mph offering from the opposing pitcher, lifting it into the air to the point of no return. The ball sizzled off the bat as Cooper walked toward first base, ready to make the 360-foot trot around the diamond at Citizens Bank Park.
For the first time in nearly a month, the Miami Marlins’ 6-6, 235-pound slugger had hit a home run — a towering, 421-foot shot into the upper deck at Philadelphia’s Citizens Bank Park during Thursday’s shutout victory over the Philadelphia Phillies.
It was the first of two hits for Cooper that night — well, three, if you listen to Cooper (he adamantly contends the hard-hit ball he hit toward Phillies third baseman Alec Bohm that bounced into left field in the seventh should have been a double, not an error).
It was also the latest sign over the course of this now-completed three-city road trip of Cooper possibly turning the corner as the season nears the end of its second month.
Cooper posted a .321 batting average with two doubles, a triple, three walks, five RBI, five runs scored and that towering home run over the Marlins’ trip through Arizona, Los Angeles and Philadelphia. He had a .421 batting average on balls in play and a .959 on-base-plus-slugging mark.
Six of the 15 hardest-hit balls he has put into play so far this season came over the course of those 10 games.
“I’m seeing the ball a lot better,” Cooper said. “I think I found exactly where I want to be.”
It’s a revelation that Cooper was hoping would come. He was in a mental funk that impacted his physical talents.
That appears to be gone. Now, Cooper wants to return to business as usual — which for him means hitting baseballs with authority and providing an offensive spark at the heart of the batting order.
“It’s just a daily grind,” Cooper, 30, said. “You’ve gotta find yourself and find your swing.”
‘Trying to do too much’
Cooper knew it would take some time to get acclimated to his new role. The Marlins’ slugger wasn’t going to be playing every day, a fact he knew going into spring training. When he did, he’d usually be roaming right field instead of his primary spot at first base.
Cooper knew there would be failure, but baseball’s a game of failure, right? He’d adapt, and the results would come like they had the past two years when he hit .281 and belted out 21 home runs over 141 games.
Easier said than done.
He adjusted his pregame routine for the days when he wasn’t in the starting lineup, taking a few extra swings to make sure his timing stayed consistent and doing more conditioning work to keep his body fresh and loose.
But it took a lot longer than Cooper had hoped to anticipated to figure out how to respond to the extended failure that came early in the season.
Just three weeks ago, his batting average was as low as .177 and he had more than twice as many strikeouts (29) as he did hits (14).
In Cooper’s own words, he was “trying to do too much, trying to get two or three or four hits a day.” That’s the role of a middle-of-the-order bat.
“You try to come out here and do so much early on,” Cooper added. “You want to do everything. You want to drive in all these guys. You want to do a little more than you can possibly do when you’re going through a bad stretch.”
He was also feeling sluggish at the plate, a residual effect of getting re-acclimated to playing in the outfield for the first time since 2019.
“I’m not really used to feeling tired at the plate,” Cooper said. “Your legs feel a little bit heavy. It starts to mentally get on you. You take the outfield into your at-bat and then you take the at-bat into the outfield. It just kind of spirals on you.”
Leaving the past in the past
Cooper’s biggest realization: Success can be fleeting.
“You can’t get caught up with what you did the day before,” Cooper said. “You have to come in with a new mindset the next day because you’ve got four or five at-bats the next day. What you did yesterday is in the rearview mirror.”
So back Garrett Cooper goes. He’s making the minor adjustments to prepare for the next game. He’s keeping his head clear of distractions and doubts.
He’s on to the next game, the next day, the next opportunity.
“When it’s going well, when the swing’s good, you have a lot of opportunities hitting in the middle of the order,” Cooper said. “When you try to do too much, you get lost a little bit and you feel like you’re letting the team down or letting yourself down. It’s just a cycle effect. ... When you struggle, you have to take a little bit of weight off your shoulders and kind of just go out there and play. If you put too much pressure on yourself, you’re not going to be a good hitter.
“Just to find my footing at the plate again is huge. I know what I can do.”
This story was originally published May 21, 2021 at 9:54 AM.
.JPG)