Twins’ Ryan Jeffers shows ABS prowess: ‘I’d be shocked if there’s anybody better’
Ryan Jeffers caught Cody Laweryson’s 1-2 fastball near the top edge of the zone, heard the call from home plate umpire Steve Jaschinski and started tapping his helmet. It was a particularly important time in the game with the Twins protecting a two-run lead and the Tigers threatening with a pair of runners on base in the eighth inning on Wednesday. A quick review with the Automated Ball-Strike Challenge System revealed the catcher’s instincts were correct.
He got up from his crouch, twirled around and pumped his fist. It was his league-leading eighth pitch that he overturned from a ball into a strikeout, and it came a day after doing it twice in consecutive innings. It’s still early and the sample size is far too small to draw too many meaningful conclusions about how to best utilize the ABS system, but one thing is clear: Jeffers seems to be particularly good at it.
“You either have it or you don’t,” Jeffers said. “Some people have an innate ability to understand the strike zone, and I guess I’m pretty good at it. ” Jeffers entered Thursday having won 10 of his 15 challenges behind the plate.
Those 10 were tied for the league-lead with Angels catcher Logan O’Hoppe. Jeffers has won 67 percent of his challenges, and most of them have been overturns into strikeouts. Most of the ones he hasn’t gotten overturned, he said, were pitches he wouldn’t be challenging if it was a different situation on the game.
He may, for example, send one off that he’s not super confident in, taking a shot late in a close game hoping to flip a count. But most of the time, he’s been getting his calls right. “I’d be shocked if there’s anybody better at it,” manager Derek Shelton said.