Shifts Against Right-Handed Hitters

In general, defensive shifts have increased dramatically over the last few seasons. That trend is more than simply a greater number of teams deciding to shift players like David Ortiz and Chris Davis. Teams are also relying on hitter ball-in-play tendencies to uncover nontraditional candidates to shift. One such grouping is right-handed hitters.

We frequently cite how the total number of shifts in baseball has nearly doubled in each of the last three seasons. For right-handed hitters, shifts have increased exponentially. From 2011 to 2012, shifts against right-handed hitters increased nearly tenfold. The 2014 season is not yet half over, but teams have already flown by the 1,718 shifts versus right-handed batters from a year ago.

On the team level, it feels a little bit like it did two years ago for the overall shifts trend. From 2011 to 2012, baseball went from 4 teams shifting 100 or more hitters to 18 teams doing so. Meanwhile, in 2013, only 7 teams shifted 100 or more right-handed hitters. This season, 6 teams have already reached 100 shifts against right-handers, and another 6 are on pace to join them by the season’s end.

Here are the leaders in shifts vs. right-handed batters:

A few specific right-handed hitters are beginning to show up on the overall shifted leaderboards. Albert Pujols, Edwin Encarnacion, and Jose Bautista are the three righties who have already reached 100 shifted plate appearances this season. All three players are among the 20 most shifted hitters from either side of the plate.

Here is the list of the most shifted right-handed batters in 2014:

Evan Longoria and Chris Carter may not have the same reputation for being extreme pull hitters like the first three names on the list, but since the start of 2013, they have pulled 87 and 88 percent of their groundballs and short line drives, respectively. That makes them 2 of the 20 most extreme pull hitters (either bat side, minimum 100 groundballs and short line drives) and has them right in line with Pujols and Encarnacion over the same time frame.