Dodgers: Joey Gallo Sometimes Feels Like He's 'Never Picked Up a Bat Before'

Hall of Famer Ted Williams famously said, "The hardest thing to do in baseball is hit a round ball with a round bat squarely."

If it was hard for Williams, universally considered one of the greatest hitters in baseball history, imagine how hard it is for everyone else.

Joey Gallo, acquired last month by the Dodgers from the Yankees at the trade deadline, has known his share of hitting struggles. Even when he was a two-time All-Star with the Rangers, he was notorious for striking out frequently and not getting many hits. He simply made up for that with a great eye at the plate and hitting the ball really hard when he did hit it.

After being traded to New York at last season's trade deadline, Gallo really struggled, batting .159 with a .660 OPS in his 140 games in pinstripes.

Gallo recently opened up about some of his hitting struggles, as reported by Fabian Ardaya in The Athletic.

“There was times where I felt like I was in a good place in New York,” Gallo said. “Then you kind of lose that feeling. A swing is kind of tricky, because I think people just assume you just pick up a bat and swing. But it’s very intricate and very ‘feel’ oriented. There’s days that you feel like you’ve never picked up a bat before."

We already quoted Ted Williams, but that sounds more like a member of the Songwriters Hall of Fame, Barry Manilow: "I've been up, down, trying to get the feeling again. ... It seemed to disappear as fast as it came."

When he joined the Dodgers, Gallo was impressed immediately by the plan the Los Angeles hitting staff had for him, telling SportsNetLA's Kirsten Watson last week:

"When I got here, they really had a plan for me. I was kind of surprised by that. I figured I'd show up and not really know what my place was gonna be. But as soon as I got here, they sat me down, told me what my role was, what they wanted me to do, changes that I could make that could help me."

As Ardaya reports, part of that plan was to work with iPad video during batting practice. Gallo takes a handful of swings, then watches video to see if what he's feeling matches what he's seeing.

“It’s not doing anything groundbreaking. It’s just getting the feel for my swing again, because I really wasn’t sure what I was doing in New York at some point. Swinging, I didn’t really have much thought process. So now, I’m trying to get back to having a plan and having a day-to-day routine and approach of how to get the best out of my swing.”

It's a very small sample size still, just 59 plate appearances in Los Angeles, and his numbers aren't yet what they were at his peak in Texas. But Gallo has been better across the board than he was in New York, so there's some hope that he has found "that feeling" again.