Freddie Freeman Happy to See Dodgers Not Just Relying on the Home Run Ball
If you happen to take a peep at the current home run leaders by team one month into the 2023 MLB season, the Tampa Bay Rays claim the number one spot. They have been raking at an incredible rate to start off the year but your Boys in Blue come in at number two with 47 dingers total.
This should come as no surprise as Max Muncy has hit 11 of them himself and leads the entire league as of now in that home run category. Six other members of the clubhouse have connected on at least four of them as well and they've been able to capture some important games thus far thanks to this success at the plate.
However, the Dodgers just won two straight games against the St. Louis Cardinals and they did not need a single home run in either victory to come out on top. In fact, only one run was recorded by them on Saturday and their stellar defense along with Clayton Kershaw's excellence at the pitching mound paved the way there.
Freddie Freeman has taken opposing pitchers deep four times this season but he made it clear that to be a successful clubhouse, you have to produce beyond just dingers and he was quite pleased to see various forms of offensive production this weekend.
"You can't always win the games by hitting home runs and all that," said Freeman. "Today, scoring runs a different way. The last 10 days, it's much better baseball that we've been playing."
Of course every great hitter would love to step up to the plate and send a pitch out of the park every trip but that is just not realistic. The approach to every at-bat is different depending on the situation and not every swing is taken with a homer in mind.
It's great to see Freeman reflect on this recent play from his squad and we'll see them back in action on Monday against the Philadelphia Phillies for a brand new series.
