MILWAUKEE (AP) — Milwaukee Brewers catcher Wiliam Contreras is learning how to keep hitting the ball hard while dealing with a fractured left middle finger.
Contreras has been playing through this injury for much of the season, which has impacted the hitting production of one of the game’s top catchers. But he’s turned a corner lately.
The two-time All-Star went 4 for 4 with a pair of doubles and hit a tiebreaking two-out RBI single in the eighth inning of the Milwaukee Brewers’ 5-4 victory over the Baltimore Orioles on Monday. He has gone 9 for 16 at the plate over his last five games.
“It’s been the William Contreras who finished in the top five of the MVP voting last year,” Brewers manager Pat Murphy said.
Contreras ranked fifth in the MVP balloting after leading Milwaukee to a second straight NL Central title last year. Contreras understands how much he means to this team, which helps explain why he has continued to play just about every day even while facing this injury.
“I’ve worked too hard to miss a day,” Contreras said. “I don’t want to take two or three months off.”
Teammates appreciate Contreras’ ability to play through pain. Contreras has missed just three of Milwaukee’s first 48 games this season after playing 155 games last year. Even when he isn’t catching, Contreras typically remains in the lineup as a designated hitter.
“It really shows his passion to one, play the game, and also about how important he thinks winning is and how badly he wants to win and be a part of it,” pitcher Quinn Priester said. “It’s really easy to play with and trust a guy like that.”
The Brewers reconfigured Contreras’ catching mitt to help him avoid feeling so much pain with every foul tip he gets while working behind the plate. Contreras has continued doing an outstanding job behind the plate, as Statcast ranks him among the NL’s best catchers at throwing out potential base stealers.
His injury had a bigger effect on his hitting.
Contreras homered April 13 in a 5-2 loss at Arizona but didn’t get another extra-base hit until May 11, when he went deep again in a 4-2 victory at Tampa Bay. That represented quite a drop for someone who had won the Silver Slugger as the NL’s top hitting catcher each of the last two seasons.
He has looked more like his usual self at the plate the last week.
Contreras’ surge started Wednesday, when he went 3 of 4 with a double and scored four runs in a 9-5 victory at Cleveland. That began a five-game stretch in which his batting average has improved from .224 to .258, his on-base percentage has soared from .333 to .370 and his slugging percentage has improved from .322 to .371.
While metrics show Contreras hasn’t hit the ball as hard this year as in previous seasons, he’s clearly making progress in that regard. All four of his hits Monday had an exit velocity exceeding 100 mph.
“It’s hard to hit a ball hard with that finger because there’s pain sometimes,” Contreras said. “But I don’t have to think too much about my finger because I’m going to keep playing the rest of the season.”
___
AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/MLB
