DJ LeMahieu kicked off his September with a 460-foot home run into the trees at Coors Field. He hit it more than 40 feet longer than any previous in his career. But it fell 6 feet shy of rookie Kyle Parker’s homer the next inning.
“C’mon,” LeMahieu said later. “Gimme those 6 feet.”
The Rockies’ all-star second baseman doesn’t ask for much. A smidge more on the measuring tape is small compensation for the hitter the Rockies used this season like all-purpose flour.
LeMahieu, as he plays through a career-best year, will probably finish his fourth season in Colorado as the team leader in batting average, on-base percentage and walks, second in stolen bases and triples and third in runs.
The Gold Glove second baseman rounded out his game with a bat to match.
“He’s more aware of what kind of player he is,” Rockies center fielder Charlie Blackmon said. “Turns out, the kind of player he is is a really good player.”
LeMahieu in August became the in the same season, when he finally hit cleanup at Atlanta. He started the year hitting eighth, the spot with the fewest pitches to hit. He hit them anyway. So he moved to second or fifth, sometimes sixth or leadoff.
“As under the radar as he was last year, and still won a Gold Glove, he’s built up a lot of respect in this league in a short amount of time,” Colorado manager Walt Weiss said. “The offensive year he put together has caught people’s attention. He’s really taken a big step.”
LeMahieu is unlike most Rockies hitters. Despite his 460-foot homer this month, he’s no Blake Street Bomber. In the past 15 years, LeMahieu is the only Rockies starter with an isolated power (ISO) number less than .100, according to Fangraphs. ISO is a hitter’s slugging percentage less his batting average. It measures extra-base hits.
Earlier in his career, LeMahieu — at 6-foot-4, an unusually large second baseman — was expected to hit home runs. This season, he changed that approach. He’s a gap hitter now.
“A lot of it has to do with experience. Being relaxed,” LeMahieu said. “I’m taking more pitches. Trying to be smarter. By doing that, I’m getting better pitches to hit than before when I kinda had a ‘see it and hit it’ approach.”
LeMahieu lowered his strikeout rate and significantly increased his walks this season. So he’s getting on base a bunch more, with a .362 OBP, up from .315 last year.
“He’s just so consistent,” Blackmon said. “You don’t see bad at-bats out of him. If he strikes out, it’s probably because the umpire missed strike one or the pitcher made a great pitch and he fouled it off for 0-1. You don’t see a lot of easy outs from him.”
Troy Tulowitzki, before his trade to Toronto, often hosted young and upcoming Rockies players in Las Vegas for offseason workouts. It became known as Camp Tulo.
LeMahieu, though, went to Georgia last offseason to work with Blackmon. “Body by Blackmon,” Blackmon calls it. LeMahieu said he took cues from Blackmon’s leadoff approach, looking for ideal pitches suited to his swing.
That led to LeMahieu waiting longer for pitches. His spray chart shows that LeMahieu, a right-hander, hits to all fields. But he hits line drives to right field. On purpose. He’ll attack pitches later in the zone. That extra foot or so that a ball travels gives him more time to pick pitches.
Opposing pitchers have responded with more fastballs, often inside. They throw him fastballs 67 percent of the time, according to Fangraphs, one of the highest in baseball. LeMahieu still pushes them.
“He’s convicted to a certain approach,” Weiss said. “When guys struggle, they start tinkering with their set-up, their approach. And a lot of times they get beat up mentally and they get lost. They can’t find their way back. He was committed to an approach this year and he hasn’t wavered.”
LeMahieu’s biggest hurdle was a dip. He hit better than .400 in April. But in June, his average fell to .252. By July, though, it was back to .400 for the month.
“Talking to Walt in my first slump, at the end of June, he told me: ‘You can’t stay locked in for six months in this league. It doesn’t happen.’ It was kind of like, he’s right,” LeMahieu said. “Everyone goes through them. It’s the guys who are tough mentally, guys who can make adjustments, who will limit those.”
LeMahieu, who made slightly more than the league minimum this season, will enter arbitration for the first time this winter. As an all-star, with numbers to match, he’s likely to see a healthy raise.
He’ll also see competition. The Rockies in September gave a long look at rookie Cristhian Adames, a middle infielder. And Trevor Story, who played at Triple-A for the first time this year, is close behind. They both can play second base.
LeMahieu, though, has surpassed the “small sample size” dismissiveness to his hitting reputation. He simply got better, and better enough to last, Weiss said.
“Even when he struggled, he had confidence in what I call his hitting values,” Weiss said. “Every hitter has values, things that are important to him. And when you lose those, you can lose your way. But he never strayed from what made him successful.”
Nick Groke: ngroke@denverpost.com or @nickgroke
DJ’S YEAR
How DJ LeMahieu’s stats this season rank among Rockies (before Sunday):
Batting average … .305 … 1st
On-base percentage … .364 … 1st
Walks … 50 … 1st
Stolen bases … 23 … 2nd
Triples … 5 … 2nd
Runs scored … 82 … 4th
