On Tuesday, Miguel Cabrera hit his 35th home run of the season and drove in five runs to bring his total over 100 for the year. He led the Detroit Tigers to a 12-0 rout of the Cleveland Indians that brought the Tigers within one game of the Baltimore Orioles for the second American League wild card spot. They face off again Wednesday (7 p.m. ET, ESPN/WatchESPN).
This is Cabrera's 12th 100-RBI season, tied for the fifth-most all time. Only Lou Gehrig, Jimmie Foxx, Alex Rodriguez and Albert Pujols have more.
Early in the season it was questionable whether Cabrera would reach 100 RBIs. He had 53 RBIs prior to the All-Star break, the second-lowest total of his career (excluding his rookie season in 2003 when he debuted in June). Since the break, Cabrera has 49 RBIs in 66 games, and has really turned things around at the plate.
Cabrera leads the AL with a 1.025 OPS in the second half, and is also in the top five in batting average (.336), OBP (.412) and slugging percentage (.607). How has he done it? A look at a couple of factors:
Off-speed success
Cabrera was no slouch against off-speed pitches in the first half, hitting .299, 14th among qualified hitters and well above the major league average of .242. However, he has taken it to a new level since the All-Star break.
In the second half, Cabrera is hitting .404 in at-bats ending with an off-speed pitch, 30 points higher than the next closest qualified hitter (Nolan Arenado). Cabrera has a 1.126 OPS against off-speed pitches, also the best in the majors. The league average is .686 over that same span.
In particular, Cabrera has been successful against breaking balls. He is hitting .460 in the second half in at-bats ending with a breaking pitch; the next-closest qualified hitter is at .387 (Yadier Molina). Cabrera's 1.263 OPS in at-bats ending with breaking pitches in the second half also leads the majors.
A big reason is that Cabrera has a 29.7 percent hard-hit rate against breaking pitches in the second half. The major league average for qualified hitters is 12.0 percent. Of the breaking balls Cabrera has put in play in the second half, 37.3 percent of them have been line drives, the highest rate in the majors.
The improvement in his hard-hit rate is not just limited to breaking balls. Cabrera has an overall hard-hit average of 22.6 percent in the second half, fourth in the majors among qualified hitters. It was 18.9 percent in the first half, which ranked 54th.
Behind in the count is no problem
Cabrera has always been a dangerous hitter regardless of the count. Over the last five seasons he is a .302 hitter after the count reaches 0-1, the second-best rate among qualified hitters.
In the first half this season, he struggled by his standard in what are deemed pitchers' counts (0-1, 0-2, 1-2, 2-2), hitting .247 in at-bats ending in those counts.
In the second half, he is back to his old ways, hitting .333 in at-bats ending in pitchers' counts, second-best in the AL and fifth-best in the majors.