Tigers' Kerry Carpenter problem has a clear culprit

Tigers' Kerry Carpenter problem has a clear culprit originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.

Kerry Carpenter hit so well the last two seasons that people were calling him "Kerry Bonds."

Not so much this season for the Detroit Tigers' left-handed thumper.

In the early going, Carpenter has just a .192 batting average and a .675 OPS. He has hit three home runs, but that's about it.

And the problem for Carpenter seems obvious once you take a look under the hood: whiffs.

Carpenter has the second-most dramatic year-to-year increase in whiff percentage in baseball.

Last season, Carpenter swung-and-missed 26.2% of the time.

This season, he's whiffing 39.3% of the time.

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Only Andrew Benintendi's 13.4% increase in whiff percentage is worse through April 16 than Carpenter's increase of 13.1%.

The first place you might look to diagnose this is how much Carpenter is chasing. It's harder to make contact with pitches out of the strike zone than in it.

But Carpenter has actually improved about three percentage points in chase percentage so far, so that's not a direct explanation.

It could instead simply come down to some cold weather, some early-season rust and some unlucky matchups and outcomes.

It's not all to fear with Carpenter, because his swing isn't entirely broken. He ranks in the 87th-percentile in MLB in exit velocity and the 79th-percentile in barrel percentage.

When Carpenter hits the ball, he hits it hard.

He just needs to stop whiffing, and everything will turn out OK.