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McCutchen never felt like himself at plate in ’16
- Updated: October 3, 2016
PITTSBURGH — The weirdest, worst season of Andrew McCutchen’s career ended with a solid two-month stretch. After four miserable months, McCutchen at least looked more like himself.
He never felt like himself, though.
“I got to that level where I was like, I’m good. It wasn’t like, I’m good,” McCutchen said in an interview with MLB.com. “I never got to that. I plateaued at good enough.”
After five straight All-Star seasons as one of the game’s elite hitters, McCutchen on Sunday finished a shockingly pedestrian offensive campaign. He hit .256 with a .766 OPS, both career lows. He struck out a career-high 143 times. He stole only six bases and was caught seven times.
In a disappointing season for the Pirates, McCutchen’s dramatic drop in production may have been the most surprising and critical development.
The Pirates’ $13 million question: What happened to Cutch?
“I was waiting for that ‘a-ha’ moment. Most of the time, we have them. ‘There it is!'” McCutchen said. “Working, working, working and knowing it was going to come. But this year, it really didn’t.”
McCutchen chalked up his offensive struggles to mental and physical mistakes. He focused too much on trying to get back to who he was before, trying to mimic his mechanics when something went wrong instead of trying to build off whatever went right. Too often, he felt out of whack in the batter’s box.
“That’s something I’m going to be working on this offseason, getting a more consistent feel with my setup and then going from there,” McCutchen said, then pointed a finger to his head. “Where are you here? Where are you physically?”
McCutchen denied the idea that he was held back by an injury, though he was plagued the first …
