Zimmerman pleased with process over results in first game

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. - When Ryan Zimmerman stepped to the plate Friday for the first time this spring, then ripped a line drive to left field, there was an audible reaction from the crowd at The Ballpark of the Palm Beaches. It would have been difficult to strike a baseball with much more authority than the Nationals first baseman did.

The crowd reaction, though, quickly changed to groans when Cardinals left fielder Randal Grichuk ranged two steps to his right and snagged the ball out of the air. As was the case so many times last season, the scorecard showed Zimmerman making yet another very loud out.

"Tough hitter's wind," he said with a laugh, referencing the 22 mph gale that was blowing straight in from center field all afternoon. "There's a lot of balls on both teams that people hit hard today. If you hit them yesterday, there probably would've been a different story. But it's not really about the results now. It's about hitting the ball."

Indeed, if Zimmerman gets into the habit of lining out on a regular basis once the season begins, the frustration will once again grow. But on March 4, the process is more important than the result, and so Zimmerman and the Nationals were happy with the way things went in his spring debut.

"He swung the bat well, real well," manager Dusty Baker said. "For the first day out, it looked like his timing was pretty good. And he hit the first ball a ton."

This is a critical season for Zimmerman, who after hitting a paltry .218 in 2016 now must prove he is capable of returning to the form that defined the first decade of his career. The 32-year-old and the club believe it won't require a major overhaul of his swing, only some small (but important) adjustments.

Baker, for one, would like Zimmerman to be more aggressive earlier in the count, pouncing on fastballs in the strike zone.

"Usually it's a little thing," Baker said. "I was waiting on Zim to break loose, because I saw that he was on the verge. The thing with Zim, like I said, I'd just like to see him be more aggressive. ... He has a lot of things that he has to get in sync. But once he gets it, boy it's unbelievable. I'm still thinking he's going to have a heck of a year."

In order to do that, Zimmerman is going to have to turn many of those loud outs from a year ago into clean hits this time around. He has been working with hitting coach Rick Schu on improving his launch angle, trying to get under the ball a bit more and turn groundouts and lineouts into doubles and home runs.

It's one thing to work on that in the cage, but how does that translate into at-bats in games?

"I don't think it really changes much," Zimmerman said. "But I think the point of these games are to kind of get going, get on time, get some at-bats facing pitching. You can't take too much stock early in the spring season. The last week or two weeks, you start to get into that kind of stuff. These games are more to get some at-bats, see some pitches. For me, make sure I'm on time and working on that. That's about it right now."

There is a lot of time for Zimmerman to fine-tune his swing before opening day, still 30 days away. And then there will be a long season up the usual ups and downs that define a streaky hitter like Zimmerman.

Whether he's able to erase the sour taste of 2016 entirely or not is up to him. But his manager has no doubt he still has many more big seasons in him and hasn't already begun an inevitable career decline.

"No, I don't look at that," Baker said. "If he's healthy, everything's fine. I mean, he's in his 30s. Al Campanis told me years ago that when you're 32 to 36 to 37, it depends on your health, but that's when your mind and body are one and you almost know what's coming all the time. The 30s should be more productive than your 20s because you're playing against underclassmen now. You're no longer playing against upperclassmen. You're not old, but you're a veteran. And you're playing with your mind and not just your body. ...

"He's worked hard. He worked hard this winter. Like I said, I anticipate him having a great year."