Hyde on Holliday: "I just want to see him play"

SARASOTA, Fla. – Orioles manager Brandon Hyde said yesterday that a “handful” of his regulars will be in this afternoon’s lineup for the first exhibition game against the Pirates at Ed Smith Stadium.

“I’m gonna give a few guys the weekend,” he said. “We’ve got some back-field stuff going, too. Not in any hurry to get any of these guys in there right now, to be honest with you.

“Couple guys going to Clearwater (Sunday), a few guys, but weekend’s gonna be … we’re slowly getting into this.”

The lineup will be posted later this morning for a game that airs on MASN. Viewers might see Jackson Holliday at second base. Viewers might have to wait a little longer.

We don’t know.

Fans will recognize Holliday’s face, as well as the muscular arms revealed in photos posted on social media. How he performs, however, is expected to be much different than in 2024.

Holliday turned 21 in December and the team thinks he’ll outgrow his .189 average, .565 OPS and 69 strikeouts in 208 plate appearances.

“I’d like to see him get every other day for a while at-bats. Get more comfortable at second base, as well,” Hyde said.

“Still a really young player. We think really highly of him. I just want to see him play. I want him to go play free and easy without any pressure and just try to play the game like I know he can.”

What does Hyde want to see from Holliday at the plate? The response leaves no room for misinterpretation.

“Less swing and miss,” he said.

Can’t get more clear than that.

“Being able to control the strike zone up, to be able to stay on the breaking ball, the changeups down and away. Stay on the baseball, more of a line drive approach,” Hyde continued.

“I’m not looking for him to hit homers. I want him to be an exciting player. I want the bunt to be a part of his game, I want the line drive single the other way to be a part of his game. Walking. We need to get more aggressive on the bases. Just more comfortable playing. We’re not looking for him to hit homers, we’re looking for him to just get on base and be a tough out.”

Also complicating Holliday’s baseball life last year was learning to play second base. Gunnar Henderson was given the shortstop position. Holliday spent extra hours with infield instructor Tony Mansolino and anyone with experience at second, including Kolten Wong, who offered tips despite competing against the kid for a roster spot. Neither one made it, but Wong was released in March.

“If you talk to him, he’s definitely a lot more comfortable,” Hyde said. “He just had kind of an offseason to get ready for that last year and it was a lot to learn when you change positions, and to have a full year and another offseason, he feels a lot more comfortable.”

Cody Asche, promoted to hitting coach, understood why Holliday labored at age 20 and expressed confidence that those days are done.

“I think for any young player coming into the big leagues, I see it in, like, levels,” Asche said. “You’ve got to learn how to hit, you’ve got to learn how to get on base. You can tap into the slug.”

That isn’t the only tapping. Holliday replaced the leg lift with a toe tap for a timing mechanism at the plate, and he swung the bat much better during the final days of the season.

“I think it was kind of his idea just by way of experimenting with things and he felt good with it,” Asche said. “I thought it looked good from a swing mechanic perspective, so we kind of rolled with it. And anytime a player makes a change, it’s got to be their idea and it’s got to come from their mouth and they have to feel good with it. I think he felt good with it.

“From my perspective, it gives him a chance to be a little bit more competitive versus a lot more different pitch types. But first and foremost, Jax has to hit a lot of line drives, he’s got to get on base. We know what the ceiling is for him as a player and that’s going to come down the road. But I think the process that he has right now, that helps that transition in finding out who he is as a player.

“Does the toe tap stay forever? I don’t know. For right now it seems like he likes it. It looked in a very small sample as if it was good. The game’s always going to tell us what’s right and what’s wrong. I have a deep image burned in my brain what Jax looked like in Minnesota, just kind of the reaction he was giving through the cage work, and those are all cues that you’re looking for as a coach. It seemed like we’re on the right track. The kid works hard, he does whatever you ask him to do. We’ll continue to work, just as we do with all our players, and I expect Jax to have a good year.”

Holliday tends to get lumped with Cody Mayo, one of the top prospects in the system who was 4-for-41 with 22 strikeouts last season. Their ceiling is too high for them to stay down.

“The skill set’s there,” said major league coach Buck Britton, who managed both players at Triple-A Norfolk. “(Colton) Cowser went through some struggles and you saw what he was able to do last year. All these guys, they’re getting pushed through the minor leagues so fast and they dominate the levels that they’re at. Sometimes the first punch in the mouth is in the big leagues. But these guys are in a good head space, they’re hard workers, they’re super talented, so I think as a group we have a lot of confidence that these guys are gonna be able to mature into the players that we hope and think they are.”

Said assistant hitting coach Sherman Johnson: “They work really hard, obviously. They love baseball, they love to hit, and I just think they’re resilient. You look at these guys and when they fail or struggle, it’s not run away. They want to work harder and figure it out. I have all the confidence in the world in all of them.”