Matt Kremnitzer: Chris Davis excelling against lefties

It doesn't take a baseball expert to notice Chris Davis' rare power at the plate. He's already surpassed the 40-homer mark for the second time in his career (42, most in the majors), he's sixth in slugging percentage (.562), and he's second in isolated power (.299). With a wRC+ of 148, Davis is still a ways away from his 168 wRC+ from 2013. But he's bounced back in a big way after a disastrous 2014, and he's put himself in position to make a ton of money this offseason.

In Davis' monster 2013 campaign, he completely destroyed right-handed pitching (204 wRC+). But his 104 wRC+ against left-handed pitching that season was close to his current career mark against southpaws (102 wRC+). This year, though, Davis is mashing right and left-handed pitching equally:

vs. RHP: 148 wRC+
vs. LHP: 146 wRC+

Out of all left-handed hitting major leaguers with more than 100 plate appearances against same-handed throwers, Davis is fourth in wRC+ behind Joey Votto, Bryce Harper and Anthony Rizzo. He's just ahead of Kyle Seager. That's not a bad handful of players to be grouped with.

Considering Davis' good but not great career numbers against left-handed pitching and his batting average on balls in play against them this year (.364), we can probably chalk a chunk of this year's success up to a small sample size. We're talking about 169 plate appearances after all. But there are some things worth noting, so let's take a look anyway.

Left-handed pitchers are throwing Davis fewer sliders and more four-seam fastballs this season, and they are also keeping the ball away from him more than in his previous seasons in Baltimore. But lefties haven't been able to get Davis to chase enough as he's laying off more pitches out of the strike zone, particularly low and inside ones. Davis' current whiff percentage of 15.5% against lefties would be his lowest since 2012 (15.4%).

Davis's BABIP is noteworthy, but it's not as if he's just collecting a bunch of bloops. He's hitting the ball harder against left-handed pitching and pulling the ball more this season:

2012: 26 Hard%, 43 Pull%
2013: 31 Hard%, 42 Pull%
2014: 32 Hard%, 56 Pull%
2015: 39 Hard%, 54 Pull%

That's also evident in his batted-ball spray chart this season vs. lefties compared to his spray chart from 2011-2014. Davis still spreads the ball around a hefty amount for a power hitter, but he has peppered a bunch of line drives down the right-field line this season. And, obviously, he's still hitting the ball a long way.

Davis' numbers this season against southpaws may not necessarily be the start of a trend of outstanding performance against lefties, but one of the best things about him is that he's not useless against them. He's better against right-handed pitching, but he is far from a platoon bat. And even a minor improvement against lefties in future seasons will increase his overall value, which is important since several lucrative, long-term contracts recently handed out to first basemen don't look so great right now. Davis doesn't have to end up like them, but the odds aren't exactly in his favor.

The Orioles may re-sign Davis, or he may depart for greener pastures. Either way, signing him won't be cheap. Whichever team signs him is going to expect him to keep hitting a bunch of balls out of the ballpark; that's a pretty reasonable request. Still, it's amusing to look back at this past offseason, when Davis' bunting skills were a popular talking point. Fans tend to focus less on an extra bunt single or two when a batter slugs 40-50 homers.

Matt Kremnitzer blogs about the Orioles at Camden Depot. Follow him on Twitter: @mattkremnitzer. His thoughts on the O's appear here as part of MASNsports.com's continuing commitment to welcome guest bloggers to our little corner of cyberspace. All opinions expressed are those of the guest bloggers, who are not employed by MASNsports.com but are just as passionate about their baseball as our roster of writers.