Zach Wilt: Free swinging serves Jones well in sizzling homestand

When I sat on my couch last Wednesday to write my first piece of the season for MASNsports.com, Adam Jones had just one hit in his first 11 at-bats of the season. He was slashing a cool .091/.167/.182. So I instead focused my attention on Alejandro De Aza and the top of the order.

In baseball, a lot can change in a week. The Orioles wrapped up their first homestand of 2015 and Jones absolutely raked in all six games. Against the Blue Jays, Jones collected seven hits in 10 at-bats and his first two home runs. He followed that with five more hits in 11 ABs and tacked on two more longballs in the three-game set against the Yankees.

Despite that slow start in Tampa Bay, Jones has struck out only twice this season, which means he's put the ball in play in 30 of his 32 at-bats. Fortunately for the O's, he just started finding a few more gaps when he came home to Camden Yards

One of the knocks on Jones' approach is his free-swinging style at the plate. Last season, Jones saw just 3.64 pitches per plate appearance, the 16th-fewest among all hitters. It's hard to draw walks when you average under four pitches per plate appearance. Entering last night, that number had dipped to an astounding 2.76 in our admittedly small size of 2015 games.

Some of this is because of that free-swinging approach, but I think most of it is due to the fact that Jones loves hitting the first pitch he sees. Last season, he slashed .371//396/.608 with five homers and 17 RBI on the first pitch. Why wait around for another pitch if you've got that kind of success early on? If he sees it and likes it, he's taking a hack at it.

Of course, not all of these pitches end up being strikes. I've always been fascinated by Jones' unique ability to make contact on pitches outside of the strike zone. According to data from FanGraphs.com, last season saw Jones swing at 42.1 percent of the pitches he saw out of the zone and make contact with 63 percent of them. That trend has continued this season, as Jones has swung at 40 percent of the pitches he's seen out of the zone, making contact with 63.6 percent of them.

Overall, Jones has swung at over half of the pitches he seen in the big leagues (55.6 percent career) and made contact with 75 percent of them. These free swings can look bad when he misses on a breaking ball in the dirt, but it's easy to forget about the low and away heater he hits 409 feet, like the one he belted against Drew Hutchison in the finale against Toronto.

In fact, all four of Jones' home runs this season have come from unique pitches in different locations. He took CC Sabathia deep on a 1-1, 89 mph belt-high sinker, went yard against Michael Pineda on a 1-2, 90 mph cutter up in the zone, crushed a 1-1 90 mph low fastball from Hutchison and hit Mark Buehrle's 2-1 cutter on the outside of the plate out of the yard to left-center.

What's the scouting report after that? There's not safe place to pitch to Jones right now and that's exactly what makes him such a threat at the plate.

The approach isn't going to change, and after seeing the results, it shouldn't. Jones takes a lot of swings, but often causes a lot of damage when he connects. And he makes contact enough to justify this aggressive technique.

Zach Wilt blogs about the Orioles at Baltimore Sports Report. Follow him on Twitter: @zamwi. His views appear here as part of MASNsports.com's season-long initiative of welcoming guest bloggers to our pages. 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.