Matt Gorski takes data approach to preparation
At Indiana University, Matt Gorski excelled on the baseball diamond. Doing so earned him a second-round selection by the Pittsburgh Pirates in the 2019 draft.
However, he also excelled in the classroom as an Accounting and Finance major.
While Gorski admitted he doesn’t overthink as much on the field as in finance, the data-driven major acted as a practice run for his current profession as a hitter in a very fast-paced numbers game of baseball.
“Looking at numbers and seeing how other people attack you has certainly helped me get into the box with a better approach,” Gorski said. “I’ve asked some of the coaches here what they would do to attack me. Going in with the mindset of what people are trying to do, can help you game plan.”
As for that in-game approach, Indianapolis hitting coach Eric Munson has remained impressed by the power-hitting righty.
“His approach has been really solid,” Munson said. “I think that’s the biggest thing to me. He’s hitting the ball to all fields. He’s not trying to pull the ball when he’s at his best. He’s trying to hit the fastball to the big part of the field and hit mistake breaking balls hard.”
Diving deeper into the numbers, Gorski has dominated the month of May each year in his professional career. This season, he hit nine home runs and posted a 1.049 OPS. While this falls short of his 13-homer and 1.211 OPS May of 2022, it was still dominant. In fact, May has been the highest OPS month for Gorski annually for the past three seasons.
“I think it’s just getting out of Spring Training, getting settled in and when the weather warms up, it’s going to help a lot,” Gorski said. “It’s just getting more at bats and feeling more comfortable.”
While he has slumped most of July, Gorski went 3-for-7 in his last two contests leading up to Friday.
Whether things are good or bad, Gorski pushes hard to keep the same approach. Despite being an analytical thinker, Gorski admitted that is just in his preparation work. Once he steps to the plate, the challenge is putting it all together so he does not think a lot at the dish. He wants to simply go up, be athletic and trust the data-heavy preparation process.
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I'd love to see our local kid make the show, even if only to give him a chance. My guess is he'd K a lot. But he already does that. I'd love to see him in September when there are more prospects pitching than any other time of year. He may be decent against lesser competition?
I would release Olivares and put Gorski on the 40 man.