J. D. Martinez Quotes

To be a good hitter you've got to do one thing - get a good ball to hit.

I have to go with the approach I had in Triple-A. I need to take a lot of those fastballs I am seeing to left field. Also must gear up for the changeup and take them up the middle.

As hitters, I think we take for granted at times how good our hands are and just how much the value of truly getting the barrel to the ball is. We don't have to do as much as we think we have to.

You can't go up there trying to get hits. You can just go up there trying to put together at-bats and square the baseball up.

Once I found my swing, I feel like if I put a good swing on it, I feel like it's got a good chance to go wherever - left, right, center - it doesn't matter. But I'm not just out here going to swing for home runs of anything. I'm just trying to put a good swing on the baseball.

There are certain things I can't do, certain pitches I can't hit. You stay away from them. You try to wait for pitches you can hit. The bat speed isn't what it used to be. You make up for it by using your head, working counts, getting ahead in counts and getting pitches to hit and hitting them hard.

The great hitters use the whole field, and that's a goal of mine.

Sometimes you go to home plate, and you have an idea, like a clear idea, of what they're going to throw to you. I think that's all: getting better pitches to hit, realizing when you hit the ball better, what pitch you hit, if you're chasing too much. If you figure out all that, you can get a little better as a player.

There's so much attached to playing shortstop that you lose your concentration on hitting, unless you're a natural hitter. There's so much to think about in the field, you don't have time to think about what you did at the plate last time. 'How did he get me out?'

Some batters, and good ones too, scoff at the whole theory of place hitting, calling it a myth. They are wrong, however.

A lot of hitters stay away from the plate, some are close up, some are forward, some are back. The thing about hitting is this: You have to know the strike zone. That's the most important thing. Hit strikes and put the bat on the ball.

I love sharing my knowledge of hitting with others. Now coaches and players at all levels can learn my systematic approach to hitting a baseball with more consistency, mental strength and accuracy.

Guessing what the pitcher is going to throw is 80% of being a successful hitter. The other 20% is just execution.

The fellows that I played with encouraged me to bunt and beat the ball out. I was anxious to make good and did as I was told. When I came to Brooklyn, I adopted an altogether different style of hitting. I stood flat-footed at the plate and slugged. That was my natural style.

I think my mindset and my approach is to hit the ball hard, whether it be first pitch or work the count.

I'm pretty close to Miguel Cabrera. We are such different hitters, but at the same time, we're pretty close because we both like to hit the ball middle-away.

I just try to make contact with the ball. It's obvious that I like to swing the bat. I'm not thinking of taking a lot of pitches.

I kind of realized that when I take more pitches I put better swings on them.

I was kind of a slap hitter, trying to get base hits, hit line drives, stay below a certain trajectory with my ball.

When I'm at the plate, I'm not thinking about what I'm trying to do with the bat - I'm thinking about what the pitcher is trying to do with the ball.

It would be useless for any player to attempt to explain successful batting.

There is no doubt that because I am a switch hitter I have one of the best offensive advantages that a hitter can have.

Eddie Haas talked a lot about not hitting the ball in the air.

My theory of hitting was just to watch the ball as it came in and hit it.

Joe Torre would tell you to make sure you can hit the ball on the outside part of the plate.