Alright. It's time to talk about Aaron Altherr (and it's "all-tear" for anyone who thought it was "all-thair" like me). Altherr has been killing the ball lately, with an eight-game hitting streak, and three consecutive games with a home run. Wednesday night, he had his best night so far, going 2-4, 2 HR, 2 R, 4 RBI. Plus, I've heard people clamoring for him to be added to our Hitter List (which you should check out cause it's awesome). He's the man right now, and we need to sit down and have a chat about him. Altherr is batting .343 on the season so far and is crushing home runs, but is it legit? Well, it might be. There was some slight buzz about Altherr in the spring. A lot of analysts thought that maybe his dismal 2016 was due to him playing hurt. Plus, he made some adjustments to his swing in the offseason with the help of Phillies hitting coach Matt Stairs, he changed his swing path. It seems like that change has helped, as his hard hit rate has skyrocketed, and his exit velocity has gone up too, sitting in the same area as players like Manny Machado, Ryan Braun, and Justin Upton. He's added power to his game and it's turning him into a pretty well-rounded player. Is he going to regress? Yes, obviously, he's not going to keep up a .413 BABIP and a 36.8% HR/FB rate all year, but there's something here that makes him worth picking up as a speculative add. At the very least, ride the streak, and then if the struggles come, dump him. But those struggles might not be too bad.
Let's take a look at some of the other performances from Wednesday:
