If you look at the organizational leaders in home runs right now for the Pittsburgh Pirates, first up you will see Matt Gorski. The outfielder has been out since June and still leads the system with 23 home runs — an impressive testament to his blazing hot start.
The player behind Gorski is somewhat a surprise, with Altoona infielder Aaron Shackelford currently leading among ‘active’ players with 17.
It’s only somewhat a surprise if you never heard of Shackelford before, as he was one of a handful of players to top 20-home runs last year in the Pirates’ system.
Doing it in Greensboro of course is one thing but being able to do it not only in Altoona but against Double-A pitching would be a different story.
Not only is he on pace to surpass his home run totals from a year ago, but he is also becoming overall a better hitter (91 wRC+ in 2021, currently 123) and has cut his strikeout rate by roughly five percent.
The biggest surprise when it comes to Shackelford, as a left-handed hitter, has been his splits this season. He has by far been better against left-handed pitching to date, slashing .327/.352/.712 with five home runs in 52 at-bats. That’s nearly a hundred-point drop (.232) in batting average and almost a 300 difference in slugging (.473).
Looking at some of the video, you can see why he’s been such a success against left-handed pitching.
Shackelford is able to make quick adjustments at the plate and punishes pitchers who either make the same mistake twice or try to get one in over on him. In the first clip, it shows the Harrisburg pitcher throw a slider that broke over the plate, getting Shackelford to swing and miss.
He tried it again, and Shackelford was ready for it, hitting it over the fence for a home run. The rest of the video shows his ability to turn on any pitched thrown on the inner half of the plate.
At the rate that Shackelford is hitting home runs against lefties, if he had the same amount of at-bats against righties, that’d be an extra 14 on top of what he’s already hit.
Here’s a quick look at Shackelford against righties. Again, a lot of the damage he does is taking pitches on the inner half of the plate to him, jumping out on it and launching it out of the park.
He’s teetering the line when it comes to strikeouts, but has managed to maintain a consistent walk rate of about 8% as he’s climbed the ladder.
Altoona has been an interesting team to follow, if only due to some of the more secondary names that have stepped up with an added opportunity. Shackelford opened the year splitting time with Will Matthiessen, but when the latter went down with an injury, the other stepped up and never looked back.
Shackelford is five home runs away from tying his Greensboro total with all of August and some of September left in the season. It would take him passing that mark to tie Gorski’s total, but it looks like Shackelford has been more than up to the challenge this.
THIS WEEKEND ON PIRATES PROSPECTS
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Cal Mitchell’s Home Run Highlights a Problem This Season
Aaron Shackelford: Reverse Splits Key To Power Surge In Altoona
