Austin Slater had an opportunity to secure the starting left fielder job last season, but his bat never took off in the big leagues. In 225 plate appearances, Slater hit just .251/.333/.307. It was certainly a disappointing outcome, especially since Slater was smoking the ball for the first two months of his season. The problem that he was smoking the ball on the ground where the best he could hope for was a single.
Among batters with at least 200 plate appearances, Slater had the highest groundball rate in the majors last year at 63.1 percent.