The 2022 Giants Rewrote the Rules of Pinch-Hitting

The San Francisco Giants used 258 pinch-hitters in 2022. That's 95 more than the next-highest team, the Athletics. The team with the fewest pinch hit appearances, Rockies, used 222. In the first full year of the universal DH, Giants were still pinch hitting at a pre-DH rate.

The 2022 Giants are pinch-hitting as much as a team without the DH. Since 2002, no American League team has used more than 200 pinch hitters in a single season. The 2015 Rays used 189 pinchhitters, 67 fewer than the 2022 team.

Gabe Kapler's Giants team used 26 bench bats in the fifth and sixth innings alone. That accounted for 23% of all fifth-inning pinch-hitters across the sport.

Kapler sent 39 pinch-hitters to the plate in the sixth.

The San Francisco Giants have used 65 pinch-hitters in frames 5 and 6 since 2002. The Rays have the next-highest total with 43 pinch hitters in the fifth and sixth innings.

The 2022 Giants Rewrote the Rules of Pinch-Hitting. Kapler's team made 195 pinch-hitting plate appearances in low and medium-leverage situations this season.

The 2014 Blue Jays used 156 pinch-hitters in low and medium leverage spots.

The 2022 Giants employed a lot of pinch-hitters in 2022. Their pinch hitters combined for five home runs, 10 doubles, and 40 walks. They had a 121 wRC+. The league-average pinch hitter had just 89 wrc+. Giants used 65 pinch hitters out of 65 in the fifth and sixth innings. They used to find the right spots for their players to thrive. The Giants will do the same in 2021. It's conventional wisdom that pinch hitting is not allowed in baseball. However, the Giants found favorable matchups for hitters based on the paths of their swings and opposing pitchers’ pitch shapes.