The challenge of modern baseball lies in navigating an era dominated by powerful pitchers and advanced technology — and here’s where it gets truly intriguing... Inside Driveline's expansive 15,000-square-foot training center, two racks display 16 broken baseball bats, positioned like pieces of modern art — symbols of intense effort and relentless pursuit of excellence. This innovative player development facility has revolutionized the way athletes train at the sport's highest levels. The belief here is clear: To succeed offensively in today’s game—where pitchers often overpower hitters—requires training under extreme, controlled conditions. Those shattered bats aren’t signs of defeat; they’re badges of the relentless work and high intensity that define cutting-edge training today.
Recently, a promising young player named Edgar Quero, who’s just starting his second season with the Chicago White Sox, stepped into one of the high-tech batting cages nearby. Equipped with reflective markers beneath his bat's barrel and a Blast Motion sensor on its knob, he prepared to analyze his swing at a biomechanical level. As he took batting practice, eight advanced Edgertronic cameras captured every move in ultra-slow motion, providing detailed insights into his mechanics.
Quero is an exceptional talent: a switch-hitting catcher with a promising offensive outlook. He has rare skills like superb plate discipline—consistently meeting the ball in the sweet spot—and his ability to stay within the strike zone. These traits are precious and challenging to develop. However, his raw power potential is limited; his bat speed is on the slower side, and his launch angle isn’t optimal, which hampers his ability to hit for extra bases. Competing for playing time against another young catcher, Kyle Teel, Quero made a strategic journey from his home in Peoria, Arizona, to Scottsdale’s industrial district. There, he spent two days immersing himself in Driveline’s rigorous hitting program — now a rite of passage for many aspiring hitters in the sport.
Driveline’s origins date back about seven years, when it established itself as a pioneer in transforming pitching through cutting-edge biomechanics and data analytics. Its technology helped pitchers unlock unprecedented velocity and movement, shifting the competitive landscape. Now, the same biomechanical principles are being applied to hitting — helping batters bridge the widening gap between pitching dominance and offensive production. It’s a perfect example of how technology and data-driven training are reshaping baseball across all levels.
It's a fact that Tanner Stokey, Driveline’s 32-year-old Director of Hitting, thinks about daily: “Hitting has never been more difficult,” he explains. “And our team’s work has played a major part in that.” Critics, including many retired major leaguers and passionate fans, often blame the sport's rising strikeouts and declining batting averages on this intense focus on bat speed and launch angle, core principles at Driveline’s approach. They argue these trends are turning baseball into a more homogenous game, less exciting and less engaging. Since 2021, four of the seven lowest full-season batting averages in history have occurred, with most of the worst years happening in more recent times. Meanwhile, the highest strikeout rates — now numbering among the top in history — have surged over the last 18 seasons.
However, these statistics tell only part of the story. The increase in pitch velocity, from an average of 91.3 mph in 2008 to roughly 94.4 mph in 2025, indicates smarter, more sophisticated pitching. Pitchers now leverage technology like spin rate enhancers, improved grip, and refined pitch profiles to gain an edge. Detailed scouting reports, fueled by Hawk-Eye data, empower pitchers to attack hitters with precision.
Stokey emphasizes: “While pitchers are improving faster thanks to technology, the key to offensive success remains consistent: hitting the ball hard. The more you can drive the ball, the greater your chances of producing extra-base hits and home runs. But a successful hitter also needs to optimize launch angle, attack angle, and swing path — all of which depend on understanding biomechanics and applying data strategically.”
Bat speed and launch angle are interrelated but must be contextualized within a broader biomechanical framework. Proper application of these metrics requires precise data and an understanding of how to maximize them. That’s why facilities like Driveline are becoming so influential — not just in professional baseball but also in the amateur ranks, where data-driven training is gaining traction. Approximately 100 former Driveline employees now work across Major League organizations, including a notable dozen with the Boston Red Sox, such as Kyle Boddy, the company's founder and current advisor, who helped ignite this revolution. The familiarity among younger players with advanced tools like HitTrax, Blast sensors, and simulated pitching machines means they are more receptive and prepared to incorporate precise analytics into their development as they advance through the minors and into the majors.
At Driveline’s Scottsdale location, a dry-erase board displays leaderboards for athletes at various levels, highlighting impressive performances like Corbin Carroll’s highest squat jump at 61.2 centimeters or Jo Adell’s notable 60.1-centimeter countermovement jump. On a recent visit, Quero underwent a series of tests, starting with mobility assessments, then explosive jumps measured on force plates. These tests gauge total force, how quickly that force is generated, and how efficiently it’s converted into bat speed and pitch velocity — with models predicting expected results within a narrow margin of error. If actual performance exceeds expectations, it suggests movement inefficiencies to address.
In the cage, Quero faced 65 mph pitches, with every movement tracked in detail. His swing mechanics were analyzed at up to 17,000 frames per second, and data overlaid to identify flaws. Last season, Quero’s stats reflected a promising but imperfect hitter: a batting average of .268 with some notable struggles against right-handed pitchers, and his launch angle and bat speed ranked near the bottom of the league. He acknowledged issues like too many ground balls, which are often a result of hitting too deep in the strike zone and not getting the ball out in front — a key factor for generating power.
Born in Cuba, Quero’s story is remarkable. Coming from a country with limited access to advanced statistics and biomechanical training, he defected to Haiti in 2019, then moved quickly to the Dominican Republic for training. Signed by the Angels in 2021, Quero was later traded to the White Sox, motivated by the team’s focus on analytics and the desire to improve on aspects like pitch framing and bat speed.
This emphasis on data isn’t new to the sport. In fact, Driveline's rise coincided with Shohei Ohtani’s transformative offseason in 2020–2021. Ohtani, then recovering from Tommy John surgery, visited Driveline to overhaul both his pitching and hitting. His commitment paid off spectacularly. Ohtani smashed three of the composite speed-training bats during those months and improved his swing mechanics, enabling him to hit 33 home runs by mid-season — a foundation for his subsequent four-time MVP-winning performance. The buzz around Ohtani’s results helped propel wider acceptance of this data-centric approach across the league, inspiring dozens of other players to seek similar training.
Fast forward five seasons, and Quero finds himself in detailed meetings dissecting his swing. During one such session, the team highlighted that his average bat speed last year was just 67.5 mph, ranking near the bottom of the league. To improve, Quero was shown the potential of adding just a few mph — which could translate into significantly more power and distance. The process involves a holistic approach: strengthening his lower-body explosiveness, optimizing his swing path, and learning to make contact more out in front of the plate.
For example, Quero struggles with hitting pitches out in front, often catching the ball too deep, which limits his ability to accelerate the bat effectively. His swing’s biomechanical flaws include early hip rotation and slow pelvis movement, leading to a steep downward attack angle — less than ideal for lifting the ball. Yet, some elite hitters succeed despite similar issues, using excellent swing decision-making and bat speed. Quero’s challenge is to improve his explosiveness, hit more pitches in the optimal spot, and develop better timing for catching the ball out front.
Driveline’s training incorporates various drills to fix these issues, including hitting side-curve pitches comparable to same-side breaking balls, encouraging him to stay closed and control his hips better. Other exercises involve loading in exaggerated positions or mimicking Hall of Fame slugger David Ortiz’s swing mechanics — all aimed at ingraining better habits and biomechanics. The ultimate goal: to get Quero comfortable catching the ball more out in front, producing better launch angles, and increasing his overall power output.
Since opening its Scottsdale and Tampa locations in 2022 and 2024 respectively, Driveline has made its training accessible for more players at different levels. A two-day assessment for professionals costs around $7,500, while year-round training — including detailed scouting reports — can reach up to $20,000. Although Quero’s visit happened just weeks before spring training, the staff is confident that some of these biomechanical adjustments will carry over into his upcoming season, helping him produce better results and unlock more of his offensive potential.
Quero himself feels optimistic: “I’m glad to understand my body better. It should help me improve my exit velocity, bat speed, and launch angle throughout the season.” But here’s where it gets controversial... does this reliance on biomechanical data and technology, at the expense of traditional approach and instinct, risk making the game too mechanized or less organic? And should increased focus on analytics be welcomed or resisted? What do you think — is this the future of baseball, or are we sacrificing the soul of the sport for data? Drop your thoughts in the comments and start the debate!
