The key to Jackson Chourio finding sustained success at the plate

Jackson Chourio is always going to be an aggressive hitter, that much will likely never change. The Milwaukee Brewers' budding star ranked near the top of the league in swing rate in each of his first two seasons in the major leagues. In fact, during the 2025 season, only 15 qualified hitters in all of baseball had a higher swing rate than Chourio's 53.2% mark.

The 22-year-old outfielder makes up for his aggressive approach at the plate with his excellent bat speed. Averaging 74.4 mph on his bat speed, Chourio ranks in the 75th percentile in baseball this year. Those quick hands allow Chourio to foul off pitches that many other hitters would whiff at, which means he can get away with swinging more frequently than the average hitter.

However, there's a fine line between being an effectively aggressive hitter and being a dangerously aggressive hitter. Through his first three seasons in MLB, Chourio has jumped back and forth over that line. From manager Pat Murphy's perspective, it's a feeling of trying to do too much that leads Chourio to fall on the dangerously aggressive side. Said Murphy on what Chourio's approach is when he's going right, "Not thinking…see it and hit it. Understand my volume doesn’t have to be at 8 or 9 it can hover at 5.”

Murphy, talking from Chourio's point of view, continued by saying, "And if it’s late in the count, same thing, I can handle any pitch. I don’t have to expand the zone to hit it. I can just hit right from my spot and handle any pitch. But we get amped up and we want to get results and we want to attack? What happens? You end up swinging at a ball.”

Murphy consistently talks about the detriment of hitters "trying to do too much" at the plate, rather than taking what the pitcher gives them and adjusting accordingly. In other words, when a batter goes to the plate thinking "I'm going to pull this ball in the air," that mentality is almost bound to yield a poor result if the pitcher stays on the outer-half of the plate. Instead, a hitter must be ready to damage if they get a pitch in their wheelhouse, while having the discipline not to force something if they aren't given that pitch.

This approach is what is often referred to as selective aggression. It involves identifying a part of the strike zone where you are prepared to do damage. If a pitcher gives the hitter a pitch in that zone, they must get their "A-swing" off, while also having the patience to lay off pitches that aren't in the zone or go the other way if there are two strikes.

As Murphy alludes to, Chourio is at his best when he's being selectively aggressive, not forcing outcomes he can't control. It's when Chourio starts expanding his zone and chasing pitches off the plate that his results start to slip. The last two months have been a clear example of this dichotomy.

Jackson Chourio is at his best when he's following a selectively aggressive approach at the plate

Chourio had a rather disappointing month of July by his standards. He slashed just .229/.283/.305 with just one homer in 105 at-bats. However, since the calendar flipped to August, Chourio is slashing .298/.363/.504 with eight homers in 141 at-bats. That's an increase in OPS of .297 in the matter of a month.

The numbers under the hood reveal how Chourio's approach at the plate changed between those two time frames. In July, Chourio had a swing rate of 48.2%, a chase rate of 37.9%, and an in-zone swing rate of 59.6%. Since the start of August, Chourio's swing rate has stayed relatively the same, but his chase rate has decreased to 32.7% while his in-zone swing rate jumped up to 65.6%. He's been more aggressive in the strike zone while laying off pitches that are off the plate -- he's been selectively aggressive.

As a result, Chourio's hard-hit rate has jumped from 37.2% in July to 44.4% since August 1, his barrel rate has jumped from 7.7% to 12.0%, and his average exit velocity has improved from 89.5 mph to 92.1 mph. By being more selective in the pitches he chooses to unleash his "A-swing" on, Chourio has begun impacting the baseball more than he was when he was chasing too many pitches off the plate.

Chourio described his approach at the plate when he's at his best by saying, through team translator Daniel de Mondesert, "I think I’m in a good spot whenever I’m a little bit more patient at the plate. Getting better pitches to hit. Usually that kind of leads to being able to create damage on those pitches."

The Brewers' 22-year-old phenom knows what it takes to find sustained success at the plate, but it's obviously far easier said than done, especially because success often leads to more confidence, and more confidence can cause a player to be more aggressive at the plate. Maintaining that selectively aggressive approach is the key to Chourio's success, but whether he can sustain it over the course of a season is the lingering question.

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