The solution to Riley Greene's strikeout problems for Tigers might be a smaller ego

Riley Greene has been hitting well in Tigers spring training, but that was never really in question. There might be a couple of guys fighting for their lives, but Grapefruit League play has been nothing more than a tune-up for most of Detroit's offense.

The question hasn't been who can break out and have an improbably good camp; it's been who can make the most improvements on the margins. Tigers hitting broke down at the worst possible time last season, and it didn't take a Savant-obsessed stats nerd to figure out why.

The Tigers were swinging and missing. A lot.

Greene was the worst perpetrator, and not only in the second half. His 201 strikeouts on the year led the American League. He tried to dismiss them — "nobody cares about how much I'm striking out if I'm hitting home runs" — but that was swiftly shut down by Scott Harris, who identified in Detroit's postmortem presser that swing-and-miss was offense's greatest defect.

He didn't make a single new addition to that offense in the offseason, so he would trust that his guys would be able to figure it out.

And Greene's tune on his K rate has changed. He told Evan Petzold of the Detroit Free Press, "Your body takes over, and you want to hit that big homer instead of choking up and getting a base hit here to score a run. I'm well aware of that now. I had a lot of conversations about the situations and the moments and slowing the game down – and not letting the game speed up on you."

Speaking with his personal hitting coach, Greene identified that the problem was at least somewhat a mental one: "I [felt like I could] hit everything for a home run."

Riley Greene admits he overestimated himself after posting career-high strikeout rate with Tigers in 2025

Obviously, he couldn't. It was clear that Greene was trying to power everything past the outfield fence last year. He would swing out of his shoes at breaking pitches well below the zone. It was undisciplined, and it clearly reverberated throughout the Tigers' clubhouse.

Sometimes, he was right. He was Detroit's leader in homers last year (36) and is already garnering early hype to hit not just 40 but 50 in 2026. The power is there — no one has ever questioned that — but if he can balance it out just a little bit more with a more discerning eye, he has a better shot at entering elusive superstar territory.

Through 15 spring training games, Greene has 10 strikeouts in 39 at-bats. It's far better than last year, when he had 19 strikeouts in 48 at-bats, but a 25.6% K rate is still below average. He's not really walking much to make up for it, either, with three walks so far to last year's six.

Patience isn't going to be learned overnight. We should still expect to see Greene whiffing at pitches he shouldn't. But it's a good sign that, instead of dismissing all of that flailing for the 0.05% chance he hits a home run in any given at-bat, he's owning up to the struggles and is set on improving.