Yankees Cody Bellinger sticking with the process despite struggles

Join Post Sports+ for exciting subscriber-only features, including real-time texting with Greg Joyce about the inside buzz on the Yankees.CLEVELAND — When Cody Bellinger was piling up the hits across the Grapefruit League this spring, Aaron Boone joked that he should pace himself for the regular season.Of course, it is not that simple, but almost a month into the season, Bellinger is still trying to settle into a groove at the plate.“Obviously I want to be better,” Bellinger said during the Yankees series at Progressive Field before finishing Wednesday batting .177 with a .527 OPS through 22 games.“I come to the park every day to make sure that I’m ready to roll and I expect really good things to happen.

So I’d like to do more, but overall, I think I just got to keep on sticking with the process and keep swinging at my pitches.”Bellinger went 1-for-4 with a walk in Wednesday’s 5-1 win, hitting a left-on-left single up the middle in which he reached out to poke an 0-2 changeup on the outside edge.It is that strong bat-to-ball skill that Aaron Boone sees as something of a blessing and curse for Bellinger, who is hitting the ball a tick harder (90.8 mph) than he has the rest of his career (89.4), but is striking out more (25 percent rate compared to 21.2 for his career).“Just missing some pitches that he needs to make hay on,” Boone said Wednesday morning.“Probably expanding a little bit in some situations.

Because he’s such a good bat-to-ball [hitter], that feeling like, ‘I can get to everything.’ Probably some pitches he’s put in play that you’re better off laying off.But just missing some fastballs where I feel like he’s, ‘Ooh.’ … Just finding that groove, and he will.”Bellinger, who fouled a ball off his right calf Wednesday and was still favoring it postgame, indicated that it can be a balancing act of knowing when to try to drive the ball versus taking what a pitcher gives him and finding a hole.

He said it is mor...