Smoak and Mirrors: a Look at Splits
Now that I’ve attracted your attention by using an obvious pun that we’ll be seeing frequently over the next five and a half years or more, let’s get down to business.
One of the rationales coming mostly out of Texas as to why this trade might not end up as bad for the Rangers as it presently seems is that Smoak is not the player we believe him to be. He’s overrated, in large part because he’s a future platoon guy. Sure, his billing has been nice and all, but years down the road, the joak joke is on us because he’s just not that good from the right side.
This argument is not without merit. The author of the article I cite brings up a number of his college splits as evidence in support of his point that Smoak is a very different hitter from the right side. History is also behind him. Just as it’s easy to bet against most minor leaguers to make any kind of contribution at the major league level, it’s also a pretty sure claim to say that a switch-hitter will eventually choose one side or the other. Very few players seem to be able to maintain consistent performances from both sides of the plate.
So let’s have a look at those career minor league splits, shall we?
vs. LHP: 130 AB, 28 H, 6 2B, 3 HR, 25/15 K/BB, .215/.304/.331
vs. RHP: 311 AB, 101 H, 18 2B, 3B, 12 HR, 65/65 K/BB, .325/.443/.505
It seems like they might be on to something, right? Here are two reasons not to jump the gun just yet.
If you’ve followed my work here for a while, you’re probably familiar with my stance that 130 at-bats is not really an adequate sampling of anything. In Smoak’s case, I’d argue that these 130 at-bats might be even less representative than they normally might be. There are six hitters that were drafted in the first round of ’08 that have already spent some time in the big leagues: Pedro Alvarez (2) of the Pirates, Buster Posey (5) of the Giants, Gordon Beckham (8) of the White Sox, Jason Castro (10) of the Astros (hehe), our man Smoak (11), and Ike Davis (18) of the Mets. Of this group, not only is Smoak the lone switch-hitter, he’s also spent the second least amount of time in the minor leagues with 599 plate appearances, behind Beckham, who comes in with 259 appearances. Alvarez (820), Posey (750), Castro (917), and Davis (769) all spent much more time in the minor leagues honing their craft.
Additionally, you can look at where they played. Smoak got fourteen games in with Clinton in the Midwest League the year he was drafted, and a rehab appearance in the rookie leagues aside (he had a ribcage injury last year, another important note), it was double and triple-A from then out. The number two pick of the same draft, Alvarez, spent half a season in advanced-A before he hit the high minors. Posey was at San Jose for two-thirds of a season before moving up to Fresno. Castro had thirty-nine games in a short-season league in ’08 before he too spent half a season in the Cal League on his way to double-A. Davis spent twenty more games in the short-season league in ’08, but otherwise his development plan was no different.
What I’m getting at here is that Smoak, relative to his peers from the same draft, not only had to deal with switch-hitting, he was also rushed. You can give him a little credit for coming out a good college program, but pitchers at double and triple-A are going to look nothing like what he’s accustomed to seeing in the NCAA. Those are minor league veterans out there, and they know how to exploit less experienced hitters. They wouldn’t be at the level otherwise. Combined with his acknowledged weakness from the right side, this created an environment where Smoak was almost certainly going to fail.
The second part is partially conceptual work. Let’s look at those numbers again.
vs. LHP: 130 AB, 28 H, 6 2B, 3 HR, 25/15 K/BB, .215/.304/.331
vs. RHP: 311 AB, 101 H, 18 2B, 3B, 12 HR, 65/65 K/BB, .325/.443/.505
There’s one important detail I’ve omitted from these lines so far, and that’s batting average on balls in play. Against left-handers, it was a paltry .245, where against right-handers, it was .380. There are a number of factors that could have contributed to this. One would be to take the “weaker from the right side” to its most literal level for comedy’s sake and suggest he’s simply not strong enough to get the ball out against left-handers, but given that this theory doesn’t pass the eye test and Smoak hit a 365 ft home run against the Astros in June 18th and a 400 ft shot against the Athletics on May 3rd, both from the right side, we might be able to put that one to a quick rest.
So what else is there? His groundball rates from both sides are roughly 45%, the five percent shift from line drives to fly balls against left-handers wouldn’t account for it, particularly when his line drive rate was close to 20% anyway, so what is it? Well, remember what I said about those crafty southpaws at higher levels? Twenty percent of his flyballs last year never left the infield, compared to about six percent against right-handers. Lefties were giving him a steady diet of jam pitches and let Smoak get himself into trouble.
That might be one thing to watch out for in Smoak’s continued development at the major league level. His ability to fend such pitches off, or at least lay off them, might end up making a considerable difference in what we can expect out of his career. But while we can acknowledge that he may never be the same hitter from the right side, suggesting that he should be a platoon player, based off a year and a half of experience at baseball’s highest levels, is foolishness.
Comments
45 Responses to “Smoak and Mirrors: a Look at Splits”
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
As usual, good work, Jay.
And I really, really think that it can’t be underemphasized that this RIGHT NOW is essentially his 2nd year in pro ball, not just the major leagues. Smoak is a work in progress and we’ll say a lot of growing pains this AND next year.
On the other hand, eight HRs this year is nothing to sneeze at for this club….
Jay,
Nice job as usual. Question though, with the season pretty much in the gutter, is it perhaps better to let him refine his craft at AAA or let him experience these growing pains against MLB pitching?
Yesterday, after the deal went public, Jeff Sullivan at Lookout Landing pointed out that one of the Seattle P-I guys tweeted that Wakamatsu said Smoak would be that Mariners first baseman going forward. I think that Smoak could have benefited from a slower development scheme, but there’s really not that much room for him in Tacoma and Kotchman, recent hot streak aside, is expendable. While I worry sometimes that picking up a skill at the major league level is more difficult because of the pressure, the only race we’re in right now is the race for draft picks, so I don’t mind in this case.
Is there ever a situation where it makes sense for a struggling switch hitter to try and hit exclusively from one side of the plate? I understand that we do not have nearly enough information to tell whether or not Smoak can cut the mustard as a righty, but hypothetically, if he does turn out to be a lousy hitter against lefties, would it be worthwhile to bat him left handed against all types of pitchers?
Jay, I have to say I love your articles. As someone who thinks of himself as a hardcore baseball fan, I’ve not taken a whole ton of time to really understand the sabermetrics portion yet and your articles really help to paint a great picture.
I have to say, I love this trade because basically we got two first rounders that already have been succesful and a few other guys as well. I agree that right now his splits may be bad but I’m curious, as to how many players have had a bad split at the beginning of their careers even if they weren’t a switch hitter. Plus I’d love to see how many of these AB’s were against lefty specialist relievers cause even though he’s a switch hitter, why wouldn’t you treat him like a lefty and send in a tough left hander against him? I’d imagine that’d be a touh go for any rookie
Regardless of the splits, I’ll take any 23 year old switch hitter that is “major league ready”.
Cannot wait to see what he does the rest of the year!
Branyan was judged to be purely a platoon guy early in his career and then had no opportunity to prove otherwise until the M’s gave him the opportunity last season (despite playing in the bigs since 1998 he had not accumulated enough PA vs LHP prior to 2009 to have a reliable sample). There’s a real danger to prematurely deciding a guy is a platoon hitter.
I think it was Joser who reminded us all of Branyan being labled a platoon player his entire career. That was until the M’s let him see LHP on a consistent basis, and he didn’t crumble, he produced. Smoak only sees LHP about 1/3 of the time, he is young and has plate discipline which will only help him. I’ll wait until he has 400-600PA against LHP before my apprehension begins to bubble.
I worry that Smoak needed more time in the minors, it may of been a good idea just to give him a few more months in AAA rather than brining him in as our new starting 1B.
Whst is the situation with Smoak’s ML service time clock? Was he brought up late enough this year to give us 6 more years or do we have 5 after this one?
Definitely not. He was up in late April, so not only is he going to be around for five more years at this rate, he’s going to qualify for Super Two status and get his arbitration payday early if he isn’t locked up before that happens.
So what happens with Milton/Saunders/Branyan? Will one be traded or will Saunders be sent down to AAA? Maybe Lopez+Branyan package?
6 years. He won’t qualify for one year of service this season, so we’ll have him for 6 full years starting in 2011. He will almost certainly qualify for Super Two status in 2013. That’s all assuming he never gets optioned back to the minors.
I would have thought that being called up in late April might have gotten him that year of service time, but apparently not.
So, is it too early to try and quantify the difference between Montero and Smoak?
Due to the fact that:
1) Smoak has higher defensive value.
2) His ability to bat LH means he won’t be Beltre’d by LF in Safeco.
3) Montero has the higher offensive ceiling
Adjusted for Safeco, how much better of a hitter would Montero have to be than Smoak for us to look back and wonder if we should have gone with Montero?
Far too many unknowns at this point, especially since it’s unclear what position Montero will ultimately stick at in the majors.
Thanks Jay,
Perhaps stepping in as the starter at 1b for the M’s will be a little easier than having to produce in a pennant race with Texas. It will give him a chance to adjust without the pressure of winning the division.
I liked Montero as a prospect also, but something scared me about him. I think he will be a good player, but I like the fact that Smoak possibly can switch hit and that he can play defensively. Even if it takes him two years to catch up and really start producing. Even then, if that happens maybe the Mariners can lock him up for a very very team friendly contract ex: Evan Longoria. 🙂
Honestly, Montero has enough power that SafeCo wouldn’t do much to him.
@Typical Idiot Fan
I would have to disagree. Unless every hit Montero delivers leaves the yard, there will be balls hit to the warning track. Those would leave the yard elsewhere. Sure, if he has enough power, he won’t have to do what Beltre said he did (try too hard to hit it farther), but I’d imagine there would still be a substantial difference.
A player has to be on a Major League Roster for at least 172 days to qualify as one year of service time. The season is generally around 180 days, so if you haven’t played in the Majors before and miss more than about 8 days, you won’t qualify. He played for OK RedHawks until April 22nd, so the earliest he could have been on the Rangers roster would have been the 23rd. The Rangers played their first game April 5th, so at the minimum he missed 18 days, putting him somewhere around 162, or around 10 days shy of accruing one year of service time, if he plays out the season with the M’s.
Great work, Jay. I personally think the ones who poo-poo Smoak right now also had Texan roots and said the same thing about Adrian Gonzalez.
No one ever wants to look like they over-paid on a deal.
Regarding Smoak and his clock, I think he’s around for SIX years more, not five. He was called up April 22 (deliberately so, I might add) and will accrue 167 days of service time for this year.
He needs 172 to make it a full year. I may be wrong on this, as I’m no expert on MLB’s time of service rules. But I also believe your Super 2 point to be spot on.
But if I’ve done the math correctly, Smoak’s player rights stay with the Mariners until the end of 2016.
Dadburn it. Sorry for the redundancy, Jay. Nice job, nathaniel. I think you covered it even better.
You also type faster than I do!
Re: Montero.
As the old joke goes, Montero has enough raw power to hit it out of any park. Including Yellowstone.
I’m really skeptical that Safeco would hamper him at all- when he hits them, what would be a deep fly out or a warning-track shot for a guy with average power becomes a home run parked into the dugout for him.
Sounds like a good comp would be a young Chipper Jones, who struggled from the right side early in his career. I haven’t researched it, but he seems to have panned out pretty nicely… 🙂
The idea that Smoak will be around a whole six years after this one makes me like the deal that much more.
Good job Nathaniel/Son of Z … very good input. I love that front office rules “shit”. I had no idea the cutoff point was 172 days. Excellent information to have. I wish I had access to all the rules, but I am gathering them along the way and keeping them in the mental rolodex. If there was a book – I would buy it. If there is a website to access … and you know of its whereabouts – please advise.
I think the fact that we are going to have Smoak (as well as the 3 other guys)- for 6+ years is the salient point … in comparison to the 2.5 months of time remaining on Lee’s rental car contract. It was a good trade. Smoak is the type of player/prospect the M’s wish they could have drafted. Now they have him – so good for us. One down – and a few more to go. Good, young, projectable talent (Smoak, Ackley, Guti, Saunders, Pineda, Felix, Moore?, x, y, z) along with solid, stable, productive veterans – and we should have a good team to watch.
If the team can resolve the other issues that drive fans crazy (baserunning blunders, hitting with runners on base, over reliance on FB’s, questionable decision making) … there will be a lot of things to like.
Clearly can’t hit lefties.
Crushes righties.
This one left the bat at 111 mph
It’s impossible for me to be disappointed this kid plays for the Mariners.
@Philosofool
Thank you for that 111 mph link. It sure warmed the cockels of my heard.
Smoak has a great power swing and he is “on balance” when he finishes. Compare his body balance/position with that of the infamous Casey Kotchman falling back (literally) on his heels after most swings – and you can just see the difference.
That link you provided should be required viewing for all USSM viewers.
Hey, super-bad/computer illiterate question time: How do I “refresh” the screen to be able to see comments as they come through from others in real time? I am constantly hitting the back arrow – and I know that cannot be the right way. If I submit this comment, walk away for a half hour and come back … my comment will be the last one visible (to me) unless I go through the back arrow routine. Is there a better way? I’m old … pardon my ignorance. Thank you.
Good question. I don’t have the answer. You only tend to see guys do it if they are really, really, really struggling from one side of the plate. At Smoak’s age – should they consider a permanent change? Jay, what say you …
Those are good clips which demonstrate that Smoak is an excellent bad-ball hitter. Smoak has a pretty swing; but he’s no John Olerud.
This is a good trade for the Mariners and the Rangers, too. We get two guys who may really contribute big time (and two who won’t).
It’s not a bad trade for either team. We get more for Lee than we would have if he had walked at end of season
BUT…
What makes this not a bad trade for the Rangers is that their farm system is loaded. The guy they brought up to play first is as good as the guy they gave us. The top minor league pitcher they gave us is just one of about 4 excellent pitchers in their system.
Anyone else find it ironic that Lee is facing Chris Tillman(ex-M as part of Bedard trade)tonight in Texas?
I will be heading out to watch Felix try to tame the Yanks tonight.
if you’re using Mozilla’s browser, there should be an arrow up by the ‘Back’ arrow that’s in a circular form. If you hit that, the page refreshes. Another option is to right click somewhere on the page and ‘Reload’. Can’t remember what the refresh button looks like on Explorer, but there’s one on that browser. All those controls are up there together on the navigation bar. Keep clicking things until you get what you want!
I gotta say, while I did note Smoak’s power – that video once again made me feel sorry for the A’s. Did you notice how empty the stadium was?
@ Juneau:
Thank you!
According to my wife – I need to find the “two green arrow thingy and I will be in business.
Also, just saw on the M’s website that Luke French has been sent back to AAA in order to make room for Smoak.
This makes sense – they can probably make it through the next two games without needing 7 relief pitchers.
What are they going to do – come next Wednesday. It’s got to be a DFA for Kotchman and/or Sweeney and a callup of a Mike Wilson … doesn’t it?
Hey – we just spotted the double green arrow clicky thingy’s.
msfanmike: F5 usually works too.
Why does everyone like Smoak so much? Seems like we need more data. I have a hard time seeing how he’s better than Montero, even if Montero doesn’t have a position. Mostly due to their age though.
Still it is nice not to wonder who’s on first.
Lee is already down 1-0 to the Orioles. Have fun pitching in that dreadful Texas weather Cliff, we’ll be missing you here in Seattle.
Hmmmm…the two green arrow thingie should be the Back and Foward buttons, which isn’t what you want. But try everything until it works!
dchappelle, there’s been about 10,000 words written on this blog since the trade explaining why everyone like Smoak so much. And if Dave wasn’t traveling, there’d probably be another 10K!
Yes, I tried that a couple weeks ago – with no success. The reason I had no success (and I just figured this out) is because the F-Lock was not engaged. It was dis-engaged. Until a few minutes ago, I didn’t know there was an “F” lock … but it seems to be appropriately named.
I just learned what a blog was 2 years ago – in all ignorant honesty.
In the last 5 minutes I have doubled my mastery of all things modern tech/computer related. I am not as “old” as I am probably making myself sound, but old enough to have missed the tatto generation (thankfully) and too young to have seen Hank Aaron play and appreciate it. I was 10 when he broke Ruths’ record.
Thanks for the extra assist though.
Lee will be fine in Texas, he is use to the Texas heat, Benton, AR gets pretty damn hot during the summer and is just as humid.
You have to take it on a case-by-case basis. Gabriel Noriega, one of Clinton’s infielders, gave up switch-hitting this season and he’s not going to turn twenty for another couple of months. I think Mike Wilson also gave it up around the time he was twenty-one.
I wouldn’t really consider it for Smoak right now for the reasons I’ve outlined, but being as high up as he is, as early as he is, his performances will come under closer scrutiny.
Sorry I know we like Smoak, it’s the “so much” I’m unsure about. 500 minor league ABs at .291/.411/.461 (even ignoring the 235 major league ABs). Assume he matches his minor league numbers and we’re looking at… Billy Butler?!
But really the problem I’m having is that we have 500 good but not great minor league ABs and 235 poor (but with a guaranteed to improve BABIP) major league ABs. This just doesn’t seem like the kind of data we should be dancing in the streets about.
Anyone realize that Tillman is outpitching Lee in Arlington? Gotta love it. Thanks Bill.
No, but one of the main premises of this piece was that he was rushed. A lesser premise, which I didn’t feel I could develop into much more than it already was, is that he had an injury (ribcage) at the same time which could have easily hampered his offensive progress.
I don’t want to knock the Rangers or suggest that their player development program isn’t good, but there’s a chance we bought low here.
Need to keep in mind that JS is a “natural right” hander. His dad taught him from an early age and his dad was rh, so JS didn’t start hitting LH until I believe little league. Even though he throws left, writes left, he still golfs right handed. Bottom line we should not be overly concerned with his RH splits.
Take time to say if hes any good or not say probaly 2-3 years hes just adjusting. I prefer him over Montero anyways Montero is a righty and probaly would hinder him just like it did to Beltre because Beltre is killing the ball in Boston.
Like Brendan I often wonder why there are switch hitters who are so much better from one side than the other. Just because you can bat .240 from the left hand side doesn’t mean that you should.