RISP Hitting
So, recently, Eric Wedge has made news by talking about how Ichiro isn’t producing enough out of the three hole, despite the fact that he’s been one of the team’s best hitters to date. In order to keep this narrative going in the face of factual evidence to the contrary, people have started to point out Ichiro’s batting line with runners in scoring position, because of course we should be making judgments about a guy based on 39 plate appearances.
Anyway, it’s true that Ichiro hasn’t been great with RISP this year. Here’s how his situational splits break down:
Bases Empty: .298/.330/.393, .318 wOBA
Men On Base: .281/.338/.391, .314 wOBA
RISP: .206/.282/.324, .257 wOBA
Now, here are Ichiro’s career situational split numbers:
Bases Empty: .326/.356/.427, .344 wOBA
Men On Base: .316/.392/.396, .330 wOBA
RISP: .317/.424/394, .331 wOBA
You can look at 39 plate appearances and decide that Ichiro can’t hit with men in scoring position, or you can look at 1,500 plate appearances and realize that he can. It’s really up to you, but what kind of conclusion you draw says a lot about your understanding of how the game actually works. People extrapolating from Ichiro’s 2012 RISP numbers either don’t have a grasp of how to actually use numbers or they’re pushing a predetermined agenda and won’t let facts get in their way. In some cases, both statements might be true.
But, hey, if you insist that 2012 situational data is meaningful, here’s some other names of guys who aren’t fit to hit in the middle of a batting order based on their RISP data to date:
Jose Bautista: .203 wOBA
Justin Upton: .209 wOBA
B.J. Upton: .215 wOBA
Jesus Montero: .229 wOBA
Troy Tulowitzki: .234 wOBA
Travis Hafner: .235 wOBA
Justin Morneau: .259 wOBA
Robinson Cano: .261 wOBA
Media members – you don’t have to believe whatever Eric Wedge tells you. He’s wrong an awful lot. Think for yourself, look up the facts, and don’t just repeat his ramblings.
Another Fun Fact
Three teams decided to spend big money in free agency this winter, showing their “dedication to winning”, their “commitment to their fans”, and their “willingness to do what it takes”. These teams showed that those fools who care about budgets and contracts are just pawns who don’t understand what baseball is really all about. Those teams are the real winners in baseball.
Except, you know, on the field, where those teams – the Angels, Tigers, and Marlins – have combined for a 50-56 record on the season, a .472 winning percentage.
It might come as a shock to some people, but lavish free agent spending really isn’t a magic formula for success. Who knew?
Game 37, Mariners at Red Sox
Vargas vs Lester, 4:05 pm.
It’s raining in Boston, as it is in much of the country today, so this game may or may not happen.
As for Jason Vargas, he gets a good test tonight against a pretty good line-up and a left field fence that is not that far from the plate. I like Vargas as a solid back-end starter, but don’t get too carried away with his early season numbers. Despite the increase in strikeouts, his contact rate is actually up over last year, and his strike percentage is down slightly, so odds are pretty good that the increase in strikeouts is just random variation and he’ll get back to something closer to his usual strikeout rate as the season goes on. As usual, he’s displaying some pretty significant home/road splits, as Safeco is the perfect spot for his skillset, but Fenway is a bit less suited to lefty fly ball guys, so this isn’t a great match-up for him. If the weather affects his command at all, this could go poorly.
In terms of the line-up, Smoak’s back up to the 5th spot in the order thanks to his offensive exploits in New York. Let’s hope he keeps showing signs of life. Ackley’s DH’ing again with Seager sliding over to second base and Liddi playing third, but don’t read too much into this, as the team is in the midst of a stretch of 20 straight games played, so you’ll likely see all the regulars get a turn through the DH spot over the next couple of weeks.
Ackley, DH
Wells, LF
Ichiro, RF
Montero, C
Smoak, 1B
Seager, 2B
Liddi, 3B
Saunders, CF
Ryan, SS
Minor League Wrap (5/7-13/12)
Baseball America’s first mock draft of the year has us taking C Mike Zunino because Buxton somehow goes second to the Twins. Discuss this entirely too much.
In this week, we have a walk-off grand slam, mention of a 27-game safely reached streak, possible breakouts from prospects that people have pinned a lot (too much?) of hopes on, the vagaries of splits, competent pitching in Tacoma (!!), a team going 2-4 while remaining in first place, and baseball baseball baseball baseball baseball.
To the jump!
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Game 36, Mariners at Yankees
Pettite vs. Millwood, 10 am
It would feel weird to me if I was looking at this and didn’t put a lineup up even if I don’t expect much posting traffic. In short, Pettite was out of baseball for a while, and then he came back fairly recently. The Mariners are sending their left-hander lineup to hit against him and haven’t had good results through three. No one has had a hit! Shouldn’t they have a scouting report on this guy? Unbelievable! But Millwood didn’t allow anything until the bottom of the third either so…. something. I don’t know. I anticipate silly home runs later.
2B Ackley
LF Wells
RF Ichiro!
C Montero
1B Smoak
3B Liddi
DH Carp
CF Saunders
SS Ryan
Happy Mother’s Day to all the moms out there.
Game 35, Mariners at Yankees
Noesi vs Hughes, 1:05 pm.
After his awful performance at the plate yesterday, you had to assume Brendan Ryan was going to be on the bench today. His bases loaded strikeout against Hiroki Kuroda was a disaster, not just because of the result but because of the pitches he decided to swing at. The final two swinging strikes were so far outside they probably would have hit a left-handed batter. Had he just gone up there with the bat on his shoulder, he very well might have drawn a walk. It was the kind of at-bat that gets you benched.
Of course, you could put together a pretty strong case that Ryan should have never been put in the #2 spot in the line-up to begin with, but I’d imagine those days are behind us, and we can probably just move on without complaining about another Eric Wedge decision that backfired. In fact, Wedge might just be running out his best line-up of the season today, as he’s gotten over his too-many-lefties-bunched-together phobia and promoted John Jaso to fill the #2 spot in the order. Given the current roster, this might be the exact line-up I’d run out there against a righty, minus swapping Ryan back in at short for Kawasaki. Let’s see more of this 1-8 line-up, please.
Ackley, 2B
Jaso, C
Ichiro, RF
Montero, DH
Seager, 3B
Carp, LF
Smoak, 1B
Saunders, CF
Kawasaki, SS
Game 34, Mariners at Yankees
King Felix vs. Hiroki Kuroda, 4:05 pm
The M’s open a three game set in the Bronx, where Felix has has dominated in the recent past. Blake Beavan threw warm-ups, and appears healthy, but he’s still been pushed back a bit and Kevin Millwood will move up to get the start on Sunday.
Today’s line-up is probably one of the better ones you’ll see against a right-handed starter like Kuroda:
1: Ackley (2B)
2: Ryan (SS)
3: Ichiro (RF)
4: Montero (C)
5: Seager (3B
6: Jaso (DH)
7: Smoak (1B)
8: Carp (LF)
9: Saunders (CF)
SP: Felix!
Justin Smoak’s still in the line-up, and the M’s have said they don’t want him in AAA as he’s got nothing left to prove there (career AAA OPS: .794. Career AAA SLG%: .414). That’s their choice, but they absolutely need to see what he’s doing against lefties. He’s now got one extra-base hit against a lefty since the all-star break in 2011, a solitary double off of Jerry Blevins. I agree that his 2012 batting stats are small sample, but his problems predate 2012.
Just to reiterate Dave’s point about Stephen Pryor: since hitting AA, Pryor has pitched 41 2/3 IP, given up 17 hits, walked 13 and fanned 56. That’s not bad.
Andrew Carraway was promoted from AA Jackson to AAA Tacoma and he’s getting the start tonight at Cheney Stadium at 7. Definitely not as heralded as his old AA rotation-mates, but he’s a good pitcher and might bring some stability to what’s been a ghastly pitching staff for the Rainiers.
Go M’s!
The M’s Should Sell Brandon League Soon
The Mariners are going to be sellers this year – that’s been obvious since day one. They’re rebuilding around young players, and they aren’t legitimate contenders, so guys who aren’t going to be part of the long term future here probably won’t spend the whole year in Seattle. The team has two obvious trading chips that other teams would likely be willing to give up something of value to obtain – Brandon League and Jason Vargas.
Vargas is pitching well and likely has helped his stock a little bit with his strong early performances, but at the same time, the Mariners aren’t really in a position where they should be looking to punt one of their two quality starting pitchers. Besides Felix, Vargas is the only guy in the rotation that isn’t a significant risk for a disaster start, and the team doesn’t have anyone who could step in and take his place without making the team significantly worse. Holding onto Vargas for another month or two in order to give Hultzen and Paxton more time to get their command in order is probably in everyone’s best interests, and another 5-10 strong starts could continue to help contenders see Vargas as a legitimate quality starter for the stretch run.
However, with Brandon League, the situation is quite a bit different. While his 2.25 ERA and 8 saves have retained his shiny Proven Closer label, he isn’t throwing the ball all that well right now. His trademark two-seam fastball last year averaged 96.4 MPH, and he regularly topped out between 96-98 with it. This year, his sinker is averaging 95.1 MPH, and he’s rarely cracking 96. As Felix is currently demonstrating, velocity isn’t everything, but League doesn’t have Felix’s off-speed stuff. He needs his fastball to help him get ahead of hitters so he can put them away with a splitter in the dirt, and he relies on the power sinker in order to generate a lot of ground balls.
Right now, League’s fastball isn’t helping him do either of those things. His GB% stands at just 46.8%, well below last year’s 57.1% mark and even further from his career 60.7% ground ball rate. He’s not trading grounders for swinging strikes, either, as opposing batters are making contact 83.2 percent of the time they swing, well above his 77.6 percent career rate. He hasn’t posted a contact rate this high since 2008 – the year he spent half the season in Triple-A and only threw 33 innings in the big leagues.
It’s still early, and we’re only dealing with 231 pitches, so all of this could just be a short blip that requires a small adjustment and League could get right back on track. However, League hasn’t had the kind of high profile meltdown that can come with these kinds of struggles and quickly erase a pitcher’s reputation for being a shutdown ninth inning guy. Within the first month of the season, we’ve already seen Heath Bell, Carlos Marmol, and Javy Guerra demoted from the closer’s role, and a bunch of other teams are hunting for bullpen reinforcements because of the struggles of their own ninth inning guys. The line between being a Proven Closer and a heart-attack-waiting-to-happen is smaller than people are willing to admit. It wouldn’t take much for League to move from one category to the other, and with the way he’s throwing right now, it’s more likely than the Mariners should be comfortable with.
There’s a market for relief pitchers right now. Very few are for sale, and pretty much every contending club in baseball is shopping for bullpen help. The Padres just flipped Ernesto Frieri – an extreme flyball setup man who had made his living in the best pitcher’s park on the planet – for a couple of interesting pieces, and he’s not seen as an elite caliber reliever. If the Mariners made League available right now, they’d have significant leverage, and could probably garner a pretty solid return even without waiting until the July trading frenzy.
The other part of this coin is that, for the Mariners, League is easily expendable. Tom Wilhelmsen has been terrific in the 8th inning role, and he has both closer stuff and a legitimate future in this organization. Meanwhile, Steve Delbar has been a surprising revelation as a power setup man, running up a 20/3 K/BB ratio in 16 inning so far this season. Likewise, Shawn Kelley has looked strong since giving up the HR to Yoenis Cespedes in Japan, and his fastball is back in the 92-94 range, a good sign for his ability to handle the seventh or eighth inning if needed.
And, down on the farm, the Mariners have several power bullpen arms knocking on the door. Earlier in the week, they promoted Stephen Pryor from Jackson to Tacoma after he ran a 24/5 K/BB ratio in Double-A, and he’s whiffed five of the first 11 batters he’s faced in Triple-A since being challenged with better competition. Pryor’s fastball has been clocked in the 99-100 MPH range multiple times, and like Delebar and Wilhelmsen, his power fastball sets up hitters and he can put them away with a strong breaking ball. Pryor could easily step into the 6th-7th inning role while he gets his feet wet in the majors, and his stuff should allow him to transition to the big leagues with ease. Back in Jackson, 2011 third round pick Carter Capps is still blowing hitters away as well, and he could easily spend the second half of the year in Seattle.
Put simply, the Mariners don’t need Brandon League. Their bullpen will be just fine without him, and he’s a piece that they could extract a real return for, especially when other teams are shopping for bullpen help and few teams are selling. With League throwing in a way that suggests that he might not be able to keep getting easy saves against better opponents, it makes sense to move League sooner than later rather than risking a meltdown that could put his Proven Closer label at risk.
If I’m Jack Z, I’m making Brandon League available right now, and telling prospective bidders that I’m going to be aggressive in making a deal, so they should bring an offer that allows a deal to be completed in the next 3-5 days. The Mariners should strike while the iron is hot. The time to move League is now.
Fun Fact of the Day
Opposing batters when John Jaso is catching for the Mariners: .191/.263/.326
Opposing batters when Jesus Montero is catching for the Mariners: .220/.293/.348
Opposing batters when Miguel Olivo is catching for the Mariners: .248/.307/.409
Percentage of total PAs caught by John Jaso when Felix Hernandez was pitching: 0.0%
Percentage of total PAs caught by Jesus Montero when Felix Hernandez was pitching: 10.3%
Percentage of total PAs caught by Miguel Olivo when Felix Hernandez was pitching: 21.4%
Remember all those comments you heard about how the pitching staff was going to really miss Miguel Olivo’s veteran leadership and game calling skills? Notice how you’re not hearing any of those comments right now?
In reality, none of those numbers prove anything. It’s all just small sample and biased selection data that has no real predictive value. There are way too many problems with looking at split-by-catcher data for it to have much value even over large samples, and over a a few weeks, these numbers are entirely worthless. Don’t use the numbers above to claim that Jaso or Montero are better game-callers than Olivo.
However, the reality continues to be that there is absolutely no evidence that the team’s pitching has suffered in any way from Olivo’s absence. Despite all the talk about his presence behind the plate and how guys like Montero and Jaso couldn’t be trusted to handle a staff, the pitchers have performed just as well without Olivo in the mix over the last 10 games. Even though the gap in handling a staff between Olivo and Montero/Jaso was supposedly so large that Montero couldn’t be trusted to catch more than once per week and Jaso could never be trusted to don the gear, removing Olivo from the catching position hasn’t had any adverse effects on the team’s run prevention.
Proving something doesn’t exist is extremely hard, and I’m not one who believes that there’s no variation between catchers in their ability to impact a pitcher’s performance. That said, if you want me to believe that you have an invisible dragon in your back yard, you better be prepared to at least show me footprints or something that he burned to a crisp for you. If there is no evidence of a thing’s existence, and then we take that thing away and see no change in its surroundings, the best conclusion we can draw is either that the thing does not exist or that its existence has a minimal effect at best.
I have no doubt that the Mariners really like Miguel Olivo as a teammate. However, respect for your teammates doesn’t win games, outscoring your opponents does.
Game 33, Tigers at Mariners
Vargas vs. Smyly, 7:10pm
Marc and I both put up game threads, so I’m just copying the contents of mine over here. His contents are below.
All season long, we’ve been advocating for Eric Wedge to deploy John Jaso more often. We hailed his contact rate and ability to hit from the left side as positives that the team needed from the catching position, and we pointed out that Jaso’s on base skills actually convinced Joe Maddon to use him in the leadoff spot while he was in Tampa Bay. As he’s gotten more playing time since Olivo’s injury, Jaso has continued to show that he can be a useful offensive piece.
So, I’m thrilled to see Eric Wedge promote Jaso to the leadoff spot for tonight’s game, acknowledging that on base skills should trump speed at the top of the line-up. I want to applaud him from the rooftops and tell the world what a great thing he’s done.
There’s only one small problem – the Tigers starting pitcher tonight is Drew Smyly. Drew Smyly is left-handed. John Jaso is also left-handed, and he’s been pretty awful against southpaws during his big league career. While 101 plate appearances isn’t a huge sample, Jaso’s .183/.320/.268 line against lefties isn’t exactly encouraging, and his primary skill against RHPs – contact ability – hasn’t been present against lefties, as he’s struck out in 19.8% of his PAs against LHPs. He’s managed to draw 17 walks, so he hasn’t been totally helpless, but he’s not a guy who is likely to have much success against quality left-handed pitching.
So, hooray for Jaso hitting leadoff. I just hope that if Jaso looks awful in that spot tonight against a lefty, it won’t preclude him from hitting near the top of the order against a right-hander in the future, since that’s the role where Jaso is actually capable of providing real value.
You may remember the name Drew Smyly, as he was one of a few potential “players to be named later” to complete the Doug Fister trade. As it turned out, Chance Ruffin headed west, and Smyly resumed rocketing through the Tigers minor league system. The 6’3″ lefty made his MLB debut on April 12th, and he’s reeled off four quality starts in a row from 4/17 to 5/4. His primary pitches are a four-seam fastball at about 92mph, a cutter at around 87 and a slider at 80. He’s got a change-up, but he hasn’t used it all that often. Thus far in his month-long MLB career, he’s been excellent, with a K% over 25% and a walk rate of just over 7%. At this point, it’s probably better to just say that he’s got 29 Ks to 8 free passes. Given his arsenal, it’s probably not a big surprise that he’s tough on lefties. He’s struck out 10 of the 31 lefties to face him and hasn’t walked any of them (though he plunked one). He’s been surprisingly tough on righties, though, thanks to a better-than-average strikeout rate. Some look at his shiny ERA and ridiculous strand rate (94%!) and see a guy who’s lucked his way into the rotation. But while he’s certainly benefited from luck, he’s been a very effective pitcher from the moment he got to Detroit.
The most interesting thing about him isn’t his arsenal – it’s the way his pitches move. As we all remember from hearing the M’s (and, briefly, the Yankees) discuss Michael Pineda, baseball folks think it’s important to have pitches that move in on same-handed hitters as well as pitches that move away from same-handed hitters. Pineda had a great slider, and the M’s wanted him to develop a change-up with arm-side run that could move away from lefties. His slider was great against righties, but the M’s worried about left-handers teeing off on the pitch. Jason Vargas is a classic example – he came up with a good slider, but then worked on his change-up so much that it’s now his best pitch, and so his K:BB ratio is as good or better versus righties. Developing pitches with very different horizontal movement is so ingrained, so routine, that it seems like a truism. The only exceptions have been guys with nuclear-grade stuff – the young Randy Johnson who used a 100mph fastball and a slider so good, to complain about the fact that it broke in on right-handers was to miss the point entirely. But even RJ developed a splitter/change-up later on (and he became one of the greatest pitchers in history). Pineda was successful last year despite not having an MLB-quality change-up, but many thought the lack of the pitch would hamper his development.
You can probably guess where I’m going with this. Here’s Smyly’s horizontal movement graphed against velocity, thanks to Brooks Baseball:
Only speed changes, not horiz. movement
Compare that to his opponent tonight, Jason Vargas:
Lots of variation in horizontal movement between pitch types
Vargas’s horizontal movement stretches quite far, from pitches like his curve that break away from lefties to his change-up that break surprisingly far from righties. Compare that to Smyly’s movement; nearly all of the variation in Smyly’s graph is in velocity. Both pitchers throw a cutter, but while Vargas uses the pitch to get a different break from his fastball (the horizontal movement is 8″ different), Smyly’s cutter’s movement is indistinguishable from his fastball. It’s a bit slower and has different vertical movement, but fundamentally, he throws a cut-less cutter. Lucas Apostoleris brought this up on twitter and it touched off an interesting conversation.
My question is still: why? Is there an advantage in this approach (everything looks the same until after batter’s begun his swing?), or is it purely the result of his delivery? Looking for comparable pitchers, Harry Pavlidis of Brooks Baseball came up with another guy with an over-the-top delivery, Josh Collmenter. Collmenter throws a curve ball, which is so different from a cutter that there’s no way he’d get similar horizontal break on a curve and his fastball, but I’d guess that if he threw a cutter, it’d move like Smyly’s. Collmenter was one of the better stories of 2011 for Arizona, coming out of nowhere to win the #5 starter job and putting up a sub-4.0 FIP and over 2 wins. This year, he’s been crushed and he’s lost his starting job already. A “different” delivery is often effective for a pitcher – until the league learns how to read it. Smyly’s been great, and he’ll probably have a successful season, but he’s probably already working to improve his change-up in preparation for next year. Funky delivery mirage or intriguing prospect who gets more out of his talent than most, I just wish the M’s got him last year.
The line-up features several interesting twists – not only has Wedge “freed” John Jaso, he’s batting him lead-off. In addition, with the M’s throwing out their RH line-up, Ackley gets the day off with Seager at 2B and Alex Liddi at 3B. Chone Figgins gets a spot start in CF and Mike Saunders had the day off.
1: Jaso (C)
2: Ryan (SS)
3: Ichiro (RF)
4: Montero (DH)
5: Seager (2B)
6: Smoak (1B)
7: Liddi (3B)
8: Wells (LF)
9: Figgins (CF)
Sp: Vargas
Go M’s!
Taijuan Walker had a shortened, somewhat mixed outing today, going 4 IP and giving up 2 R and 2 BB against 4 Ks. Jackson lost to Huntsville, 4-2.
The Rainiers were undone by long balls today in their game against Albuquerque, but Forrest Snow still had one of his better starts of the young season, getting 8 Ks in 6+. Chance Ruffin still doesn’t look quite right, giving up 2 runs in the 7th and picking up the loss in a 9-7 defeat. Vinnie Catricala showed some tentative signs of life on the R’s recent road trip, but went 1-5 with a single and a GIDP. Still only 6 XBH on the season.