Archive for Joey Votto

Reshaping a team core comes with reshaping team analytics – or, at least the goal is to craft players within a certain subset of principles. Each player will have natural talent they are inclined to favor (power, getting on base, choice of stat here), and in that nature, the team principles taught might be best thought of as a way to control the random chaos of baseball. Creating an orderly lineup within a game of disorderly results.

Thus, one of the underlying theories of evaluating a team reshaping the core is to analyze those players they are shaping; players who have the talent to subtly manage their own game. The Reds are one of those teams rebuilding with a split between stark promise and those who, bluntly, are roster spots. In some regards, Cincinnati is a universe revolving around the Joey Votto-style of baseball – low rate of outside swings, high contact, the simplicity of getting on base. Overall, they have the fourth lowest swinging-strike percentage in the MLB (9.6 percent), are tied for the fifth lowest outside-swing percentage (29.1 percent) and are tied for the second highest-contact rate (79.5 percent) with the Boston Red Sox.

There is sensibility of principled baseball despite their slight record. Effectively, however, the main separating point between teams such as the Red Sox and Reds is visualized in their spray chart on base hits; Boston with a wide range, Cincinnati lacking viability of power. There is something to be said about Cincinnati having the MLB’s fifth-best batting average (.259), but that average is held back by a .144 ISO and a .401 SLG mark (bottom third of the MLB). Cincinnati’s range of contact is quaint, more akin to a peaceful breeze than a bombastic wind.

Philosophically, the peaceful wind of contact is bound to the style of pitches attacked, their underlying method of creating order. Further defining that order (and leading with summation), they have a knack to lead pitchers into throwing them a favorable pitch with foul-balls and an inclination for avoiding weak contact. And while Votto might be the veteran tangentially modeling an established career, the success of Scooter Gennett, Jesse Winker, Curt Casali, and Jose Peraza reflect effectiveness seasons from now.

To note, if any player can be removed from this group, it would be Gennett, who has intrinsic power and might be termed the most natural player. However, he still falls into the binding theme of an academic plate-approach under the adage of leading pitchers into contact and lowering swinging-strike percentage. Between all four players, they have only 724 swings outside of the zone. Not surprisingly, the aberration pitches far outside are mostly Gennett swinging – remove his partiality to power, and the chart loses wild swings and the knuckle curve.

Moving inside the zone, the Cincinnati four have only 10.3 percent whiffs, with 39.1 percent fouls, 32.6 percent balls batted into plays, and 18 percent hits. One of the most impressive aspects of the inside contact has been the lack of weak contact opposed to the flare, solid, or barrel contact. Hence, within their categorized principles, Cincinnati has shaped the type of pitches which need to be attacked inside the zone. Again, that point of avoiding handing a pitcher a quick-out, instead creating foul balls and probability in launch-angle. Although they overwhelmingly have better contact than average, their lack of deep power (exit velocity) is seen in the classic moon-shot of under contact.

Principled swinging might be best reflected in the evolved in-game attack. As the game progresses, these players make contact in a tighter range with higher exit velocity. The results in innings one through three have been a method to create more power contact, albeit, at the risk of weaker contact. Hence, a method of sorting through how to attack during the remainder of the game while taking a risk on some intrinsic fastballs. From innings four through six, the contact group becomes smaller, and thus the spray chart also becomes more oriented toward singles with less power. They become more principled to find the average rate of success. Even though power is lost, they are becoming better at capitalizing on simplicity.

Inning seven through nine are the most evident of how Cincinnati is shaping their players to hit for the average rate of success. Regard, this is a team which overwhelmingly has found a way to chip away late in games. (The Cincinnati four have combined for a .304 AVG; 128 wRC+ split in high leverage, .289 AVG; 111 wRC+ in innings seven through nine).

Their attack becomes tuned for breaking pitches (or finding the breaking pitches which do not break) and thus into making less powerful contact but creating more functional contact on average. They remove the risk from themselves by avoiding wild swings, and thus force pitchers to throw breaking balls into the zone. 28.7 percent of their swings in the late innings have gone into play, while another 37.8 percent have gone for fouls. That punctual ability to create foul balls and chip away at pitchers creates long-at bats to reveal weak-points, wears down relievers, and eventually lead to a swing-worthy breaking ball.

Cincinnati may not be the most successful or powerful team within the moment. But, this is only the moment of crafting. The Joey Votto way of baseball might be a grinding and dying way of baseball. The Votto way of baseball might even be a misnomer for power-hitters such as Gennett. Yet, in the end, the underlying philosophy of Cincinnati’s baseball is to remove intrinsic risk in swinging and create order by forcing the pitcher to make the first risk.

If you walked up to me and said “Joey Votto is the best player in baseball”, I’d have a hard time finding a good argument against that. Heading into his twelfth season, Votto has been one of the most consistent players in the league. From 2007 on he’s played at least 110 games each year, with the exception of his rookie year and the injury-shortened 2014 season.

Using a summary of his last three years, you’ll see he’s been at or near the top in almost every major statistical category used to evaluate players.

• Fourth in overall WAR
• Second in Batting Average
• First in On Base Percentage
• First in BB/K rate
• Third in Win Probability Added
• Second in Weighted Runs Created Plus

Does Votto leave anything to be desired? Well, of qualified first basemen, he ranks 12th in DRS (3) and 16th in UZR/150 (2.6) since 2015. So if you could get on him for anything, it would be his fielding.

Hitting a baseball is one of the hardest feats to accomplish in any sport. I would venture to guess, whether you’re the pitcher or hitter, that a full count creates the most tension on the baseball field. I don’t think it takes a Bill James-like brain to figure out that 0-2 is a very tough situation to be in at the plate; the scales tipped heavily in the pitcher’s favor. Game tension is a fun energy to experience in baseball, which leads me to stick with looking into the more balanced full count.

Would you be surprised if I told you that no one has performed better in recent seasons under those conditions than Votto? But first, behold the predictable OPS under all two-strike counts!

• 0-2, .389
• 1-2, .419
• 2-2, .470
• 3-2, .814

Digging into the specifics of a full count, 30% of hitters get walked and 46% reach base. Votto is one of those 46%-ers. In fact, since 2015, no other hitter had a better wOBA under a full count than Votto.

Pretty impressive at the plate to begin with, every aspect of Votto’s at-bats are above average; needless to say, you’re going to have your work cut out for you when he comes to bat.

Votto has an advanced eye, which you can tell by only looking at his swings out of the zone; at least 10% lower than league average. On the other hand, he seems to make contact more than average when offering at those pitches. But, only achieves a paltry .219 when putting the ball in play. Regardless, pitchers have to be pretty careful with what they do to get him out lest he ends up on base and/or putting crooked numbers on the scoreboard. We’ll get to that in a minute.

Getting back to his production with a full count, we have three other hitters within reach of Votto. The qualifying threshold is 200 at-bats (regular and postseason), of which 28 hitters qualified. The following are tops in wOBA when faced with a full count. After that foursome, there is a very sharp drop off.

1. Votto- .481
2. Matt Carpenter- .480
3. Kris Bryant- .467
4. Mike Trout- .461

Votto and Carpenter are very close, one one-thousandth of a point, but Votto has been in this position 111 times more. The averages keep them close but there is no way to be certain Carpenter could keep that number consistent as his at-bats go up.

No real correlation there but Votto and Bryant are the clear outliers; Carpenter and Trout are with them as well but are a bit further back in terms of pitches.

Votto also has the highest percentage of 3-2 counts in terms of pitches faced with 7.12% of his pitches being delivered in that situation; again with a minimum of 200 ABs. That’s an attribute to his plate discipline.

So how has he been so successful? This is where things get interesting. When Votto is faced with a 3-2 count, look where the pitches he has to work with are concentrated.

Furthermore, take a look at his career batting average based on zone location.

For whatever reason, pitchers seem to be content delivering a 3-2 pitch right into Votto’s butter zone. To be specific, the three pitches thrown at him the most in a full count are:

• 34.8% Four-seam Fastballs
• 17.2% Two-seam Fastballs
• 17% Sliders
• 9% Changeups

Almost half of the pitches thrown are fastballs of the two and four-seam variety. Guess what Votto eats up?

Those are the pitches Votto has seen the most since 2015. Coincidently, they are not only the four he sees most in 3-2 counts but also, with the exception of the slider, the pitches he has the most success against.

There are some pitchers don’t throw a slider but what I don’t understand is why they try to beat him with a fastball almost 50% of the time. It obviously doesn’t work. I’ll try to quantify as best I can, the situations Votto comes to bat under. Just going on what I have in the previous charts, maybe there aren’t many high-leverage situations when its Votto’s turn to hit.

For his career, he’s come to the plate 2,683 times with runners on base; 1,528 of those are with runners in scoring position. For the former, his OPS is 1.026 and the latter 1.079.

To give context to how much more/less Votto comes up with runners on base, I used the 2015-2017 average season numbers of total at-bats and divided that by 750. The 750 is 25 players per 30 teams. That’s a loose guesstimate but I would presume that through a given season a team holds at least that many (different) hitters on average, taking into consideration promotions/demotions/injuries/etc. That gave me 107 plate appearances per season with runners on base for the average hitter.

Then I used Votto’s career 2,683 PAs with runners on and divided it by his 11 seasons to get an average of 244 PAs per year. So, he has runners on about 44% more than the average hitter each season. Where he hits in the order DOES help but you have to remember he’s been playing on, for his career, a pretty mediocre Reds offense.

And, as a footnote, his worse performances are with runners on second and third followed by bases loaded; he excels with runners only on second, third, or first AND second.

That tangent we just went on only answered part of the question. We can’t know what the score was, the leverage index and other minor variables. All of those could change the way Votto is pitched to given the particulars. But, for whatever reason, the best hitter in baseball under a full count does not seem to be challenged much at all.

This post and others like it can be found over at The Junkball Daily.

Eric Hosmer is one of those guys you either love or hate. His career, which includes one World Series championship and two American League pennants, has been just as polarizing.

First, who Hosmer is. Consider his WAR each season since 2011:
1.0
-1.7
3.2
0.0
3.5
-0.1
4.1

Interesting pattern; let’s look into that. The chart below is Hosmer’s career plate discipline (bolded data are positive WAR seasons).

Nothing appears to be out of sorts, no obvious clues to suggest a divergent plate approach.

Moving on, I noticed his BB/K rate did relate to his productive seasons; that alone can’t possibly explain his offensive oscillations. While his strikeout and walk rates did vary, the differences were a matter of two or three percentage points, at best.

So, I decided to look at his batted ball contact trends and found that his line drive rate directly correlated with his higher WAR seasons; 22%, 24%, 22% in 2013, 2015, and 2017 respectively with 19%, 17%, 17% in 2012, 2014, and 2016 accordingly.

OK, so his launch angle must be skewed. But, like his plate discipline, no outliers were demonstrated; his 2017 season should be easy to pick out. The below animation is a glance at Hosmer’s three-year launch angle charts, in chronological order.

How about his defense? Well, something seems off about that, too.

He’s won a Gold Glove at first base four out of the last five years. He looks great on the field, but unfortunately, his defense reflects the same way as a skinny mirror; his UZR/150 sits at -4.1 and his defensive runs saved are -21. Since 2013 (the first year he won the award) he ranks 13th in DRS and 12th in UZR/150 out of all qualifying first basemen. So, middle of the pack basically but worth four gold gloves? Probably not.

As we could have surmised, he’s simply an inconsistent player. Falling to one side of the fence yet?

One thing is a certainty; his best season was, oddly enough, his walk year with the Kansas City Royals in 2017. Now, I’m not about to speculate that Hosmer played up his last year with the Royals to get a payday (which he most certainly got). Looking back at his WAR in the first part of the article, you can see his seasonal fluctuations suggest he was due for a good year.

Keeping with the wavering support of Hosmer, is the contract he acquired to play first base with the San Diego Padres. His eight-year deal (with an opt-out in year five), will net him $21 million each season. He will draw 25.8% of team payroll. When his option year arrives in 2022, he’s due for a pay cut of $13 million in the final three years.

A soundly contructeed contract as, according to Sportrac’s evaluation, his market value is set at $20.6 million a year. To note, the best first baseman in baseball, Joey Votto, signed a ten-year deal in 2015 for $225 million dollars (full no-trade clause). Starting in 2018, Votto is slated to make just $4 million more than Hosmer will in the early portion of his deal. Did San Diego overspend? It all depends on what their future plans are for him.

In any case, Hosmer will join a team that, following his arrival, is currently 24th in team payroll. In 2019, they will hop to 23rd. It could go down further upon the arrival of their handful of prospects who look to be the core of the team.

So who will the Padres have going forward? Using wOBA, probably the most encompassing offensive statistic, I decided to forecast what the coming years will look like for Hosmer. It goes without saying that defense is nearly impossible to project. So, for argument’s sake, we’ll continue to assume Hosmer will be an average defender at first.

Since Hosmer’s rookie year in 2011, the league average wOBA is approximately .315. Hosmer should stay above that through the majority of the contract. But, let’s be more accurate. Using both progressive linear and polynomial trend line data (based on both Hosmer’s past performance and league average wOBA by age), I was able to formulate a projection for Hosmer through age 35 (no, I’m not going to lay out any of my gory math details).

OK, I lied. Here is the equation I used to come to my prediction :

From age 28 on is what we want to look on from. Hosmer is expected to take a dive offensively in 2019 with a bounce-back year in 2020, sticking with his past trends. A year before his opt-out clause (where he’s slated to make $13 million), his wOBA is expected to regress at a stable rate. He’ll continue to be league average or better during the twilight years of his career.

Prognosis

Hosmer seems to be appropriately compensated. You could argue that he’s making too much, but the Padres had the money to give him and they are banking on Hosmer to be highly productive at Petco. But, chances are (according to his history), he won’t maintain (or exceed) his 4.1WAR in 2018. He’ll be labeled as a bust but ought to have a few good years in him during the $21 million salary period. And, as my forecast chart shows, his 2022 pay cut comes at just the right time.

*This posts and more like it can be found over at The Junkball Daily

Cost-controlled, 4-WAR players have the ability to revamp a farms system. The Brewers confirmed that notion by paying a hefty price to nab a piece that pushes the National League Central into a clear three-team race.

Reacting to trades can be redundant, especially after nearly a week for shock and awe to simmer down. Instead of reaction, I choose to consider how Yelich’s environment might affect his swing.

I’ve seen a lot of buzz, on the fantasy side of the industry and elsewhere, about how much this change from Miami to Milwaukee helps Yelich’s value. If we crudely compare the 2017 Marlins and Brewers, there isn’t much of a difference on the offensive side of the baseball. The Marlins actually outscored, outwalked, and outhit the Brewers, with the nine-win difference between the two teams attributed largely to the difference in pitching.

Yelich also hit between Giancarlo Stanton and Marcell Ozuna for the majority of 2017, the early movers out of the Marlins’ new regime. The lefty will now hit between some mixture of Lorenzo Cain, Eric Thames, and Ryan Braun – a clear downgrade.

The key element of any argument for Yelich’s performance and resulting value increasing is rooted in the change of scenery – literally.

What we do know is that Miller Park in Milwaukee is a substantially for home runs off the bat of left-handed hitters.

What we don’t know is by exactly by how much.

Varying methods exist for calculating park factors. Guessing Yelich’s new level of production becomes slightly difficult to peg the further into this rabbit hole one digs. I used Stat Corner’s methodology along with Baseball Prospectus to find a balance between what seemed to be aggressive and conservative ratings between Miller and Marlins Park. Where the two disagree is on how much, regarding home runs, Miller Park inflates the longball; it’s clear they both see Marlins Park as below average in everything (even home run sculptures).

To stop your eyes from glazing over as show off my skills in google sheets, focus on the two boxes highlighted yellow. Here exists the greatest discrepancy between park factors from 2016 to 2017.

2016 was a robust year for left-handed home runs in Milwaukee, but such inflation fell off in 2017; Baseball Prospectus believes more than Stat Corner. This is likely due to a difference in methodology – a topic for another day.

As any good arbitrator would, I want to split the difference, and naively predict the park factor for Miller to fall somewhere in the middle of 112 and 132. If we assume Marlins Park stays consistent on its park factor for 2018, we’d expect a 30 percent increase in home run totals (92 HR factor for MIA to 120 for MIL) for a left-handed hitter going from Marlins Park to Miller Park.

As a player sees half their games at home, in a vacuum, a 30-home-run bat with even home-road splits would see roughly 4.5 more home runs in his home games. A 20-home-run hitter would see an uptick of three home runs. Factor in everything else a park could help or hurt with and I’m confident saying, yes, this change will impact Yelich’s statistics. Thankfully, the difference between Marlins Park and Miller Park isn’t immaterial, meaning my crude math and assumptions can largely be forgiven in favor of a general consensus.

***

Giving Yelich 21 home runs for 2018, roughly three more from his 2017 total seems reasonable. The question is if you think Yelich’s 2017 is the more representative body of work than his 2016, where he hit 24 home runs with a home run to fly ball rate above 24 percent.

Favoring Yelich’s impressive 2016 and providing an aggressive home run prediction could tie to a few factors.

• Miller Park inflates Yelich’s home run total more than we think (and more than my crude numbers say)
• Yelich is entering a prime window for power according to aging curves
• Yelich changes his swing

The last of my trio above is the most interesting, given how beautiful and fluid his swing currently is.

This is where statistics and scouting clash.

I asked two of my most trusted baseball information resources (Kevin Black- @Kevin_Black_ and Richard Birfer – @RichardBirfs) what they’d do with Yelich given the knowledge that Milwaukee is a substantially better park for left-handed power. They both differed their response, mentioning how little should change for Yelich given the success with his current approach.

I probably agree, but speculating on something that might be far from Yelich and his hitting coach’s mind is more entertaining than agreeing with my reputable contacts.

Yelich’s batted-ball profile isn’t something often tied to praise. He sits near the bottom of the league in pull percentage (33%) and average launch angle (only 5.6 degrees in 2017). You might convulse at the thought of batted balls below a 7-degree launch angle, but there is misconception around that as well. Andrew Perpetua mentions how balls hit between 0-10 degrees are often hard to achieve because of how perfectly lined up the barrel of one’s bat has to be with the ball to result in this angle. As a result, balls in this window are very productive, resulting in a batting average of .472 and slugging percentage of .522 in just under 50,000 batted balls.

Sure, some of the balls he lifts to right field will have a better chance to carry out, but it’s even less convincing to suggest drastic change if Yelich sprays low line drives across the field successfully.

Yelich is an extremely productive, unique hitter, but his profile doesn’t “fit” with the kind of production that benefits substantially from life in Miller.

A wiseman once said, don’t break what isn’t broken. But as I remember the band Meat Loaf saying, “If it ain’t broke, break it.” In layman’s terms, if a more productive alternative exists… why not?

When I started mulling over what to do with Yelich in order to embrace Miller Park, a swing comparison came to mind: Alex Gordon. The Royal put up career spray and batted ball data that hangs right around league average, with a slight tendency for fly balls.

You’ll notice their swings are pretty similar. Yelich starts his hands further back and goes into a higher leg kick, but both these balls looks like they’re hit to left-center, with the inside-out approach Yelich uses to push his opposite field hit percentage near 30, five percent above league average.

Compared to Yelich, Gordon is willing to open up on pitches. Veering from Yelich’s inside-the-ball approach, Gordon generated a lot of his home run power to “true” right field. Yelich’s home run spray chart shows us that “true” right field pull power is something the former Marlin has turned to only sparingly from 2016 to 2017. Gordon’s spray chart across his most productive three years shows power that skews itself heavily to right field; a noticeable difference from Yelich even as these two hitters are a fair comparison mechanically.

The issue? I believe Yelich has more power than Gordon. Going to a slightly pull-happy approach for Yelich and mimicking Gordon deviates too much from his current approach. Balance, if we are to entertain breaking Yelich’s current poise, is key.

So how about Joey Votto? He’s a player with a somewhat-similar swing (as we’ll see in a second) and his career batted ball distribution is nearly even to all fields, with a fly ball rate lower than Gordon’s, but higher than Yelich’s. Here is that same clip of Yelich next to a younger Votto (2015).

The biggest difference I notice – aside from hand placement – is how centered Votto’s weight stays from his stride to front-foot plant. Yelich is comparable, but you’ll notice how much more Yelich uses his lower half to generate momentum towards the ball. This isn’t a fault of Yelich. It’s actually just me praising Joey Votto.

While I’d love for Yelich to one day possess the power Votto does and sit back so well, it’s tough to expect that kind of change. What I’d love to see Yelich do in Milwaukee is take the lift aspect of Votto’s game and embrace it, even with the knowledge of how productive the 0-10 degree launch angle window can be. I don’t want to see Yelich open up as much as Gordon and I can’t expect him to evolve into Votto’s power profile. So the balance would be to keep the same all-fields approach, but make a conscious effort to tweak and embrace a slight uptick in fly balls. Votto is able to do so with a fantastic line drive rate. Instead of taking the Yonder Alonso approach and shooting for the moon, a marginal tweak to “unlevel” Yelich’s swing, similar to the rotational path Votto possesses, could be extremely beneficial.

If no change occurs in Yelich’s batted ball profile come 2018, while I still love his move to Milwaukee for various other reasons (he is happy and has the incentive to win), I wouldn’t expect a noticeable inflation of statistics simply because of Miller Park.

And at then end of the day, we all need to be more like Votto.

A version of this post can be found on BigThreeSports.com.

Even as a fan of a different AL East team, seeing Manny Machado go down with a knee injury this Monday saddened me. Fortunately, reports indicate the injury is not as serious as originally feared, and Machado could return for spring training. Machado is part of a class of young stars that have simultaneously taken baseball by storm and wrecked the grading curve for everyone to come after them. People are already giving up on Jurickson Profar because he isn’t a star at an age when most players are in Low-A ball. Bryce Harper ranks in the top 20 in the MLB in wRC+ at the age of 20, and hardly anybody notices.  Anyways, I digress. So where does Machado’s age-20 season rank?

Machado compiled 6.2 WAR in 2013, good for 10th in the MLB. In the last 55 years, only Alex Rodriguez in 1996 and Mike Trout in 2012 have posted a higher WAR in their age-20 season. Of course, there were some better seasons before then, but Machado probably wouldn’t have been allowed to play in those days.

Unlike Rodriguez and Trout, Machado’s offensive numbers, while impressive for a 20 year-old are league average overall. A-rod had a 159 wRC+ in ’96, and Trout had a 166 wRC+ last year. Machado managed a 101 wRC+, providing most of his value with the glove. UZR credited him with 31 runs saved, best in the majors. After a very hot start that was fueled by an inflated BABIP, Machado slowed down.

So what can Orioles fans expect from Machado going forward?

Machado is an aggressive contact hitter. His walk rate of 4.1% is one of the lowest in the MLB, and his strikeout rate of 15.9% is well below the MLB average. While Machado will never be Joey Votto, the walk rate will improve as he matures. His minor league walk rate was above 10%. Additionally, Machado should hit for more power. I could just say that he hit 51 doubles and those will turn into home runs. But, that would be lazy, and doubles don’t always turn into home runs as a player develops. Sometimes they turn into singles. Just ask Nick Markakis.

However, there are other reasons to believe Machado will hit for power. First of all, he has excellent bat speed, and there’s no lack of raw power. Some of the home runs he has hit are very impressive. Of the 14, ESPN Home Run Tracker classifies 10 of them as either No Doubters or Plenty.  The average speed off the bat was just a shade behind Robinson Cano. Furthermore, despite playing in one of the best home run ballparks in the league, and having an average fly ball distance on par with Nick Swisher, Machado’s HR/FB ratio of 7.9% is in the bottom third of the MLB. Bet on this ratio improving. While he does have a very high rate of infield flies (9th in MLB), he should be able to bring that down with improved discipline.

Hopefully for Orioles fans and baseball fans, Machado will have a complete recovery from his knee injury. It might be hard to live up to expectations after producing a 6.2 WAR season at age 20, but with improved offense Machado could be up to the task. Expect the plate discipline and power to improve, as the defense inevitably regresses from a season that stretched the upper bounds of UZR. It’s a very small group he’s in, but star players at age 20 tend to be stars at 25.