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18 Jan 2009 |
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Tweet me!The 2007 baseball season featured the fantastic power display of Ryan Braun, a rookie third baseman who the Brewers called to the major league in May, and who slugged his way through the rest of the season, earning by year's end a total of 34 home runs, a 1.004 OPS, a .324 average, and a Rookie of the Year award. In 2008, Evan Longoria delivered a rookie revelation of his own. Longoria appeared in the majors in April, and, to support his own Rookie of the Year award, hit 27 home runs with a .272 average and .874 OPS.  What made these seasons even sweeter for fantasy owners is that, in many leagues, both Braun and Longoria were late-round draft picks--or even free agents--in their rookie years, making those of us lucky enough to snag them sweet on their prospects forever. Accordingly, each has shot up the draft charts, to the point where Braun averages as a top-ten overall draft pick, and Longoria currently figures to go as the third third-baseman in most leagues, and in the top twenty overall.Braun, great hitter though he is, doesn't match Longoria in defense, and after a full season in left field, doesn't figure to be eligible as an infielder in any fantasy league ever again. Now that Longoria has taken Braun's place as the next highly valued youngster at third, can we expect him to follow Braun's trajectory as a slugger? Portrait of the Peripherals as Young Men A quick glance at Longoria and Braun's peripherals from their rookie years can make it tempting to liken the two:
Here we have two players who strike out a lot, walk rarely (though Longoria was a bit better in this respect in his rookie year), and hit line drives at or even less than a league-average rate. Conversely, they hit a lot of fly balls (at a 44.9% rate for Braun, and 41.6% for Longoria), and quite a lot of those fell for home runs. But beyond that, a couple of important differences start to emerge. The first is that Braun profiles to be a much better hitter, despite Longoria's superior walk and line drive rates. He looks even better if you include the stats from his second major league season, when that high BABIP and HR/FB rate could be expected to regress:
Even with a drop in those two stats (and a concurrent dip in average), Braun cut down on his strikeout rate and hit even more home runs than the year before (37, admittedly with the benefit of playing in about 40 more games). Braun's BABIP in both years, though, points to a curious feature of his peripherals. What's With that BABIP? An old, reliable rule of thumb is that a batter's BABIP can be expected to equal about his line drive rate plus .120. So, using that rule, Braun's BABIP in 2007 and 2008 "should" have been about .283 and .293, respectively. However, there are a number of exceptions to this rule, which have been the subject of some very deep and intriguing analysis by The Hardball Times' Chris Dutton and Peter Bendix, among others. I won't presume to summarize their findings, but the upshot of their critique of this rule of thumb is that a number of players consistently out- or under-perform the number, which suggests that a player can have the repeatable skills to hit better than their BABIP says they "should" (Again, this is my takeaway from their writing, and a result of me trying to summarize their in-depth study. I don't presume to know all there is on the subject, and would love to hear more from someone who does know more than me--Mike Podhorzer, I'm looking at you). A good example of such a player is Ichiro Suzuki. Because of his speed, and because of his ability to hit all over the field, his BABIP (a career .356) has consistently stood higher than what his line drive rate (a career 21.0%) would suggest it "should" be. Ryan Braun may also be such a player, perhaps for similar reasons (though not as fast as Ichiro, he is fast enough to steal 15 bases a year, while Longoria has seven steals in his major league career, while we're still comparing them). If we look back through his minor league career, we can see that Braun's BABIP, with one exception, has consistently been higher than the expected (or "xBABIP", here) BABIP that his line drive rate points to:
Please Speak English Again This is all a very long way of saying that Ryan Braun has a unique talent for hitting, one that doesn't quite fit the standard, simpler methods of player analysis. What's more, he has repeated his batting skills over enough time, and at enough levels of competition, that he seems a good bet to keep repeating them, and to continue to be an exceptional slugger at the major league level. Longoria, meanwhile, seems to have a BABIP that pegs more closely to his line drive rate:
This suggests that while Longoria's nice numbers in 2008 didn't seem to come more from luck than skill, it also suggests that what we see is what we can expect to get. While Longoria has shown some good batting skills (especially some nice power), and the promise to perhaps get better, he also hasn't shown much history of hitting well for average. Couple that with his low stolen base numbers, and you have the profile of a hitter who doesn't seem justifiable as an early pick like Ryan Braun. So Where Should You Draft Him? As I said, Longoria's current average draft position puts him at around a second-round pick. I know my colleagues Rhett Oldham and Mike Podhorzer think that's way too high, and the analysis we've done here makes me think it's a little too optimistic, as well. Where would you draft Longoria? Trackback(0)
Comments (9)
  written by Andrew Cleary, January 20, 2009
Hi Rob, thanks for the compliment. I do like Longoria a lot, and he is one of the better options at third base, which can be a hard position to fill after the top three guys get picked.
However, I'm a little down on his prospects for average and stolen bases, which makes it hard for me to pick him too early. It's going to be very fun to see what he can do in his second year.
written by Andrew Cleary, January 19, 2009
Steve, thanks for beating me to the punch on clarifying that. I couldn't have written a better answer. Many thanks to you and ducat for being regular, close readers of the site.
written by Andrew Cleary, January 19, 2009
Hi Steve, thanks for writing, and for the kind words. Whether it's clear or not from the article, I do like Longoria a lot, and hope that he can post a line like Bill James projects.
But, like you, I wouldn't be comfortable taking him as early as he's likely to go. I am 100% in agreement with you on drafting Beltran first. He is the epitome of what I look for with an early draft pick: excellence you can count on in five categories.
written by ducat2, January 16, 2009
Steve,
Thanks. I initially was looking at the actual BABIP, not the xBABIP. The link and your explanation have certainly clarified the article's meaning. Again, thanks.
written by RobReed, January 16, 2009
Nice job, Andrew... some technical stuff that was explained nicely.
Longoria -- using RAW stats, minimum 150 ABs, minimum 20 games played, and standard 5x5 -- comes in as the 72nd best fantasy player in all of baseball last year ( 12th best 3B ). Prorated (assuming consistency in a full season), he's at #38 ( 5th best 3B ). So, I like him in the third round... I'd love him to be my primary 3B.
written by Steve Shane, January 16, 2009
Someone sometime ago figured out that LD% (yes line drive) + .120 comes fairly close to BABIP. This is considered "the old version" of xBABIP.
The link in the article, a very good read btw, talks about "the new" xBABIP that accounts for many many variables. The stats used in this article xBABIP=LD%+.120. What hes trying to say is when someones BABIP is much greater or less than xBABIP, the batter was either lucky or unlucky on balls hit in play, thus there should be some regression the following season.
written by ducat2, January 16, 2009
Who is the author of this article? There is no byline yet.
Question: Looking at the charts I don't see how BABIP is approximately LD% (assuming this means line drive rate) plus .120. Did you mean .220? In addition, how do you determine EXPECTED BABIP?
written by Steve Shane, January 16, 2009
Let me be the first to say great article, I love the correlation between SABR stats and real life stats.
The one reason why I probably wont have Longoria on any of my teams is I want certainties from my first ~5 picks. Id draft Longoria mid-late round 3 but he'll be long gone by then. Id rather draft Beltran than Longoria, (23 vs 19 ADP), take my 110/30/110/20/.275 and move on. Could longoria post a 102/37/116/8/.280 as Bill James projects, sure he could, but he could also post a 80/25/95/10/.270
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Great article man. I got Longoria with the first pick of the 4th round in our FP911 sloooooooow mock II. I was very surprised and elated to see him get to me. I think he is a late 2nd-mid 3rd round pick. I still like Braun ahead of Longoria for the extra SB but I can see Longoria matching Braun's power numbers this year.