Betts, Fowler Top the BABS Leaderboard
Through nearly two months, we are starting to see some of the early season’s extreme performances settling down. But even within that settlement, there are a few players who are taking that next step up.
A reminder about how to use the chart:
Batters and pitchers, individually, are ranked by skill, regardless of playing time. In this way, you can identify the skills tiers and cherry pick players who have upside even if they do not have the plate appearances or innings so far. However, playing time is a measure of BABS credibility for this in-season update.
Ratings for players on pace to put up Full-time plate appearances and innings are the most credible now that we are two months in. Mid-timers are somewhat less so. The ratings for Part-time players (those with a blank in the PT field), and especially those whose names are in italics (fewer than 30 AB or 10 IP), are hardly projectable at all. They are listed only to provide a peek into how the players are currently performing.
MAY 25 UPDATE: [EXCEL] [VIEW/PRINT]
Dexter Fowler came into 2016 with a [p,SB,+] rating, showing moderate power, significant speed and some OBP help. Through one month, BABS bumped him up to [P+,SB,AV+], adding elite level power and more batting tools. Now through two months, his current [P+,s,AV+] rating shows him holding onto those early gains, with speed taking a step back. Though he only has 5 HR to date, I would not be surprised to see a power spike at some point.
Nick Castellanos came into 2016 with a [PW,a] BABS rating. After one month, his early surge merited an increase to [P+,SB,AV-]. Now, at [P+,AV], he’s settled in to a level that shows a direct improvement from the pre-season. You can see that this is still the same player as what we expected in March, just better.
Here are other signs of settlement… The [P+,AV+] tier was 16 players deep at the end of April. It is currently only 12 deep, with four of those 12 having fewer than 30 AB. The [P+,AV] tier had 19 players about a month ago; now only 16, including one fringe guy.
April’s skills leader, Jose Altuve, has already seen his power fade from that [P+,s,AV+] rating to his current [PW,s,AV+]. Given that BABS’ pre-season expectation [SB,AV] showed below average power, it would not be a surprise to see his HR output continue to tail off. He did hit 6 HR in April, and only 3 in May so far.
The current skills leader is a member of our elite pre-season quartet. Mookie Betts’ [p,S+,AV] rating just edges out Fowler [P+,s,AV+] for the overall lead. It might seem counterintuitive for a moderate power/extreme speed player to beat out an extreme power/moderate speed guy, but speed is a scarcer commodity this year, which pushes Betts slightly ahead. It’s close, though.
Let’s take another look at that early season quartet:
Player Pre-Season April May =========== ========== ===== === Pollock,A.J. p,SB,AV Injured Injured Betts,M p,SB,AV p,S+,a- p,S+,AV Marte,S p,SB,AV PW,SB,AV- p,SB,AV- Blackmon,C p,SB,AV SB,+ PW,AV
Betts and Marte are rounding into expected form. Blackmon seems to still be looking for some footing after his early season injury.
Here are a few interesting current skills triplets. Players are listed along with their respective pre-season BABS ratings.
P+,s,a (Extreme power, moderate speed, moderate batting tools) Mark Trumbo PW,a Jay Bruce P+ Trevor Story P+,SB,x
Here, it’s all about the power; everything else is incidental.
PW,AV- (Significant power, significant batting tools, but OBP discount) Zack Cozart a Brandon Drury p,AV- Danny Valencia PW,AV
All three have arrived at this spot from different places. For Cozart and Drury, it represents improvement. For Valencia, this is his expected skill level.
S+,a- (Extreme speed, moderate batting tools with OBP discount) Billy Burns S+,a Dee Gordon S+,AV Tyler Goeddel SB,x
Goeddel might not be stealing bases – yet – but the tools are there.
At the end of last month, Clayton Kershaw was sharing his elite [E+,K+] rating with Noah Syndegaard and Vince Velasquez. Since then, Velasquez has expectedly dropped back [ER,K+] while Syndegaard has held on. Jake Arrieta [E+,KK] ranks next, followed by a group that includes Velasquez and five other [ER,K+] starters. In that group is Drew Pomeranz, who could very well be for real.
Some interesting pitcher groups:
E,k (Moderate pitching tools, moderate strikeouts) James Shields e,k Nathan Karns e,k Rick Porcello e Nathan Eovaldi
Shields and Karns are pitching exactly to expectation, while Porcello and Eovaldi have elevated their games.
k (Moderate strikeouts) Francisco Liriano ER,KK Zack Greinke ER,k Carlos Rodon e,k
All three pitchers have taken a step back in their pitching tools, though Greinke and Rodon are maintaining their strikeout ability. That is not necessarily a good sign.
x,KK (Poor pitching tools, significant strikeouts) Chris Archer ER,KK Michael Pineda e,k
This is the next step backwards from the previous group. Poor pitching tools would be a bad sign no matter what. But when a previously-skilled pitcher is throwing a lot of strikeouts with an inflated ERA, that means they’re regressing from “pitcher” to “thrower.”
Lots of food for thought in this update.
Photographer: Dan Hamilton/Icon Sportswire
No mention of Carlos Gomez … in the little bit that I’ve seen of him, he looks totally lost.
Yeah, he and several players are in this camp. I don’t have answers any more than anyone else, but I may write an analysis of these guys shortly – Gomez, Prince Fielder, Russell Martin, etc.
Ron, Thanks for this BABS update. I admittedly found it hard to know what, if anything, to do with the May 1 update, and 24 additional days of data at least lends more credence to possible skills changes for certain players. I wonder if it would also be possible to see a more aggregate picture of skills over time. I could be wrong, but I thought you looked at data over the course of the previous 5 seasons when you created the initial ratings. Would it be possible to publish occasional updates with skills ratings based on a larger sample than the current season? E.g., over the past calendar year (or 2, or 3, etc.)?
I appreciate the updates. However I am still having problems understanding what to do with them. For example; Does this mean that Dexter Fowler should be a target. I think I can get him on the cheap right now from his owner. Is that reading this correctly? How do we measure sustainability?
Yes, the original ratings were based on 5 years of data. Getting a larger sample of data for current analysis is obviously a good thing, but artificially creating these samples by arbitrary time frames is probably not a valid way to do it. We play our games within the current season, so our goal needs to be to validate whether current performance is for real or not. Comparing the current BABS ratings to the 5-year history is a good means by which to validate.
Similar to the question above, probably the best way to use BABS is to compare each player’s current ratings to their draft ratings (which are based on 5 years of history). If you can see that a player’s current ratings look similar to history, that validates their current performance. In the case of Fowler, his current [P+,s,AV+] rating represents a bit of a jump from history [p,SB,+], but you can see that this is still essentially the same player. If I were to guess, I’d estimate that his 2016 level will likely settle at something like [PW,s,AV], which still represents growth.
When do we expect the next update? Thinking of dumping either Kemp (who has lost all plate discipline he ever had) or Andrew McCutchen, who is not helping things by trying to play through a thumb injury, in favor of Grossman. Leaning towards getting rid of Kemp; at least McCutchen isn’t costing me points, but he may end up on the DL sooner than later. Maybe I should get rid of both of them.
Think about what you’re saying… replacing Kemp and/or McCutchen with GROSSMAN?? While BABS liked his skills in his tiny early month sample, this is not a talent even remotely comparable to Kemp or McCutchen. The next update will be out at the end of the month.