With Colby Lewis and Scott Atchison returning to the majors this season, I thought I’d take a look at the players who have had the most success after spending time in Japan.

Honorable Mention: Pedro Feliciano (2005, Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks)

5. Julio Franco (1995, 1998, Chiba Lotte Marines) Went to Japan along with guys like Darrin Jackson and Kevin Mitchell after the 1994 MLB strike; left after the Marines fired Bobby Valentine, but returned after a front office change. After time in Korea and Mexico, made a lengthy MLB return in the 00’s.

4. Lee Stevens (1994-95, Kintetsu Buffaloes) Put up better numbers in MLB return than he did in Japan; played in late-90’s Texas division winners.

3. Rafael Betancourt (2000, Seibu Lions) Pitched 28.2 middling innings in Japan in 2000, has been steadily worth 1+ WAR since sticking at the MLB level in 2003, including an excellent 2007 season.

2. Matt Stairs (1993, Chunichi Dragons) Didn’t make an impact in his one season in Nagoya; post-Japan career needs no introduction.

1. Cecil Fielder (1989, Hanshin Tigers) After hitting 38 jacks with Hanshin, changed his Tigers to Detroit and ushered in the 90’s power era, presumably without the aid of ped’s.

Note: this doesn’t include non-Japanese players who started their professional careers in Japan, so former Carp players Alfonso Soriano, Timo Perez, and Ramon Ramirez weren’t considered. I’ll also give Melvin Mora a nod for the time he spent in Taiwan prior to breaking out with the Mets.

The closest thing to a trend here is that Stevens, Betancourt, Stairs and Fielder were all on the right side of 30 when they played in Japan. Franco is an exception because he went over following the strike. Aside from that, this is a scattered group. Stairs and Betancourt didn’t play much in Japan, and needed several more years of minor league seasoning before breaking out at the MLB level. Stevens got his MLB shot after a great year in 3A in 1996, Franco was already an established MLB player, and Fielder had been blocked by Fred McGriff prior to playing in Japan.

The first day of August 2004 brought with it an interesting array of baseball storylines. The Chicago Cubs were hosting the Philadelphia Phillies. Greg Maddux was on the mound. Surrounded by young arms like Mark Prior and Kerry Wood and intriguing throwers like Carlos Zambrano and Matt Clement, at times it seemed like Maddux was the boring option in the rotation. The vanilla option so to speak. Today though, was supposed to be his day. This was his first chance at win number 300.

Naturally Maddux would be overshadowed. See, this was August 1st, the day after the trading deadline. The day after the Cubs went out and acquired Nomar Garciaparra. The Nomar Garciaparra. The Cubs’ faithful gave Garciaparra a standing ovation in warm-ups on this Sunday that lived up to its name. The Cubs’ lineup looked wholly competent now too. Prudent maneuvering had the Cubs fielding an offensively strong lineup, one that featured Michael Barrett, Derrek Lee, Todd Walker (or Mark Grudzielanek), Aramis Ramirez, Moises Alou, Corey Patterson, and Sammy Sosa. Now, writing Nomar instead of Ramon E. Martinez must’ve been a feeling of ecstasy for fans and manager Dusty Baker alike.

Of course this isn’t the memory most fans have of Nomar. He is a Boston legend. Even re-watching the DVD I have of this game leaves the entire scene with a surreal sense, and it’s not because the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air preceded the pre-game show hosted by Chip Caray. This isn’t the Nomar most of us know, but somewhere in Massachusetts, there’s a five-year-old child who has no idea why Nomar Garciaparra retiring is a big deal. That’s startling. Here are some of the more interesting Boston-related tidbits about Nomar:

After hitting 30 and 35 home runs in his first two full seasons, Garciaparra never reached 30 homers again. He hit a homer in about 5% of his plate appearances those two seasons; only 3% the rest of his Boston career.

It seems like there’s a legitimate case to make that Nomar should’ve won the 1998 A.L. MVP. Nomar’s wRC+ was 143 which falls a little below Juan Gonzalez’s 149, but Nomar played shortstop and Gonzalez was a right fielder. You could make the case for Ken Griffey Jr. too, who had a comparable amount of RBI (146 to Gonzalez’s 157), more homers (56 to 45), and an OPS only 20 points lower while playing center field. Alex Rodriguez has a really strong case too.

Amongst shortstops with at least 1,000 career plate appearances, Nomar’s wOBA ranks eighth all-time.

Someone else is going to put what Nomar meant to the Red Sox into better terms than I can. Whether that person is Joe Posnanski, Peter Gammons, or even Marc Normandin is anyone’s guess. The only thing I can harp on is that Nomar is a Boston legend. In nine seasons he hit .323/.370/.553. After being traded, he hit .287/.338/.440. Not having the monster to bang doubles off, not having complete health, or not having amigos Derek Jeter and Alex Rodriguez around to push him; whatever it was, he was just never the same.

He’s yours again, Boston. But I guess he always was.

Zack Greinke is the best pitcher in baseball. As a Royals fan, I’m biased, but I’m not alone. If you look at CHONE’s own runs saved above replacement, Greinke is the top pitcher projected for 2010. But I’m not interested in a “who is the best pitcher” debate at the moment. When all factors are taken into account, I can imagine good arguments for any one of a number of pitchers, including (but not limited to) Greinke, Tim Lincecum, Felix Hernandez, and Kei Igawa. My goal in this piece is not to argue Greinke’s case, but to argue that one “knock” on Greinke — his past struggles with depression and social anxiety disorder — should not be considered a significant factor.

Before I start, let me make three things clear: 1) I am not trying to minimize the seriousness of mental health issues; 2) I don’t have any special “inside” information; and 3) I am not a doctor, psychologist, or any other sort of expert or mental health professional; this is a lay opinion of a baseball blogger writing from the “outside.”

I’ve read comparisons of pitcher value going forward in which Greinke’s past mental health issues that caused him to leave baseball for a time in 2006 are given as a reason to grade him down. I disagree; if it’s a worry at all, it’s a relatively insignificant one. This isn’t meant as an “inspirational” piece about the power to overcome obstacles, either — there’s a place for that, but frankly, I’m not sure professional athletics is the arena to which we should look… that’s a rant for another time and place. This is more cold-blooded: it’s about how this should (not) factor into valuations of Greinke.

First of all, despite the way many of the bandwagon-jumping pieces that came out during Greinke’s 2009 Cy Young campaign made it sound, it’s not as if Greinke was out of baseball until right before his historically great 2009. Greinke’s problem actually came to a head four years ago, in 2006. His ‘comeback‘ to the major leagues full-time was three years ago, in 2007. He pitched well in 2007 and 2008 already — he’s been back for a while, and has been fine.

Second, the time off in 2006 as well as the lighter 2007 workload means that Greinke (who has never had a significant injury in his professional career, as far as I know) has fewer miles on his arm — another important factor for his value. So that at least partially (and in my mind, more than fully) offsets whatever risk Greinke’s condition involes.

Third, think for a moment about how many people you know that have struggled or have ongoing struggles with mental health that requires some sort of ongoing treatment (and again, I don’t know any specifics regarding Greinke’s treatment). It seems quite likely that a fair number of baseball players (including very good ones) are dealing with this sort of stuff, and we simply haven’t heard about it (some we have, as with Khalil Greene’s difficulties) because they’ve managed to keep it private. Do you really think professional baseball players are that much different from the rest of us?* If they can deal with it, so can Greinke, who has been dealing with for a few years now.

* And no, I’m not including the ‘shocking‘ increase in the number of players who needed AdderAll prescriptions after baseball banned greenies (which, unlike steroids, definitely didn’t help players’ performance in the past, even if they did do them, which they totally didn’t.).

Fourth, again without minimizing the seriousness of mental health issues, keep in mind that in February 2006, Greinke was just 22. Undoubtedly, social anxiety was the primary factor in Greinke’s difficulties at the time, but it’s also an age at which many people are at a crossroads. In The New Bill James Historical Abstract, James recounts the 1978 tale of the 22-year old Robin Yount, who, like Greinke, had been brought up at a very young age and was going through something of a career crisis, as the Brewers were considering moving him off of shortstop. Like Greinke, Yount thought about leaving baseball entirely (in Yount’s case, to take up professional golf). Some saw this as immaturity, but, as James writes after he returned to baseball

…Yount became a better player than he had been before; his career got traction from the moment he returned. What I didn’t see at the time was that Yount was in the process of making a commitment to baseball… What looked like indecision or sulking was really the process of making a decision… In the biographies of men and nations, success often arrives in the mask of failure (p. 594)

Greinke’s case (aside from the obvious) is obviously different than Yount’s, but there are similarities. Greinke, too, wanted to leave baseball behind for good. But that’s clearly not the case now. Contrary the “Zack’s just so goofy!” stereotype sometimes projected onto him (due to some memorable quotes), the main picture one gets is of a guy who is super-competitive (in everything — Brian Bannister has called Greinke “the most competitive peson I’ve ever met in my life.”) and driven.

Moreover, given baseball’s relative unconcern with its drinking problem, why would teams be concerned about a guy who got help for a treatable problem four years ago when they don’t seem to care all that much about players hitting the town every night while on the road? I’m not moralizing, I’m just “wondering” which is more detrimental to high-level athletic performance. Who knows?.*

* It’s hard to imagine, but maybe Greinke also hits the town with a world-historically awesome entourage of Kyle Farnsworth (Drama), Brian Bannister (“E”), and Billy Butler (Turtle). Um, not that I watch that stupid show.

But I digress. There are many reasons why someone might (wrongly, in my opinion) prefer one pitcher or another to Zack Greinke. Relative to all the various factors, Greinke’s issues with social anxiety shouldn’t be one of them.

Wrapping up my series on first-pitch aggressiveness I am ready to address the second question I put froward in Monday’s post: to see whether it first-pitch aggressiveness against good pitchers pays off. Before I do that, though, I want to address a suggestion from the comments section of Monday’s post who wanted to see Monday’s chart broken up by batter quality.

I took Tango’s suggestion:

Right, what the others have been saying. Chipper is a career .400 (wOBA) hitter. I’d rather see five charts with the breakdown at those levels:
.380+ hitters
.350-.380
.320-.350
.290-.320
under .290

Here are the z-swing rates for these five groups of batters for first pitches and subsequent pitches by pitcher xFIP. The color of the line indicates the group with the lightest gray the worst hitters and black the best. The dotted lines are for first pitches and solid for all others.

Sorry that the graph is a little cluttered, but that is the point. There is noclear relationship, if I had included the standard errors for these lines the five first-pitch ones would overlap completely and the five subsequent-pitches ones would as well. All five groups have pretty much the same swing rates and no clear trend depending on the xFIP of the opposing pitcher. So Jones’s first-pitch aggressiveness against good pitchers is unique compared to not only the average batter, but also compared to his peer group of very good batters too.

Ok now we can turn our attention to how this behavior affects the result of an at-bat. I break at-bats into one of four groups: those with first pitches in the zone and swung at, in the zone and taken, out of the zone and swung at, and out of the zone and taken. For each group I calculate the wOBA of the at-bat and plot against the pitcher’s xFIP. Color indicates whether the pitch was in the zone, black in the zone and red out. Line style whether the pitch was swung at, solid swung at and dotted taken.

First look at the first pitches out of the zone (red). There is a huge difference, no matter at the quality of the pitcher, in the result of at-bats when these pitches are swung at or taken. The difference between starting an at-bat 1-0 versus out-of-zone contact or starting 0-1 is great, even against poor pitchers. I think this goes a long way in explaining batter’s low swing rates on first pitches. Batters cannot tell for sure whether the pitch will be in the zone, and better to not swing.

On first pitches in the zone there is not quite as much difference, but the size of the difference expands as the pitcher gets better. So not swinging at a first pitch in the zone against a good pitcher results in a great deficit (versus swinging at it) than not swinging at a first pitch in the zone against a poor pitcher. This would suggest that swinging at first pitches more often against good pitchers is a good idea. But only if you have a good idea whether the ball will be in the zone or not, because the disadvantage of swinging at a first pitch out of the zone is just so great.

I think this is the reason Jones is well poised to exploit this difference and swing so often on first pitches against better pitchers. Few batters have his ability to swing at balls in the zone and not those out of the zone.

Following up the recent Top 10 lists for each club in Major League Baseball, we now have the Top 50 prospects in the American League. Tomorrow, we’ll look at the Top 50 prospects in the National League. On Friday, we’ll unveil the Top 100 MLB prospects list, which will be a blend of the two lists. I’d like to thank both Bryan Smith and Erik Manning for their inputs on the lists.

We have a pretty exciting year planned for prospect analysis here at FanGraphs and RotoGraphs… so be sure to keep us bookmarked. It’s going to be an exciting year.

The Top 10 AL Prospects
1. Desmond Jennings, OF, Tampa Bay Rays
2. Neftali Feliz, RHP, Texas Rangers
3. Carlos Santana, C, Cleveland Indians
4. Jesus Montero, C/1B, New York Yankees
5. Dustin Ackley, 2B/OF, Seattle Mariners
6. Brian Matusz, LHP, Baltimore Orioles
7. Jeremy Hellickson, RHP, Tampa Bay Rays
8. Justin Smoak, 1B, Texas Rangers
9. Chris Carter, 1B, Oakland Athletics
10. Martin Perez, LHP, Texas Rangers

Just Missed the Top 10
11. Casey Kelly, RHP, Boston Red Sox
12. Aaron Hicks, OF, Minnesota Twins
13. Tim Beckham, SS, Tampa Bay Rays
14. Wade Davis, RHP, Tampa Bay Rays
15. Michael Montgomery, LHP, Kansas City Royals
16. Brett Wallace, 3B/1B, Toronto Blue Jays
17. Kyle Drabek, RHP, Toronto Blue Jays
18. Ryan Westmoreland, OF, Boston Red Sox
19. Josh Bell, 3B, Baltimore Orioles
20. Tyler Flowers, C, Chicago White Sox

The Middle of the Pack
21. Hank Conger, C, Los Angeles Angels
22. Mike Moustakas, 3B, Kansas City Royals
23. Wilson Ramos, C, Minnesota Twins
24. Casey Crosby, LHP, Detroit Tigers
25. Eric Hosmer, 1B, Kansas City Royals
26. Austin Romine, C, New York Yankees
27. Michael Taylor, OF, Oakland Athletics
28. Austin Jackson, OF, Detroit Tigers
29. Matthew Moore, LHP, Tampa Bay Rays
30. Lonnie Chisenhall, 3B, Cleveland Indians

31. Zach McAllister, RHP, New York Yankees
32. Zach Stewart, RHP, Toronto Blue Jays
33. Daniel Hudson, RHP, Chicago White Sox
34. Tanner Scheppers, RHP, Texas Rangers
35. Jacob Turner, RHP, Detroit Tigers
36. Brandon Erbe, RHP, Baltimore Orioles
37. Jordan Walden, RHP, Los Angeles Angels
38. Junichi Tazawa, RHP, Boston Red Sox
39. Jake Arrieta, RHP, Baltimore Orioles
40. Alex White, RHP, Cleveland Indians

The Final 10 AL Prospects
41. Kyle Gibson, RHP, Minnesota Twins
42. Zach Britton, LHP, Baltimore Orioles
43. Mike Trout, OF, Los Angeles Angels
44. Michael Saunders, OF, Seattle Mariners
45. Nick Hagadone, LHP, Cleveland Indians
46. J.P. Arencibia, C, Toronto Blue Jays
47. Trevor Reckling, LHP, Los Angeles Angels
48. Nick Barnese, RHP, Tampa Bay Rays
49. Hector Rondon, RHP, Cleveland Indians
50. Danny Duffy, LHP, Kansas City Royals

So there you have it… Keep in mind that these lists – regardless of who does them – are subjective and I would probably create a slightly different list if I were to do it next week. There are certainly some players that I could rank a little lower or a little higher and still feel pretty good about it.

Episode Eleven
In which the panel tries its luck.

Headlines
FIP for Hitters?: A Summary
The Problem with PrOPS
A New Metric: Regressed wOBA
… and other hits of tomorrow!

Featuring
Matthew Carruth
Matt Klaassen

Finally, you can subscribe to the podcast via iTunes or other feeder things.

Audio on the flip-flop.

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It doesn’t take a sabermetrician to know that home runs helps teams win games. They lead to run scoring, and teams that score more runs generally win more games. The other side of the situation, of course, involves preventing runs. A team might score five runs a game, but if its pitching staff allows 5.5, the team will probably lose more games than it wins. Even an anti-stat crowd would have a hard time refuting this.

In my first article for FanGraphs, just about a month ago, I addressed the reasons why Jermaine Dye remains unemployed. The inspiration came from a Ken Rosenthal article in which he discusses the situation with Dye’s agent, Bob Bry. Frustrated that his client hasn’t received an acceptable offer, Bry decries the emphasis on the defensive metrics. He thinks it’s overblown, and then turns around to say that Dye hits home runs, and when teams hit home runs they win more games. Specifically, teams that hit zero home runs in a game had a .332 winning percentage, which rose to .517 with one home run and .659 with two.

This comes as no surprise. The home run is a subset of the larger runs category, and teams that score more runs win more games. Earlier this off-season, Walk Like A Sabermetrician posted a chart breaking down teams’ win percentages when scoring X number of runs. Teams that scored three runs had a .337 win percentage, four runs had .523, and five runs had .629. In other words, pretty close to Bry’s home run numbers. Of course, since his client’s strength lies in his power, Bry doesn’t mention the flip side of the equation.

While Dye adds runs to a team’s total with his home runs, he also detracts with his defense. He does not get to balls that other right fielders do, which leads to more base runners. Where other right fielders might have caught a fly ball and ended an inning, Dye’s inability to field it costs his team not only the base runner, but also extends the inning. All of this allows opponents opportunities to score more runs. So, while Dye’s home runs increase his own team’s chances of winning, his futile defense boosts his opponents’ run totals, thus increasing their chances of winning.

Dye’s maximum value comes from the DH spot, but as Cameron noted, his handedness complicates this issue. Further hurting his opportunities, all AL teams currently have their DH situation under control. Some have a permanent DH, while others are carrying four starting outfielders, with the intention of rotating then in the DH spot. This leaves Dye without any viable prospects. If he wants to play the 2010 season he’ll have to wait until a team has an opening. Since he’s certainly the best remaining free agent position player, that opportunity should come eventually.

It does appear, though, that underestimating the value of defense costed Dye this off-season. His power undoubtedly helps, but if he’s costing his team a similar number of runs in the field why would anyone sign him to a multimillion dollar deal?

Given the media circus around the event, you surely already know the specs behind Stephen Strasburg’s Spring Training debut with the Washington Nationals yesterday: 2 IP, 2 H, 0 ER, 0 BB, 2 K, 27 pitches. If you spend any time on Twitter, you caught wind that he touched 98 mph (thankfully we have Twitter, because the radar gun didn’t kick into the TV broadcast until inning three) and threw all four of his pitches for strikes. And after the game, you probably heard that Jim Riggleman sounded a little less confident the Nationals wouldn’t start him him in the minors: “We’ll make that call as an organization. But as far as he knows, he’s like everybody else trying to make the club.”

My feelings about starting a top prospect in the Major Leagues on Opening Day have already been voiced, so we won’t re-hash that today. Instead, since Strasburg wasn’t available during the Fan Projections on this site, I want to open up a dialogue about the expectations that we have for his first season in the Majors. I want to approach this using the components that make up FIP: home runs, unintentional walks, hit by pitches and strikeouts. I’m eliminating innings pitched from the discussion — we’re going to use 150.

Why? Because it’s nice and round and possible. It accounts for either a May call-up, an early shutdown in September, or a slight injury. And I want the focus to be on the component stats. Let’s talk about each:

Home Runs: I point you to Jeff Sackmann’s study on The Hardball Times about the average college pitcher’s development, and his interesting findings that players give up more home runs as they progress through college. Strasburg was no exception: even though his sinker got better in college, and his GO/AO ratio was 1.41 as a junior, his four home runs allowed were more than expected. Now a 0.33 HR/9 isn’t bad, but the Aztec had given up just one over 134 innings in his first two seasons. Then, in the Arizona Fall League, Strasburg gave up three big flies over just 19 innings.

This is going up quickly, and I can tell you Major League players will be no easier. I’m going to go with 18 home runs allowed.

Unintentional Walks: This is, of course, one of Strasburg’s hallmarks — he walked just 50 batters in a college career almost reaching 250 innings. He did walk seven in the Arizona Fall League, so I think we can probably toss a walk rate below 2.0/9 out the window. Still, you will never find a scout that won’t rave about his fastball command. And yesterday, with his last strikeout a perfectly controlled full-count breaking ball, you saw the touch he has with all his weapons. I’m going to go with 45 walks, representing a 2.7 BB/9.

Hit By Pitches: There’s an old story about Wes Roemer, who was famous in college because he never walked anybody. His walk-less streak kept a dialogue about him going, and scouts were quick to give him a 80 on the 20-80 scale for command. However, another scout noticed that Roemer wasn’t walking people because if he got to a three ball count, he would just peg the player. I don’t think is an uncommon story in college baseball, and I tell it because it’s interesting, not that it applies to Strasburg. In fact, he hit just 7 batters in his final two seasons, and avoided them completely in the Arizona Fall League. Conservatively, let’s say 5 HBP, and move on.

Strikeouts: This is where the intrigue lies. I’m guessing it’s been a long time since Strasburg didn’t strike out a batter an inning — all three years of college, every summer baseball stop, and last fall in the Arizona Fall League. He showed yesterday that he won’t be intimidated by stars like Miguel Cabrera, who he sent to the bench with a nasty high fastball. However, he was also very sinker-heavy against the Tigers, and I wonder if the two-seam fastball won’t be his bread and butter early in the count. I also wonder if hitters won’t take the Chipper Jones approach and swing early to not fall behind. All in all, I’m projecting 135 strikeouts.

I want to hear your predictions in the comments, but those are mine — a conservative first year equaling out to a 3.95 FIP. And if you think I’m setting the under/over there, you’re wrong, because I’ll take the under.

Vesting options are an interesting bargaining tool in the market of baseball. Usually based on some sort of playing time (PAs, games started, games finished, appearances, etc.), the players’ ability theoretically decides whether or not the option vests, as the player will be benched if his performance isn’t worthy of the playing time bench mark. However, we can see some situations come up where a team can be put between a rock and a hard place with these options, as the player is performing too well to be benched but too poorly to earn the money the option guarantees. Here are two vesting options to watch for the 2010 season.

Magglio Ordonez, OF, Tigers

This is one that Dave Dombrowski and the Tigers should have been watching Ordonez’s 2009 vesting option – he only made the cut by 61 plate appearances, and if salary was as big an issue as Tigers brass made it sound when Curtis Granderson was traded, 61 plate appearances could’ve been easy to cut from his playing time. Instead, the Tigers will be paying Ordonez $18MM this season.

The same situation could come up once again this season, as 540 plate appearances will guarantee a $15MM salary for Ordonez in 2011. Even if the market rate for wins climbs back to $4MM per win next season, Ordonez’s market value likely won’t approach $15MM, as CHONE projects the 36 year old for only 2 wins. Simply put, age hasn’t been kind to Magglio since his fantastic 8.8 WAR, .438 wOBA 2007, and his defense is approaching liability territory. The Tigers would do well to avoid letting his option vest.

Kerry Wood, RP, Indians

Kerry Wood’s 2 year, $20.5MM contract was considered risky at best by many at the time of its signing. Now that the Indians don’t appear to be contenders, it looks worse, as Wood didn’t have the leads to save last year and may not this year either. Wood has an $11MM option that vests if he finishes 55 games – teams aren’t allowed to use performance-based qualifiers such as saves for options or incentives.

The Indians certainly have incentives to play Wood at the end of the games early in the season, as anything can happen with key injuries to players like Joe Nathan. Mostly, though, the Indians would do well to build up Wood’s trade value, as they could bring in some well needed young arms if Wood shows promise early in the year. As a reliever who will turn 33 this season and is averaging 1 WAR per season over the last three years, it’s unlikely that he will fulfill the value of his option. It will be interesting to see how Wood’s team handles this situation if he is on a contending team, whether that be the Indians or a hypothetical trading partner.

Jason Bartlett is an odd bird, one without a beak or visible feathers. One presumably etched in as the Rays’ leadoff hitter come the regular season. One who happens to bat righty yet struggles with pitchers who throw from the same side, at least until last season. This wouldn’t be an issue, except the league has far more right-handed starters than southpaws.

By now, everyone knows of Bartlett’s 2009 season. Fueled by an increased batting average on balls in play and doubted, in part, because he actually hit more fly balls. That means more home runs, but it also means more outs. Or it should mean. Batting Bartlett leadoff is a carryover from last season, which is fine if Bartlett could be reasonably expected to repeat his success or if this was a lineup maneuver against lefty starters and below average right-handers. Take a look at how Bartlett has fared versus righties since 2007 in various metrics:

This is nothing new. Bartlett’s career wOBA versus righties is .310, the exact number B.J. Upton posted last season, when he was (deservedly) removed from the leadoff spot and met with widespread criticism. Bartlett has faced about 29% lefties the last three years, so Bartlett’s struggles are not from unfamiliarity or small sample sizes. He just can’t hit righties.

Perhaps this is all just a head nod towards Bartlett’s 2009 production and a good-willed approach to rewarding players. But, instead of removing Bartlett from leading off now, the Rays are facing the possibility of removing him 150 at-bats into the season. It’s just a peculiar situation since the Rays have an everyday player who switch hits and seems to profile as the typical leadoff hitter.