After acquiring Austin Jackson from the Yankees last winter, the Tigers wasted no time in testing their new center fielder. Even with Johnny Damon, a career leadoff hitter, on the roster, Jim Leyland still wrote Jackson’s name in the lineup’s top spot. So far he has flourished in the role, posting a .372 wOBA, which is identical to his OBP. That is largely based on his .316 batting average, though his 8.1 percent walk rate is far from horrible. Even with his hot start, though, Jackson clearly has to make adjustments if he’s to sustain his success.

Steve Goldman and Rob Neyer discussed Jackson recently, noting the obvious: no one can sustain a .520 BABIP and a 31.9 percent line drive rate. As the latter falls back into a normal range so will the former. This hurts a player like Jackson even more, because he strikes out at a tremendous rate. In his 86 plate appearances to date he has struck out 32 times, or in 38.6 percent of his PA. We can expect that number to decline, too. But will it be to an extent that it can keep up with his declining BABIP?

At his current strikeout rate, Jackson would break Mark Reynolds’s single-season strikeout record, 223, in just 600 PA. Yet, because he bats leadoff, Jackson would have far more plate appearances during a full season. If he played 150 games at his current rate of 4.77 PA/game, he’d come to the plate 717 times. That would amount to 272 strikeouts, 49 more than the record Reynolds set last year. Of course, if Jackson continues to strike out at his current clip, chances are he won’t be long for the leadoff spot. Even at 650 PA, though, Jackson would still walk back to the dugout 247 times.

In AAA last year Jackson struck out in 24.4 percent of his plate appearances. Even if Jackson reduces his strikeout rate to that level he’d still swing and miss at strike three 175 times in 717 PA. That would represent the 29th most strikeouts in a season ever, a tie with Jay Buhner, Jose Canseco, Rob Deer, Dave Nicholson, and Gorman Thomas. As you might recognize, at least from the first three names, those guys hit for power. Jackson does not.

Jackson’s power peaked at advanced-A ball in 2007 where he posted a .221 ISO during his breakout second half. The next season, when he moved to AAA, his ISO declined to .135. During his 2009 season in AAA it barely cracked .100, sitting at .105. This year he has started the year hitting for a bit more power, a .145 ISO fueled by five doubles, two triples, and a home run. Even at that rate, though, Jackson still doesn’t hit for considerable power. Historically, this does not bode well for his future performance.

Only one player in baseball history has struck out 175 times in a season while producing an ISO of .150 or less. Jose Hernandez accomplished the feat in 2003 with just 571 PA. Jackson should not look at Hernandez as a role model of any type. In addition to his puny ISO, Hernandez posted a minuscule .287 OBP that season. For Jackson, a guy who hits leadoff, that’s unthinkable. Even if we make an adjustment and look for players who have struck out in 24 percent or more of their PA (minimum 500) with an ISO of under .150, we get only 16 names. Of those, only three — Ben Grieve in 2001, Rick Monday in 1968, and Rich Becker in 1997 — posted an OBP of .350 or better.

If the voting took place today, Jackson would be the obvious choice for AL Rookie of the Year. If he continues adapting to the majors, he could end the year in the same spot. The way he’s currently going, though, will not suffice. He has hit far more line drives than any player can sustain during a full season, and currently boasts the best BABIP in baseball by nearly .070. Even at his ridiculous .384 BABIP from last year, Jackson would show greatly different numbers. His batting average, for instance, would fall to .241. Who knows what type of effect it would have on his power numbers?

The Tigers have to be happy with the production they’ve received so far from Jackson’s hot bat, but the way he’s currently going it would be foolish to expect his run to continue. This isn’t to say he can’t adjust. He certainly can, as he showed during his minor league career. Part of that is striking out less often as fewer of the balls he puts in play drop for hits. It’s not an easy adjustment, but it’s one Jackson will need to make as we get deeper into 2010.

It is no secret that Dave Duncan is a huge fan of his pitching staff getting groundballs. He’s made a career out of taking discarded pitchers and turning them into useful parts by convincing them to get hitters to pound the ball in the dirt. As Steve Sommer showed a few weeks ago, there is a quantifiable “Duncan Effect”, where pitchers under his tutelage see a significant up tick in their GB%.

The newest member of the Fixed By Dave Duncan club is Brad Penny. You almost don’t need me to run off the numbers, as the story is so predictable. In his first four starts for St. Louis, he’s running a 53.4% GB%, which would be a career high. He’s followed the Joel Pineiro path to success by pounding the strike zone, issuing walks to just 3 of the 109 batters he’s faced this year. The groundballs and strikes combo is working like a charm, and Penny looks to be well on his way to finding career revival, thanks to Duncan’s teachings.

However, while the results are reminiscent of Pineiro’s conversion, the process is entirely different. Last year, Duncan got Pineiro to reduce the frequency with which he threw his off-speed stuff and rely heavily on his sinker, taking his fastball percentage from 58% to 71%. Penny has done the exact opposite; he threw 71 percent fastballs last year, but Duncan has him down to 51 percent this season.

Instead of his fastball, Penny has added a new pitch, a splitter (Pitch F/x calls it a change-up) that is averaging 89 MPH and has been devastatingly effective so far this year. You can see it as the big yellow blob in the first chart below, and see how this is a pitch he just wasn’t throwing last year in the graph of a game from last April below that.

His splitter has been +4.3 runs above average so far, making it one of the best pitches in baseball to date. So it’s not just a trick pitch, but an actual viable weapon. And Duncan apparently taught Penny how to throw it in a month.

For all the talk about how great Leo Mazzone was, Duncan is a guy who we have tangible evidence of his philosophies changing how guys pitch, and seeing dramatic differences in results. If you’re ever going to put a pitching coach in the Hall of Fame, it should probably be this guy. What he’s done over his career is nothing short of amazing.

Kansas City Royals top pitching prospect Mike Montgomery was promoted to Double-A yesterday, so in all likelihood, the record books will read his Carolina League career thusly: 90 batters faced, 33 strikeouts versus 4 walks, 14 hits, 1.71 GO/AO ratio, five runs allowed. His second start, a 13 strikeout, 2 hit, 1 run performance over seven innings was called by Baseball America’s J.J. Cooper (on Twitter), “[the] best minor league pitching performance I’ve ever seen in person.”

Montgomery, who will turn 21 on July 1, is headed to a more advanced, more offensive-friendly atmosphere, and away from the cozy confines of Wilmington. But if anyone is geared to succeed at such a young age in Double-A, it’s a 6-5 southpaw (death against left-handed hitters) capable of touching 95 mph with quickly-advancing secondary stuff. On the whole, we’re talking about a guy that has thrust himself into the argument of the Minors Top Southpaw, joining a group that already features a pair of future aces in Aroldis Chapman and Martin Perez.

This early season success story isn’t the only good news on the Kansas City farm front, as we have seen a bounce back year from a number of Royals prospects. Surely none more than former first-round pick Eric Hosmer, who reached base four times last night to increase his batting line to a rather ridiculous .446/.532/.631. Hosmer has drawn 12 walks in 78 plate appearances, and has a strikeout rate just north of 12%. With healthy eyes and a healthy hand, Hosmer is regaining the status that made him the 2008 draft’s consensus top prep slugger. You have to think at some point the Royals will look to get him out of Wilmington and to Northwest Arkansas, an environment more conducive to showing off the prodigious power that has been praised more in batting practices than games thus far in his career.

This might have been the rationale behind Mike Moustakas moving up to Double-A this season, as he was a candidate to repeat High-A after his poor 2009 season. I can testify to Moustakas’ ability to put on a batting practice show the same as Hosmer, so the Royals brass had to be encouraged when he began his season (late, due to a minor injury) with a two home run performance last Thursday. The California product added another blast on Saturday, and has struck out just once in his first 22 plate appearances at Double-A. While plate discipline will always be one area that Alex Gordon holds the advantage, Moustakas is quickly closing the gap in all the other areas of the game.

When the Royals minor league season began with the surprise retirement of Danny Duffy, it looked like the Royals 2010 season was bound to be as comical at the minor league level as it was in the Major Leagues. But things are looking a little brighter with the early season performances of Montgomery, Hosmer and Moustakas. Here are the other highs and lows we’ve seen through the first 18 games of the minor league season:

— Aaron Crow is getting groundballs (3.33 GO/AO), but not strikeouts (5.0 K/9) through four Double-A starts. Most concerning are the five home runs allowed, although this also means we are seeing an unsustainably high BABIP (.348) and HR/FB%. The strikeouts are all that concerns me so far.

— You have to love the re-emergence of Johnny Giavotella, who is hitting .377/.473/.459 through 17 games in Double-A. The little second baseman has been especially hot in his last eight games, where he’s 17-or-32 with six walks. Not like the Royals could use it.

— Not a long of good things are showing up in Tim Melville’s lines in Wilmington, as he’s allowed something like 34 of the 70 batters he has faced to reach base. I’ve yet to hear a good explanation for the struggles, which might be as simple as he’s unable to find the strike zone. Too early to worry, but you can’t count him as an early season success story.

— How about Derrick Robinson and his .308/.400/.462 batting line? Most impressive are the 10 walks in 17 games, including two yesterday, which led to a perfect 4-for-4 day on the basepaths. This almost reminds me of when the light finally came on for Denard Span in 2008, and he realized just how dangerous a patient, fleet-footed, slap hitter could be.

— The dominance that Wil Myers showed in short-season ball last year might not have been a good thing for him, because I’m not sure the Royals would have sent him to the Midwest League at 19 years old otherwise. The .225/.282/.408 batting line isn’t where you’d like it, but look between the lines and there’s some good things: two home runs in last 3 games, a 1.013 OPS in a tiny sample vs. LHP, and he’s thrown out 7-of-17 baserunners. Like most MWL teenagers, he’s in over his head, but he has the talent to have long-term success in Burlington.

— Out goes Danny Duffy, in comes John Lamb as the second southpaw in the Royals farm system. Lamb’s full season debut, also at 19 in Burlington, has begun exquisitely, with a 1.00 ERA, 23 strikeouts and 23 baserunners in 18 innings. I am depressed to have missed seeing Lamb live two weeks ago, but early praise has been around the advancement of his change-up, giving a real second weapon against right-handed hitters. He’s one to look out for.

Ultimately, the reason we gave Kansas City the nod over Houston for the #29 spot in our organizational rankings was because the Royals had more upside in their minor league system. Depth is always nice in the minors, but most important is the development of stars. I see a few with the potential listed above, and that might just lead to an improvement upon #29 next year.

[Statistics presented are prior to last night’s game]

Rangers fans are likely quite happy with their new DH’s production through his first 17 games. Vladimir Guerrero has posted a .409 wOBA in his first 73 plate appearances as a Texas Ranger, largely on the strength of a .364 batting average. Guerrero has only hit 2 home runs this year, a mark well below his career rate of one home run per 19 plate appearances and his 8.0% HR/FB rate is the lowest of his career. This is continuing a concerning loss of power from last season.

This is summed up quite succinctly by the following graph:

In his most productive years – including the 23 wins he compiled from 2002-2005, the first 4 years of the Win Value era – Vlad’s ISOs were over 100 points above the league average. His prolific power was mostly supported by the ability to consistently blast home runs. We only have HR/FB data from 2002 on, but in those first 4 seasons, Guerrero’s HR/FB rate was above 17% for all of them and even above 20% for the 2002 and 2003 seasons, well above the league average rate of 11.5%.

In 2009, his ISO plummeted to .164 and his HR/FB rate dove to 11.5%, both career lows. As a result, Guerrero posted a career low 110 wRC+, and given his position as DH, a career low WAR of 0.8. The projection systems all foresaw a rebound to 2008 levels of hitting produciton – .303/.365/.521 and a 130 wRC+. However, Guerrero turned 35 over the offseason, and a drop in power could certainly be caused by old age – especially given the beating his knees took on the turf of Olympic Stadium in Montreal from 1996 to 2003.

Guerrero’s 7.6% strikeout percentage is what is currently keeping his batting line so high. Given his career strikeout rate of 12.4% (14.4% the last two years) and the fact that his O-Swing% has risen to over 50% – nearly double the league average – it is unlikely that this rate stays so low. That combined with likely BABIP regression will bring Guerrero’s line rapidly down to earth. Even though Guerrero’s season has started excellently, don’t be surprised if 2009 Vlad rears its ugly head in the upcoming months.

My goal at the start of the research for this article was to develop a quick methodology (i.e. not digging into individual game logs) to find out how effectively teams were deploying their relievers. My first cut was to take a team’s qualifying relievers ranked by gmLI and compare that to the same set of relievers ranked by CHONE ERA. The simple numerical representation I used was the absolute value of the difference between individual pitcher’s rankings summed over each team. For example a player that was ranked 2nd on his team in gmLI, but 3rd in CHONE ERA would have a difference of 1, so a team that has two players flipped would get a total score of 2. So, according to this metric, who is doing well so far? The Rays, Twins and Phillies all have a score of 2, and the next tier is the Cubs Marlins and Orioles with 4. The bottom list consists of the Indians and White Sox at 16, and the Rangers at 14*. Full list can be found here.

That brings me to observation number two, a couple of guys that have already seen their role (read leverage) shift. Randy Williams of the White Sox is ranked 2nd in gmLI and 6th (out of 7) in CHONE ERA for his bullpen, and it seems like Ozzie has figured this out. Here’s a chart of his LI (in this case pLI as it was easier to scrape from the game logs) by appearance

That, my friends, is being put in the reliever doghouse.

On the flip side is Jason Bulger of the Angels. He ranks 4th in gmLI, but 1st in CHONE ERA. Scioscia also seems to be figuring this out as here’s his chart.

I’ll willingly admit that my quick little metric from above might not be the best way to judge a managers bullpen usage, but what do you guys think? Fans of the teams that were in the top or bottom lists, does your team appearing there make sense? Is it worth looking at this retrospectively (i.e. for 2009)?

*I didn’t adjust for Starter to Reliever conversions, so that likely affects the Rangers ranking.

Episode Twenty-Two
In which the panel takes a deep breath.

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Justin Smoak: The Man Who Launched 1000 Puns
Marc Hulet Hearts Sinkerballers
¿Que Pasa, Lou Piniella?
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Zach Sanders, Deep Breather

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When David Price was made the number one selection out of Vanderbilt, the comparisons for him were all over the place. The most obvious comparison – in size and tone – was CC Sabathia. Like the Yankees’ gentle and svelte ace, Price threw a high octane fastball and complemented the heat with a slider. Through yesterday, Price and Sabathia had a near equal fastball velocity. The only other southpaws comparable to the 93-94 MPH heat are Jon Lester, Francisco Liriano, and Brett Anderson.

Price is arguably the least accomplished of the quintet. What, with Sabathia and Lester being perennial Cy Young contenders and Liriano and Anderson having two of the better rookie seasons in recent pitching memory. Price made 23 starts and posted a 4.49 FIP in the tough American League East while struggling with his secondary stuff and – at times, especially early on – his control.

If he can pitch like he did on Sunday afternoon, he’ll fit right in. Against a rather weak lineup, Price struck out nine, walked one, allowed no runs, and completed his first career shutout. The Jays had Jose Molina, Mike McCoy, John McDonald, and Alex Gonzalez all playing, and with Adam Lind being a lefty, Price had a relatively easy go of things.

Price has altered his pitching this season. He’s no longer using the slider as his secondary pitch. Instead, he’s using that spike curve he picked up last season. He’s gained enough confidence in it to start batters of either hand off with it. He’s still hanging it a little too much for comfort, but Price’s fastball is so ethereal that hitters can’t sit on his curve. Put it this way. Roughly 13% of his four-seamers were whiffed on entering yesterday, while around 6% of his sliders and an additional 6% of his curves resulted in Wiimote-style empty swings.

Some would call that ‘learning to pitch’ while others would call it mixing his pitches better. Either way, the 2010 Price experience can be summed up in one at-bat. In his start against the New York Yankees, Price faced Curtis Granderson and worked him with a slider, curve, and fastball all within a three pitch sequence. The velocity readings were something like 75, 88, and 95. Totally unfair to Granderson.

His homer per fly ball rate is a little too low to sustain, but Price seems on his way to having a fine season.

When the news first broke and the details started to emerge, I was tempted to fill this entire article with just me laughing. My co-writers convinced me that while an appropriate response, that was not quite informative enough so I have relented and will actually map out the value of Ryan Howard’s new extension. I’m laughing pretty hard, though, in case you wanted to picture it.

Howard receives $20 million in 2012 (his age 32 season) and ’13, $25 million per from 2014 through ’16 and there is a team option on 2017 (his age 37 season) for $23 million that costs the Phillies $10 million to buy out. They even threw in a limited no trade clause.

The extension kicks in after Howard’s current 3-year, $54-million deal ends in 2011. I wrote about that deal back in February of 2009 when the Phillies avoided arbitration with him by signing it. I was not a fan of the deal at the time but pointed out the Phillies were bound by the arbitration process and the way it tends to overvalue the skills that Howard had in excess and marginalize the skills that he lacked. There is no such rationalization here as this new deal covers only free agent years.

Howard did well in 2009, besting projections by about a win. That made him a solid bet to produce the amount of value needed to match his salary from 2009-11. Projecting Howard’s performance from 2012-7 is incredibly difficult. We’re not only looking very far into the future, but we’re doing so with a hitting profile that historically ages awfully. Richie Sexson, Cecil Fielder, Mo Vaugn, David Ortiz, Tony Clark and others are among Ryan Howard’s most comparable hitters according to Baseball-Reference. All of them dropped off harshly in their early 30s. About the only success story in Howard’s top ten comparables in Willie McCovey.

Even if you think baseball’s salary per win goes up to $4.25 million this coming offseason and rises at a 5% clip every winter through 2017, Howard will need to produce an average of 4.75 wins from 2012 through 2017 just in order to justify his salary. If you factor in that Howard gets (even more) long-term security from this deal, then that average production levels goes up to 5.3 wins.

In other words, Howard will need six seasons that were better than his 2009 season, except over his 32-37 years. I’m not sure I would lay even money on him achieving even half of that. This contract is both incredibly risky and unnecessary since Howard was already signed through 2011. Say hello to baseball’s newest worst contract.

Some guys are really hitting a lot of home runs, but it’s early. Everyone knows it’s early, but rather than getting into what constitutes an acceptable sample size for analysis, let’s look at a concrete example using an unsubtle, but helpfully simple tool.

Another thing that everyone knows is that Ryan Howard (any news on him today?) has monster power to all fields. While there are a few sluggers who hit around 25% of their fly balls out of the park, from 2007-2009 Ryan Howard hit an incredible 29.4% out of the park, far and away the best among qualified hitters during that period. Let’s call that the “Howard Zone.” Many players who are playing far above or far below their true talent in different areas so far this season. Let’s look at one extreme — the six players who have hit 30% or more of their fly balls out of the park so far in 2010, players who are (currently) beyond the Howard Zone.

Jason Heyward, 40.0%. I won’t bore you with another recititation of Heyward’s sudden legend. Despite some problems with pitches in the dirt, his overall numbers show a guy who isn’t swinging at many bad pitches (21.9 O-Swing%). He’s got great power, but no one has 40% HR/FB power. At least I don’t think so. One thing to watch is Heyward’s ability to get the ball into the air as the season progresses. So far, he actually isn’t hitting that many fly balls (26.3%), and is hitting a bunch of grounders (55.3%). I’m not sounding any alarms, but it’s something to watch.

Nelson Cruz, 36.8%. Cruz has always shown power (.231 career ISO), but this is beyond him. Yes, the park helps, but he’s a good hitter that actually passed through waivers a few years ago. Despite the inevitable power regression from terrifying to merely excellent, he could be in for a monster season. Have people noticed he’s probably a better player than Josh Hamilton?

Kelly Johnson, 36.8%. Speaking of being helped by a park… Jack Moore covered Johnson this morning, so I’ll keep it brief: Johnson’s always had good offensive skills, but he’s not going to finish the season with anything close his current .492 ISO, but 20+ home runs is realistic. Great pickup by Arizona.

Ty Wigginton, 35.3%. I just realized that Ty Wigginton and Garrett Atkins are two different people. Ty’s the one who can hit. Okay, so he’s not going to his more than a third of his fly balls out, but so far, he’s hitting righties just about as well as lefties, although his career splits aren’t as horrible as one might think, given his reputation. He’s a useful hitter in a part-time role, but his presence on this list should be a warning to all those who think that Vernon Wells‘ and Jose Guillen’s power resurgences (with lower HR/FB rates thatn Wigginton) are for real.

Paul Konerko, 32.0%. A big .400 wOBA start from the guy in the last season of a seemingly endless contract. His career HR/FB rate is 16.7%, and he hasn’t been over 20% since 2005.

Derek Jeter, 30.0%. Despite the big overall surge in 2009 and a new stadium that helped his power output, no one expects Jeter to continue this. Indeed, despite the great fortune on fly balls so far, his 2010 ISO is merely a decent .158, and Jeter is hitting about 74% of his balls in play into the ground.

We here at Fangraphs are big Brett Anderson fans: Dave Cameron has a huge crush on him; I fawned over his crazy slider; Marc Hulet saw him as the AL ROY favorite last August and then was devastated when he missed out on him in his fantasy auction; and, RJ Anderson and David Golebiewski see him as one of the game’s top starters. So when a commenter to my post last Thursday on Sheets shifting his position on the mound noted that Brett Anderson used to do this too, I jumped at the opportunity to check it out.

In this image I plot the histogram of his horizontal release points versus RHBs (solid) and LHBs (dash). In April and May he had two clear release points: one to RHBs and another shifted to the extreme arm-side of the mound to LHBs. But starting in June and continuing for the rest of the season — and in his starts so far this season — he uses a single location on the mound, the one he had previously used just to RHBs. On the right side of the graph it shows the number of Ks and BBs he had that game. (There is no pitchf/x data for his April 28th start.)

We all know that correlation does not equal causation — so we cannot say that Anderson started doing better because he stopped using two different positions on the mound — but it is interesting that at the same time he dropped the second position on the mound he also started pitching much better (FIP of 5.88 in April and May versus a FIP of 3.04 from June on).