All-Joy Team: Third Base

Much like Shaquille O’Neal in his prime and/or the libidos of our nation’s politicians, one can’t stop the All-Joy Team, but only hope to contain it.

Yes, we here at the Fidrych Institute (the country’s pre-eminent joy-related think tank) have had our fingers in all manner of multimedia pies recently (comme ci, commme ca), but the luminous mystery of the All-Joy Team has never been far from our minds.

To recap, in our latest episode, we’d just elected Kelly Johnson and Adam Rosales to All-Joy status, bringing the current pre-season roster to its current state:

C	Kurt Suzuki
1B	Brian Myrow
2B	Kelly Johnson
SS	Ben Zobrist
LF	Chris Heisey
CF	Ryan Sweeney
RF	Daniel Nava
UTIF	Adam Rosales

SP	Billy Buckner
SP	Jason Godin
RP	Brandon League
RP	Kevin Jepsen

The reader will notice that, with the exception of a few positional omissions, the above bears a shocking resemblance to a field-able baseball team. Exciting, is the only word for that. Now, let’s see if we can’t clean this up.

Today, you get a third baseman; tomorrow, a designated hitter.

3B: Alex Gordon, Kansas City

Basketball analyst John Hollinger has coined the term “second draft” to describe the acquisition of players who (a) have, at one point, been considered prospects, (b) have fallen from prospect status, (c) have played out the duration of their rookie contracts, but (d) are still young enough so’s to make good on their early promise. Because of the extent of control that MLB organizations exert over their players, this entire cycle can actually occur before the young player escapes his arbitration years.

The Rise and Fall and Other Rise of Alex Gordon is a bad name for a book. But I think, before his tenure in Kansas City is through, it’ll be an accurate one. Even just three years ago, Gordon was receiving Wieters-esque attention from people who know what’s what. It was in that year, 2007, that Gordon was number one overall on Kevin Goldstein’s Top 100 Prospects list, number one on John Sickels’ Top 50 Hitting Prospects list, and the second overall prospect on Baseball America’s list — behind Daisuke Matsuzaka, which is kinda cheating, seeing as the latter had already been a star for a while in Japan and was 26 years old.

In light of the hype, Gordon’s freshman campaign was a relative disappointment, although still good enough for a 2.1 WAR. In his second season, he improved his batting mark to a 109 wRC+ from the 89 wRC+ he posted in his rookie season. Even with a drop in UZR and 30 fewer PAs, he still improved his WAR to 2.4. Last year he hurt his hip early in the season, and his end-of-year numbers suffered predictably. But look here: you still have a guy with at least a league-average bat, most likely an average glove at third, and a great pedigree. He’s turning 26, which means he’s got some projection left, and CHONE likes him to post a 114 wRC+ this season with exactly league-average third-basing — good for a 2.6 WAR in only 479 PAs. Not earth-shattering, sure, but good.

Gordon does have one proverbial strike against him, in that he’s a Royal. Though I don’t know of any hard evidence to support this, there’s something to be said for organizational culture, and my sense is that — and again, I’m speculating wildly — but my sense is that some players will underperform their talent level in certain situations. Obviously, Gordon’s teammate Zack Greinke is a glaring example of the exact opposite phenomenon. But I also think of a player like Felipe Lopez, who did some interesting things in Cincinnati before moving to the uber-woeful Nationals, where he proceeded to play like Willie Bloomquist*. Then, as you probably know, Lopez was sent to St. Louis, where he once again began hitting and playing like a legitimately talented player. Ditto last year, during which he posted a career-high 4.6 WAR in stints with Arizona and Milwaukee. I’m curious as to whether the baleful effects of Kansas City’s mediocrity could affect Gordon’s ability to realize his potential so long as he’s there.

*No exaggeration here. From 2006 to 2008, Lopez had a -0.1 WAR in 1354 PAs with Washington. Over the same stretch, Bloomquist registered a 0.8 WAR in 663 Mariner PAs. You could make the argument that he was protected from certain, tougher pitchers or whatever, but still.