Crawford Will Be Okay in Boston
A lot of ink and keystrokes have been used over the awful start by Carl Crawford in a Red Sox uniform. After signing a massive seven-year contract worth $142 million, Crawford is being booed by the Fenway faithful less than three weeks into the season. Coming into Tuesday night’s games, the leftfielder was hitting just .133/.175/.167 in his first 63 plate appearances. A year after topping 60 extra base-hits and 40 stolen bases, he had just two of each through 14 contests.
Thus far, Terry Francona has moved Crawford around in the lineup and given him a day off to try and jumpstart his new toy; however, nothing has worked. Truth be told, no change in lineup or day off will cure what ails Crawford. As Jonah Keri would say, only time will.
If you’re a regular reader of Fangraphs.com, you already know this. That said, even the most knowledgeable followers of the game can get sucked up in the sample-size tidal wave. Crawford’s current streak is horrific. He has been the worst offensive player (.159 wOBA) in the major leagues by quite some margin. The good news for Boston fans is it will not be this way all season.
Crawford has dug himself a sizeable hole, but not much has changed about his hitting profile. In terms of discipline rates, he is walking less than normal (3.2% vs. 5.4% career) and striking out slightly more than his career total (16.7% vs. 15.4% career). Meanwhile, both are small sample sizes and still right in line with his career numbers.
A low number of walks has never been a problem for Crawford because he has always hit his way on base. Here is where we have a huge problem. When looking at batted ball types, Crawford’s current LD, GB, and FB rates are pretty close to where he ended last season. On the other hand, his BABIP is an absurdly low .160. It is pretty safe to assume that this number will come close to doubling by the end of the season.
The first set of stats that tend to stabilize pretty quickly are swing related. Again, Crawford is not doing much differently here, either. His percentage of swings on pitches outside the zone is within reach of his career rate. He is also making contact at a similar rate and is actually whiffing less than usual. The one change that sticks out is his swings in the strike zone.
Crawford’s swing rate is down around 6% overall. It is down more than 10% on pitches in the zone. This could explain some of his problems considering he is making good contact when he does swing in the zone. Perhaps he is just not seeing the ball well right now or simply guessing incorrectly, but he is not offering at pitches that one would think are hittable pitches if they are falling within the four quadrants of the strike zone.
There are certain things Crawford will always struggle with. Left-handed pitchers and pitches in the dirt are a few of those things. On the other hand, making contact, getting on-base, and wreaking havoc once he does are not. After following “CC” for nearly a decade, these types of streaks are not uncommon. Had this streak come after a 15-for-20 start to the season, it would not be as big of deal. But with new money comes new pressure and expectations. It is frustrating to watch. It is downright ugly, actually; however, at some point he will turn back into the old Crawford.
Tommy Rancel also writes for Bloomberg Sports and ESPNFlorida.com. Follow on twitter @TRancel
Duh!! Shame on any doubters.
Not an insult to this article at all. Just to the reactive haters.
Career:
CF V.Wells (32): 6037pa, .344woba, -4.4uzr/150
LF Crawford (29): 5461pa, .345woba, 14.1uzr/150
(note the position when looking at defensive rating)
2011
LF V.Wells (32): 74pa, .221woba, 24.5uzr/150
LF Crawford (29): 66pa, .166woba, -65.2uzr/150
Contracts
V.Wells: $21.5m/4yrs
Crawford: $21.3m/7yrs
WAR over past 4 seasons:
Crawford – 18
Wells – 7
……thanks to questionable defensive ratings at the least important defensive position in baseball for Crawford, compared to questionable defensive ratings at one of the most important defensive positions in baseball for Wells.
I am of the opinion that doubles to left field are of similar importance to doubles to center.
So everdiso thinks that left field is the least important position on the defensive spectrum AND that Crawford’s defense there is “questionable.” Is that right??? Can’t be…
WAR the 4 years before each of their big pay days
Crawford – 18.1
Wells – 16.4
Also Wells was younger at the time of his contract. Crawfords deal pays him $16 million dollars more. It’s funny how people view Wells deal as terrible but I haven’t heard anything about Crawford’s deal even being questionable, am I missing something?
The Crawford contract makes a little more sense largely because left fielders tend to age better than center fielders. That said, it could certainly turn into a Wells-like bust.
“left fielders tend to age better than center fielders.”
Wouldn’t an aging CF make the perfect LF?
@ adohaj — “are you missing anything?”
Yes, you’re missing the value of the dollar and the market value of free agents at the time the contracts were signed.
No idea what your point is, but those 2011 numbers are worthless.
they do give us an early snapshot of how Verno’s defensive value may change with the position switch, and how Crawford’s defensive value may change with the move to the least defensively important home left field in baseball.
Since crawford’s only edge over Wells coming into this year was ENTIRELY, 100% defensively, it’s more than interesting to look at the early returns, however small the sample size may be.
And of course you have an idea what my point is – the point couldn’t be any clearer.
No, since all you did was post some numbers, and since half of those numbers are meaningless, I didn’t bother to take the time to deduce what you may have implied by your ramblings.
You absolutely cannot make any meaningful deductions from 15 games of UZR. You have wasted our time.
How can you not infer what his meaning is? It’s pretty obvious.
Is it? Enlighten me.
Crawford the player adored by the fangraphs community is much more similar to Vernon Wells than people realize. At least value wise basically my post in response to MV
I guess you can choose the “bury your head in the sand” approach. Solid move in this case, I agree.Deny, deny, deny, and maybe it’ll just go away.
Won’t change the fact that Crawford’s entire advantage over Wells has always been based on questionable defensive metrics – and that the potential change in these metrics from both players leaving the one home team and park they’ve ever played in, with one moving to a new team and position and the other moving to the most unique LF in baseball, is definitely a factor that bears keeping a very close eye on going forward.
Many have speculated that Crawford’s defenisve numbers were fairly bizarre and could easily be inflated and might change significantly in a new setting, while many have also speculated that Wells’ defensive talents might turn him into a pretty special left fielder defensively.
It just so happens that the early returns – both in the numbers, AND the eye tests – seem to support those views so far, and while the numbers are obviously inflated at the moment, it’s quite possible that they do indicate at least a direction in which each player’s defensive metrics might move this year, in their new situations.
Either way, an interesting test as to the value of current defensive metrics – because defensive metrics were pretty much the only thing separating what many considered the best signing of the offseason with what many considered the biggest albatross contract in baseball this offseason.
Many have speculated that Crawford’s defenisve numbers were fairly bizarre and could easily be inflated
Oh really, who exactly has speculated that?
The bottom line is, the entire caveat of UZR and defensive metrics is that you need a large sample size. You can believe whatever you want to believe after a dozen games. It means nothing. You are simply wrong. And stubborn. And an Angels fan, likely.
Quoting a UZR sample after 15 games. Bad post.
small sample or no, if Wells becomes a plus defensive player in LF, then there goes most of the advantage Crawford has over him as a player.
early returns, both the numbers and the eye test, are very good for Verno in LF.
and if Crawford’s bizarre WAR line based on near-unbelievable defensive ratings at a position chock full of bad defensive players is negatively effected by his move to Fenway’s “unique” LF, well, then, Crawford loses all his edge over Verno entirely.
and Verno is the “albatross of all albatross” contracts in the league, or so I’ve heard.
Said at the site where seasonal UZR stats are updates every 6 days or so?
Articles by FG authors have quoted 2011 UZR numbers.
Anything written about baseball from April to August could be “SSS’d” as a response.
—————————————
A lot of folks are getting kinda worked up about Crawford’s past defensive metrics. Given the discussions about UZR, I’m not sure why.
Check this Out …
http://www.beyondtheboxscore.com/2011/3/30/2081259/best-left-fielders
Fielding Runs from 2006-2010
——————————
Carl Crawford: 59.6
Alfonso Soriano: 57.5
There’s no way ANY of us would say Soriano is even in the same realm as Crawford as a defender. But, since we say that, perhaps we shouldn’t refer to seasonal WAR, especially for a player who gets a lot of value from defense.
On the other hand, why the hell bring up Vernon Wells in this thread?
Why is it any different than quoting offensive stats after 15 games. Fact is, Crawford has not fielded well nor hit well, and the numbers have reflected that. Neither are predictive because it is a SSS, but that does not mean they should be ignored..
Crawford may well be another victim of UZR’s approach to Fenway (whatever happened to those H-A splits we were promised last year), but there were some balls hit over his head that bounced short of the wal he should have had, one of which made lackey very unhappy (hands in the air). His arm is also a bit disappointing. Guess thats why he was not in RF..
Career numbers? What does how these players played a decade ago have to do with how they play now?
Since 2007:
Wells’ wOBA – .334
Crawford’s wOBA – .357
hey, you can slice and dice the numbers any which way you like to make yourself feel better about crawford.
Interesting use of the oh so common and often-used 4-year split, btw.
Too bad you couldn’t get as much separation using the 3yr or 5yr split, or the last year + this year split, eh?
3 years: .344 to .355
5 years: .344 to .359
Good job trying to use <75 PA to evaluate them by the way.
“hey, you can slice and dice the numbers any which way you like to make yourself feel better”
Yes, you’ve already demonstrated that point a handful of times today.
Unsurprisingly, Kyle, you selected the sample that showed best what you wanted it to show. I’m guessing you’re still choosing not to include this year’s numbers in your splits, of course.
and Xenophanes, forget the handful, just point out one example of me slicing and dicing numbers.
Please refer to your initial post. You compare Wells’ and Crawford’s career stats in wOBA and UZR in trying to eliminate a disparity in skill between the two. However, more recent data–far more relevant–shows it’s not-so-close as you would leave others to believe, i.e. 2 of Crawford’s 3 best seasons UZR-wise and wOBA-wise have come over the last 2 years. Wells’ best years by wOBA and UZR are not even remotely recent, nevermind his inability to have solid seasons back-to-back since 2006. As MV said before:
“WAR over past 4 seasons:
Crawford – 18
Wells – 7”
Stop criticizing others for cherry picking stats if you do it yourself.
I used 4 years because that’s what I always use, I didn’t check to see how many years made it look the best. Don’t believe me? Don’t care.
Regardless of whether you choose 4 or 3 or 5 it still makes the same point. Crawford is better offensively; the difference is not 100% defense. I still don’t see any point in including stats from a couple dozen games this year, other than it makes your point look more valid.
@KyleL I was referring to everdiso’s cherry picking, not yours. I used yours as reason why everydiso was cherry picking stats; I completely agree with you.
Yeah, my response was actually to everdiso as well.
I iz dumb.
wait, so now using an unheard of 4yr split (which conveniently happens to be the way to show the biggest disparity between the two players) is the fair way to compare players?
and using their total stats, with no slicing and dicing at all, is cherry picking?
if you have to go to Bizarro world to make crawford look better, I think that shows the weakness in your argument right there.
of course we can make excuses and eliminate years you don’t think reflect Crawford’s real ability, just like I could choose to eliminate Wells’ 2007 and 2009 campaigns based on his injuries in those years, but slicing and dicing the numbers like that only leads to bias creeping into the comparison.
I’m of the opinion that, since Crawford would have been very valuable in Yankee Stadium’s expansive LF, and I don’t doubt for a second that the Yankees wanted him, bad, any discussions on his true value to the Sox should consider the massive upgrade he would have been to Gardner.
My math:
Crawford (Boston) = 4-5 WAR
Crawford (NY) upgrade to Gardner = 2 WAR
Crawford value to Boston = 6-7 WAR
I also fail to understand why anyone would compare two totally different players, in Crawford and Wells. Having similar contracts and skin color is not a good basis for comparison.
A bit late to the party, but I don’t follow the ‘questionable defensive rating’ argument against Crawford:
In each year, 2008, 2009, and 2010, he has very high marks in UZR, DRS, and TZL (and very high marks in 2009 and 2010 in FSR with no 2008 data). There are 11 numbers, across 3 years and 4 metrics, and every single one is double digit positive. His Aggregate Defensive Rating is 15, 18, and 14 in those years.
My comment was more to the questionable reliability of defensive stats in general.
It’s a strawman argument in an attempt to say that Wells is as good as Crawford. When the numbers don’t work in your favor, blame the methodology (and then use a 15 game sample of them to say that Wells is as good as Crawford).
Actually, the numbers we have do say that Wells and Crawford are similar offensively, and defenisvely as LFers. It’s just that the defensive numbers for Wells as a LFer are far too small to draw any conclusions from – though early indications are that he’s very good out there, and that’s not really a surprise to many.
P.S. I don’t think you understand what “strawman argument” means.
They likely need him to be better than okay.
The situation is that even when his BABIP normalizes, he’ll have a “down” season due to the start.
As we discussed the other day … a bad start doesn’t mean he’ll hit .370 for a month to “balance out”.
Being BABIP dependent is always a concern, especially for a guy whose value consists of stealing bases. “You can’t steal first base” is an oldie but a goodie.
He will bounce back. The questions are when and how much?
Yea, the short version of my post below is – this is not just bad luck. He has hit countless dying quail, and is simply not squaring the ball up. When you don’t hit the ball hard, you don’t get hits. Luck and execution are about equal culprits for his horrific start. Give him good luck over those PAs and he’s still not at an acceptable level of performance.
Had this streak come after a 15-for-20 start to the season…
Hahaha… has ANYONE ever gone 15-20 to start a season? That’s a pretty absurd off hand comment.
I’ve watched probably 80% of Crawford’s PAs so far, and I will give a qualitative assessment:
Yes, his babip is godawful, and a big culprit there is because he’s hitting grounders right at infielders. And while he has hit some balls hard, he’s definitely not getting the barrel of the bat on the ball as much as he should be. He’s hit quite a few weak FB, and those are less bad luck and more poor execution. He looks a little bit lost. He falls behind in counts, then makes bad swings. He borderlines on looking jittery. I never liked his ridiculous stance, and I feel like he has to rush to square himself up.
In the end, I’m sure he will be fine, but if you “re-ran” his PAs so far, he’s not anywhere close to his career line. His true talent over these atbats is probably .250-.275 wOBA, while that’s certainly a whole lot better than .166, he has been legitimately bad, (and legitimately unlucky.) I guess that’s really the only way you have a wOBA of .166 over 66 PA.
Your assessment mirrors my own (keep in mind I’ve only seen 4 games). He looks more tentative and unsure than he usually does and I suspect he’s overthinking in the box. If I’m right, he will be a significantly worse player than vintage Carl Crawford until he stops thinking. You can’t hit a pitch by thinking about it.
Yea, it’s like he’s torn between being patient and being aggressive. Just wound a little too tight between the ears. There’s some rock solid sabermetric analysis for you.
I’m a huge Sox fan and have seen just about all his at bats this year. Could be that I just wasn’t paying attention when he was with the Rays but doesn’t his stance seem more pronounced than in the past? It seems like his front foot is farther away from the plate than it ever was and pitchers are taking advantage by pounding balls on the outside part of the plate. I’m not sure if I’m just making this up to account for why he’s so bad so far or if this is a legitimate issue. Any ideas if I’m off base here?
I’m not sure. He’s always been very open. Though he does seem to have his front food on the line of the batter’s box, and I just watched some older footage of him, and it looks like he’s a few inches less open. I dunno. I wouldn’t bet that he’s changed anything physical, but at the same time I wouldn’t be surprised if he was slightly more open.
I am having a HELL of a time finding a front view picture of Crawford as a Ray to link to. I didn’t notice anything different personally although I’ve always wonder how anyone could hit with such an odd and stiff looking stance. I’ll see if I can find something in THT’s photo’s but I won’t be able to share them here.
Ok I think I just looked at 300 pictures of Crawford’s batting stance and swing and not a single one was from a front or back angle…I can say that based on the angle of his hips, it looks like things are pretty much business as usual.
Stance is about the same; he’s always stood w/ both feet out of the batter’s box. (Usually literally, which is what made it memorable for me.)
Thanks for the responses. I couldn’t find a front view of his stance either that’s why I asked. I’m sure he’ll turn it around that was just something I happened to notice early on in the season. His lead foot is definitely out of the batter’s box and I think that’s why I really noticed it.
Sorry for the unrelated, but any posts on Adrian Gonzalezs new contract? Just made me think of that
Crawford will probably rebound but will he ever again match the high WAR numbers he put up in Tampa? I would bet against it. This year he’s probably pressing, going to a big market team on a big contract with huge expectations. And the Fenway factor for LF might be depressing his fielding stats. Going forward I would expect his age to impact his production, since a lot of it (fielding and stolen bases) depends on his legs.
Bottom line is they paid him for the high WAR numbers he put up the last two years but I don’t think he’ll come close to matching them in Boston. I’m guessing a max of about 4 WAR.
I was not happy when Theo overpaid Crawford so much because I knew it would make retraining Reyes by the Mets that much harder. And the Mets would have to overpay for Reyes too if they want to keep him.
Hard to say that he will turn back into the old Crawford when the old Crawford popped 15-18 HR, swiped 50 bags a year and hit around .300 for the season. Depending on where he hits in the lineup throughout the season, it’s hard to say that he’s going to steal at the same rate and the fact that he hasn’t hit a HR in Fenway since May of 2006 makes me wonder how much power we’re going to see at home this year. If 350 AB is a decent enough sample size to look at, it should be noted that he has just 4 HR in that span in Boston. Then there’s the injury risk playing left field there….
I agree with Telo. My impression is that he may be hitting so weakly in part because he’s behind on the count so much – taking too many pitches. A more aggressive approach could help him get going, perhaps.
It’s worth noting that the Sox have also been facing a lot of left handed pitchers. Seems abnormal to me to have seen a 50/50 split in LH/RH starting pitchers thus far. If Crawford struggles against lefties, he’s had a lot of reasons to struggle.
The best point that can be made here is that the Wells contract was not terrible at the time it was signed, something that’s been written about on this site. It only became terrible when Wells became terrible the year after he signed it.
Although it may not be likely, it’s certainly possible that CC follows the same career path.
Eh, I think a better lesson is that the Crawford contract was riskier than generally acknowledged.
Vernon Wells’ contract was only not terrible if you accepted 2006 as his new value, not the 3 years before that.
Here’s some more of everdiso’s thoughts on the Red Sox:
“Yep, the preseason projections of them improving on their 89 win season because gonzo/crawford/salty would easily better the seasons that beltre/Vmart/Hall gave them last year, and because every one of their injured/offyear players would come blazing back at 100%, and because none of their bigyear players would regress, obviously had no flaws in their reasoning at all.”
Clearly an objective observer.
what exactly do you find unobjective about that statement?
given how good beltre/vmart/hall were last year, and that it would take gonzo/craword/salty matching their personal career best years to be an upgrade over the production they were replacing, am I not correct in stating that the reasonable expected improvement was based entirely on their injured/offyear players coming back and their healthy/bigyear players not regressing?
Oh, and not wanting to include Crawford’s .300 OBP when he was a 21 year old is definitely cherry picking, dude.
Wells finally became a regular player at age 24. Crawford signed his deal after his Age 29 seasons. Here’s Wells and Crawford Batting Runs Age 24 through Age 29:
Age Wells Crawford
24 -2.1 16.9
25 32.4 22.2
26 7.7 18.7
27 3.3 -2.1
28 28.2 23.3
29 -13.1 32.3
— —- —-
Sum 56.4 111.3
It’s not volume either–Wells played more games over the span. How exactly are these guys comparable offensive players?
wRC+
Age : Wells : Crawford
29yrs : 117 : -12*
28yrs : 82 : 139
27yrs : 129 : 123
26yrs : 102 : 94
25yrs : 107 : 122
24yrs : 133 : 123
23yrs : 95 : 118
22yrs : 110 : 107
21yrs : -100 : 84
20yrs : 59 : 73
* in progress
The list confuses rather than simplifying it. Here’s the comparable seasons from your list, leading up to Crawford’s free agency at age 28, ranked best to worst.
Wells : Crawford
133 : 139
129 : 123
110 : 123
107 : 122
102 : 118
95 : 107
82 : 94
Earlier seasons don’t work. Wells only got token appearances earlier than the seven seasons above.
Crawford has generally been 10% better, which matches the batting runs numbers.
Remember when Vernon Wells played in like every game a couple years ago and was replacement level.
Let’s go back 7 years, is that enough for everdiso? We’re not comparing their HoF cases, we’re talking about their current ability and future performance.
Since 2004
Wells: 19.5 WAR
Crawford: 30.9 WAR
wOBA:
.341
.355
UZR:
-8
+92
Just give it up, brother. You have nothing to stand on other than “uh UZR is questionable!”
And by the way, the Red Sox don’t use UZR! GASP!
The best part is that he thinks the fact that CF is one of the most important positions is an argument in Wells’ favor. Yes, he was playing a crucial defensive position, and he was butchering his pitching staff’s ERA. This clearly shows that Wells > Crawford!
Not sure where the appropriate place to put this is (which, ironically, is part of the reason i have to make this post in the first place) but the layout of this website’s main page is really really poor.
1) you cant even read the full titles of most articles because the space allotted to the “recent article” heading is way too small.
2a) there is no place where you can easily see all articles sorted by day. if you click on “recent articles” you get a page full of previews. which is completely useless because you have to scroll around looking for what you want.and anyone who starts reading the preview of an article must then click on the link for the full writeup anyway – makes no sense.
2b) there should be a page where ALL articles (for a given day, or week or whatever) are listed in the same place. No previews. Just titles, dates, and author listed so we can see all of them without having to scroll around and wed through the dumb previews.
3) maybe its just a compatibility issue with Firefox, but when after posting a comment, you are sent to a blank page and you cant do anything from there. you cant even refresh the page – you get an error message. So to see your comment you have to post it, wait for the blank page to load, go back a couple times, refresh the page then scroll back down to see if you post went through.
Why???
4) Comments section is not user friendly at all.
there needs to either be threaded replies that are easier to use/read, or a quote function. Its almost impossible to follow the comments in high traffic articles because nobody can tell which comment another comment is replying to.
5) Again sorry to post this here, but there is no place i can find where it will be seen by the people who run the site.
“. On the other hand, his BABIP is an absurdly low .160. It is pretty safe to assume that this number will come close to doubling by the end of the season.
”
Babip is not random. Let me repeat:BABIP IS NOT RANDOM.
Crawford hasn’t been getting on base because he hasn’t been hitting the ball hard. He hasn’t been unlucky. He’s hit about 3 balls well the whole season.
Also, assuming it will double is gambler’s fallacy.
Since Crawford’s career BABIP is .329, assuming it will “come close to doubling by season’s end” from .160 to around .320 is not gambler’s fallacy. If you think his career is a reasonable reflection of his true talent, and assume he’ll play at that true talent level going forward, even given his start he WILL nearly double the .160 by season’s end.
Enjoyable thread! Crawford will be fine, essentially same batted ball profile (LD rate), same amount of contract (around 84%) but a horrific BABIP (sub .170) and an unusual (for him) 13% IFFB.
The contract will never hurt the Sox given their vast resoures but we will likely judge the contract an overall failure from a value point, don’t see how we couldn’t.
Agree that Crawford will be fine.
He also needs time in front of the Green Monster as he has misplayed some balls – perhaps he should take a tip from Manny (who was better in LF than most give him credit for) and play deep, then CC can use his speed to come in on balls or go side to side rather than going back (which you don’t want to do because, hey, its a wall). He and Ellsbury also need to coordinate better on balls to the wall between them so that one can go to the wall and one backs up to play the carom.
It may be a little early to judge the value of the contract. Who knows where salaries will be in a few years and what Crawford’s production will be? But even if a value misjudgement, I’m glad he is on the roster.
I’ve scored every pitch of the season and there’s no question that the awful numbers are the result of both bad performance and bad luck. He’s 4 for 9 on line drives, he’s hit 26 grounders and had 1 go through a hole, and he’s been robbed twice of infield hits by blown calls at 1B.
During ST I listened to the Rays broadcasters during a Red Sox game. They were going on about how much weight (muscle) Crawford had added over the offseason, and wondered what impact if any it would have on his speed and power. I had not heard anyone else mention it in Boston, but most did not pay much attention to Crawford before he joined the Red Sox, except during the few games we see each year. In ST I remembered thinking he looks bigger than I had thought, and so these comments resonated with me.
If this is true, could the extra pounds have slowed Crawfords bat speed, if not his legs?
I suppose it’s a possibility, but how often do we hear reports of players bulking up/slimming down/losing weight/getting fat only to see another year that falls in line with career norms?
I’ve heard arguments for Ortiz “getting too fat to get the bat around” and simultaneously “adding too much muscle. He’s muscle bound!” only for him to have another similar season.
Lackey lost 15 lbs! And will still be a 4 WAR pitcher.
Shape of his life/he really let himself go! stuff seems to carry little to no weight. No pun intended.
When’s the last time someone got so muscle bound over one offseason that it really affected their performance? Has it ever happened?
Rudy Pemberton. LOL
Crawfords value has been his speed and quickness. Anything that slows him or his bat down has to be a concern
Wasn’t too much muscle Ruben Sierra’s excuse for a lousy 1993? I haven’t heard “too much muscle” in a long time regarding a MLB player.
Carl is .167 with 10 hits in 67 AB’s. If you give him 600 AB’s this season Carl must hit 274 for the rest of the season to end his first season AT 260. THIS MEANS CARL NEEDS to average MORE THAN 1 hit per game for the REST OF THIS SEASON.
I think it is tough to compare these two players. One of Crawford’s biggest weapons is his speed. It may not show up in his wOBA but how many times does this guy turn a single into a double or triple by swiping bags? Crawford has a SPD rating of 8.4 for his career compared to 4.7 for Wells. It will be interesting to see how his speed is effected as he ages. Most people seem to just be looking at these guys from a pure wOBA and UZR perspective but once you add the SPD into the equation it is easily understandable why Crawford got the contract he did, and it makes it more understandable why Wells contract was an albatross.
I believe that if he turns a single into a double or triple, it would show up in his wOBA.