Daily Notes: Julio Teheran’s Spring Opposition, Examined

Table of Contents
Here’s the table of contents for today’s edition of the Daily Notes.

1. Entirely Relevant Preamble
2. Julio Teheran’s Spring Opposition, Examined
3. Mostly Unhelpful Video: Julio Teheran, Succeeding

Entirely Relevant Preamble
Among the entire surfeit of spring numbers considered in yesterday’s edition of the Notes, one such number suggested the possibility that Atlanta right-handed prospect Julio Teheran has produced the best performance of spring training so far. The data revealed that Teheran had struck out 25 (or ca. 32%) of the estimated 73 batters he’d faced during his five spring starts — a rate which, when regressed against spring averages, is the highest among all pitchers. While further inspection reveals that Teheran has, in fact, faced 74 batters (i.e. one more than originally suggested), the point still remains: relative to the amount of innings he’s thrown, Teheran has probably been the most effective of the spring’s pitchers.

What one wonders is this: “How is it that nearly everyone owns a car despite the enormous expense of buying one — not to mention the associated costs, like insurance, fuel, and maintenance?” After that, though, one wonders a second, more relevant thing — namely, “How strong has Teheran’s competition been this spring?”

To address that latter question in full is impossible. Insofar as some batters use spring training to experiment with mechanical adjustments or plate discipline, the “true talent” of those same batters in the moment during which they’re facing Teheran might diverge wildly from previously recorded levels.

That said, with the projections available here at the site, we do have some sense of the talent level of any player Teheran would be likely to face. It’s with that thought in mind that the author had the idea of documenting every batter Teheran had faced this spring, with a view to assaying the strength of those batters relative to major-league average — again, with all possible caveats regarding spring training and how hitters use their time there.

Julio Teheran’s Spring Opposition, Examined
Below is a table of every batter Julio Teheran has faced this spring. For each batter, there’s a record of the date on which Teheran faced him. For each batter is also included his projected walk rate, strikeout rate, batting average, on-base percentage, and slugging percentage for 2013 — all according to Steamer. Finally, at the bottom of the table, is an average (among all of the batters Teheran has faced) for each of the five projected metrics, the major-league average for all of those same metrics in 2012, and an index rating, where 100 is average and less than 100 is worse than average — including for strikeout rate, for which I’ve used the following equation, which retains the league average in the denominator: (1-((K%/AvgK%)-1))*100.

Note: the two pitchers included here (Jake Westbrook and Jon Niese) have no offensive projections. In lieu of that, I’ve simply reproduced here their respective career batting numbers.

Notes
• What we find here is that the batters Teheran has faced this spring are projected to slash .250/.315/.393 in 2013, with 7.9% and 20.0% walk and strikeout rates, respectively — i.e. not very different at all from the major-league average of .255/.319/.405 from 2012, with 8.0% and 19.8% walk and strikeout rates, respectively. On average, it appears as though Teheran’s opponents this season have been about 1% worse than league average.

• The group above has posted the following slash-line against Teheran this spring in 74 plate appearances: .104/.209/.194. And the following walk and strikeout rates, respectively: 8.1% and 33.8%.

• Given what we know about the samples required for certain metrics to become reliable, that slash-line figure isn’t entirely helpful, probably. Regressed using spring averages, however, we can get some sense of Teharan’s walk and strikeout rate against the above opponents to date — in this case, something like 8.1% and 25.8%, respectively.

• By way of reference, here are the spring averages so far for walk and strikeout rate, respectively: 8.2% and 18.0%.

• Is any of this predictive so far as the major-league season is concerned? I don’t know. The question asked towards the top of this post, however, regarded the strength of Julio Teheran’s competition so far this spring — strength of competition being frequently cited as one of the reasons why spring numbers ought to be handled delicately. In Julio Teheran’s case, he appears to have faced something similar to a major-league-average group of batters — and appears, also, to have dispatched of those same batters in an above-average way.

Mostly Unhelpful Video: Julio Teheran, Succeeding
Here’s mostly unhelpful footage of Atlanta right-hander Julio Teheran striking out seven Mets in six innings in his most recent spring start: