Hanley’s “Down Year”

For most major league shortstops, a .285/.366/.443 batting line and a .355 wOBA would be cause for celebration. Hanley Ramirez isn’t like most shortstops, however. The 26-year old Marlins star posted a combined .397 wOBA over the 2006-2009 seasons, easily topping the .400 wOBA mark in each of the past three years. Prior to 2010, ZiPS projected Hanley for a .408 wOBA, and CHONE called for a .412 wOBA.

Why is Ramirez merely hitting very well as opposed to ranking among the absolute best batters in the big leagues? One reason is a lower-than-usual batting average on balls in play — Hanley’s BABIP is .307 this season. His career BABIP is .345, and both ZiPS (.355 pre-season BABIP) and CHONE (.357) predicted 35-36% of his balls put in play would evade fielders. According to this expected BABIP (xBABIP) calculator from The Hardball Times, Ramirez’s BABIP should be closer to .333.

So, Ramirez has been unlucky to an extent. But that’s not to say that everything else is business as usual. His power production is down:

Hanley’s Isolated Power is .158. His career average is .207, and ZiPS (.217 pre-season ISO) and CHONE (.221) expected him to easily surpass the .200 mark. On a related note, Ramirez’s ground ball rate has spiked:

He’s hitting grounders 54.5% of the time in 2010. By contrast, Ramirez’s GB% was 43.8 in 2006, 40.1 in 2007, 45.8 in 2008 and 38.6 last season.

Using Pitch F/X data from Joe Lefkowitz’s site, I broke down Hanley’s batted ball distribution by pitch type over the 2008-2010 seasons (the years for which we have a lot of Pitch F/X data). I also included Ramirez’s slugging percentage on contact (SLG CON) by pitch type. To provide context, you’ll also find the major league averages by pitch type, provided by THT’s Harry Pavlidis.

(Note: the fastball averages include both four-seam and two-seam fastballs.)

Hanley’s hitting more ground balls on fastballs, sliders, curveballs and changeups. He’s still killing fastballs when he makes fair contact, but not to the same extent as in 2008 and 2009. The sample size isn’t huge on curveballs and changeups, but he hasn’t done much of anything with those pitches this season — check out those SLG CON totals in 2010 compared to the two previous seasons.

I don’t think there’s any reason to think that his power output will remain this mild — with 432 plate appearances, Ramirez is short of the point at which ISO becomes statistically reliable (550 PA). It’s entirely possible that he goes on an extra-base hit binge from here on out. ZiPS projects a .190 ISO for the rest of the season. That, along with a BABIP bounce back (.335 projected), gives Ramirez a .391 rest-of-season wOBA. The fact that people are asking, “what’s wrong with this guy?” when he has the second-best wOBA among qualified shortstops tells you just how special a talent Hanley Ramirez is.