Have No Fear, Church is Here
When Omar Minaya traded Lastings Milledge to the Nationals this offseason, for Ryan Church and Brian Schneider, the heads of many New York fans began to spin. Don’t believe me? Check out some of these comments from a New York Times blog entry detailing the trade:
Wow. Worst. GM. in Baseball. What a joke. Kazmir part 2.— Posted by Tom
Great. The Mets have now inherited 25% of the starting lineup of one of the worst teams in baseball in return for a potential star. How could the combination of Schneider/Church conceivably be better for the Mets than the combination of Torealba/Milledge. Oh wait, Church is left handed. Comforting. 6 years older and below average at best, but at least he’s left handed. And then there is the Estrada trade. What the heck is Omar doing? — Posted by Mike C
This is an absolute disaster. They make decisions like “Must trade Milledge†and then settle for garbage in return instead of realizing that he’s better and cheaper than what they get in return. Schneider is toast and cost $5mm per. Church is ok, 29 year old. I hate myself for rooting for this doomed franchise. — Posted by Sauerball
I could show more but I live by the rule of three and think these responses clearly illustrate the frustration of Mets fans that this trade took place.
While the team is off to a slower-than-expected start, Ryan Church has performed so well that I’m sure at least some of the larger group of Mets fans represented in the aforementioned quotes have rescinded a bit. Church currently leads the Mets with 10.77 BRAA and a 0.67 WPA. His slash line of .310/.378/.478 accounts for the highest batting average on the team and second highest slugging percentage. He also leads the team in hits with 35 and runs participated in (RBI+R) with 45.
Despite posting a very high .373 BABIP, Church has actually been a tad unlucky based on his line drive rate. Lining the ball 28.7% of the time we would expect his BABIP to be near .400. Where is this coming from? Well, he is hitting virtually the same amount of grounders — 42.6 last year and 42.5 right now — but has turned six percent of his flyballs from a year ago into line drives.
Should he manage to keep up this torrid pace he would finish the season hitting .314/.384/.487, with 22 HR and 119 RBI. TangoTiger’s 2008 Marcel Projections pegged him for a respectable .274/.334/.465, with 15 HR and 65 RBI.
One factor not discussed much is how Church played in a notorious pitcher’s park the last three years. Whether or not the confines of Shea Stadium will truly benefit him is yet to be seen but, from what can be seen, without his production the Mets would likely be in panic mode.
Eric is an accountant and statistical analyst from Philadelphia. He also covers the Phillies at Phillies Nation and can be found here on Twitter.
I’d usually assume that you’ve read this already, but in case you missed it:
What Do Good and Bad Starts by Pitchers Tell Us
And, right on cue, a Ryan Church first-inning home run.
I guess I can’t post links here…. Eric, I was trying to tell you to read MGL’s post from a few days ago titled, “What do good and bad starts by pitchers tell us?” (if you haven’t read it already). I tried posting the link before, but it didn’t work.
Yeah I read it. I go there everyday just about.
Eric,
Great post! I”m a huge Mets fan, and I was one of the few (believe me if you will) who like the trade. I looked at Church’s road OPS, OPS+, etc. plus his outstanding defense and still somewhat young age and new we were getting a solid player (along with Schneider, a HUGE defensive upgrade). He has been our MVP so far this year, no doubt.
Related question- you cite his BRAA. I’m relatively new to some of these Fangraphs stats. Is that the one you consider the “go to” stat oif the Fangraphs ones (as opposed to WPA, WPA/LI, etc)? I also like GPA on Hardball TImes, what do you think of that?
Mitch, glad to please you… even though, as a Phillies fan I hated the trade, because Schneider always seems to do something “clutch” against the Phillies. As far as BRAA, it is not really a “go-to” stat but then again I don’t consider any one stat to be the “go-to.” I like to look at a wide array of statistics because each tells us something different.
BRAA is essentially the amount of runs better somebody is than an average hitter with the same amount of opportunities.
I’m personally a very big fan of BRAA. It works exactly like win expectancy except it uses run expectancy, so it takes the inning and score out of the equation leaving the runners on base aspect.
I would favor BRAA over RC for the years it’s available since it’s calculated on a play-by-play level and it’s adjusted by league. Not to mention it takes into account how batters do with runners on base. It’s also easier to see what the baseline is since it’s above average (0 runs).
BRAA is also available on a wins scale instead of a runs scale, with the REW stat.
Here’s the Glossary Entry: BRAA
Yeah I have had so many people ask me what REW is when they see it on a player’s page. Now I realize my explanation can be reduced to simply, BRAA in Wins.
David, Thanks for the excellent explanation of BRAA.