JABO: The AL’s Right-Handed Problem

by
July 10, 2015

When Alex Gordon got injured on Wednesday night, it was a big blow to the Royals, who have lost their best player for the next two months of the season. But with Detroit struggling — and having lost Miguel Cabrera themselves just a week earlier — and the Twins probably unable to keep playing as well as they have in the first half, the Royals will probably still be able to hold on to their division lead, even with Gordon on the shelf for the next few months.

However, Gordon’s injury does create a pretty significant hole on the American League All-Star roster. No, it’s not that Gordon is really that much better than Adam Jones, who will replace Gordon in the starting line-up, but that Gordon brought one unique skill to the American League’s offense: he bats left-handed.

With Jones replacing Gordon, all nine American League starters will bat from the right side of the plate. Let’s take a guess at what Ned Yost’s starting line-up might look like.

1. Lorenzo Cain, LF
2. Jose Altuve, 2B
3. Mike Trout, CF
4. Albert Pujols, 1B
5. Josh Donaldson, 3B
6. Nelson Cruz, DH
7. Adam Jones, RF
8. Salvador Perez, C
9. Alcides Escobar, SS

There are some pretty great hitters in the middle of that line-up, and guys like Trout have historically hit right-handed pitching just fine. But at both the top and bottom of the order, you have some guys on the team primarily due to their defensive abilities, and hitting right-handed pitching isn’t really their strong suit.

And the National League has loaded up on right-handed pitching. Of the 13 pitchers already on the NL roster, 11 of them are right-handed; only Madison Bumgarner and Aroldis Chapman are lefty hurlers on the NL’s squad. Johnny Cueto is likely to join that group via the Final Vote, which would push the NL up to 12 RHPs, many of whom are death to right-handed hitting.

Read the rest on Just a Bit Outside.





 

Dave is the Managing Editor of FanGraphs.

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MGL
8 years ago

Much ado about nothing. Now if this were a lineup of lefties v lefty pitchers, then we would have a story.

And RH “lefty killers?” Come on, Dave. You know that there is essentially no such thing – that most of the observed extreme splits for RHB are random fluctuations.

For example, an average RHB has around a true 27 point wOBA platoon differential (and 1.09 ratio). The most extreme non-split guys like Trout and Pujols still have a 19 point differential (true or projected, not actual). The most extreme guys with large splits have a projected differential of around 36 points. Donaldson, the player that you point out as having extremely large splits, has an estimated wOBA differential of 29, only 2 points more than the average RHB! The SD of RHB platoon talent is around 4 points (differential). For LHB, it is around twice that.

In addition, most great RH starting pitchers have relatively small platoon splits, so that will further reduce the NL’s RH/RH advantage. For example, Wacha has NO estimated true platoon split, Burnett almost none, and Miller and Cole a small split. And if and when Bumgarner comes in, the RHB will have a huge advantage as he has a huge estimated true split.

So, again, much ado about nothing.

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Mark
8 years ago
Reply to  MGL

They’re still at a disadvantage. Even if it’s not as big as Dave is suggesting, having 9 RH bats in the lineup against an army of RHP is a disadvantage. Unless Bochy screws up, the NL should have the platoon advantage for virtually every at bat of the game, unless Tex is up as he’s a switch hitter. And none of the hitters will face a pitcher that has to go multiple times through the order, meaning that the starters can throw harder than they normally do. That’s not an insignificant advantage for the NL.

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