Mookie Betts Needs Some New Comparisons
On Sunday, and for the second time this season, Mookie Betts launched three home runs in a game. He now has 26 home runs on the season; for comparison, Giancarlo Stanton has 25, Chris Davis has 24, and Mike Trout has 23. Mookie Betts has a higher isolated slugging percentage this season than Miguel Cabrera, Ryan Braun, or Carlos Gonzalez. This is not what anyone expected.
I’ve long been one of Betts biggest supporters, but it’d be dishonest to pretend that we saw this coming. Even back in 2014, when I wrote the “Don’t Trade Mookie Betts” post extolling his value, I included the following paragraph.
Due primarily to his size (5-9) and the potential limits that puts on his power, Betts has not generally been viewed as a franchise cornerstone type of prospect the way Xander Bogaerts was as he ascended the ranks. And while it might seem unfair to make generalities about Betts’ future based on his height, there is merit to the idea that he probably won’t become a big-time power hitter in the big leagues.
In that piece, I noted that Betts’ combination of a low swing rate and a high contact rate put him in the company of mostly low-power slap hitters, but noted that it looked like he had enough doubles-power to become a Matt Carpenter or Ben Zobrist type of hitter, and those guys were worth holding onto. I liked Betts a lot, but I liked him because of the overall game, not because I thought he was going to turn into a slugger.
Even the following spring, when Betts went bananas in the Grapefruit League, his teammates sought to praise him by comparing him to Andrew McCutchen. And those comparisons were met with pushback, even by myself, as I continued to not see that kind of power development as Betts’ likely path to success. But now, a year and a half later, the McCutchen comparison looks wrong not because Betts didn’t develop McCutchen-level power, but because he’s already surpassed McCutchen-level power, and has become a very different player than he looked like coming up through the minors.
In the minors and even in his first half-season in the big leagues, Betts was a guy who took a lot of pitches, drew a bunch of walks, and succeeded by emphasizing the value of getting on base. But Major League pitchers decided to challenge Betts, giving him a high rate of strikes in order to force him to hit his way on board. It took a little bit of time, but Betts made the adjustment, and started looking for strikes to jump on instead of working counts.
The result is that Betts is putting up a season entirely unlike anything he’s done before. His current 6% walk rate is the lowest he’s posted in any professional season, but he’s offset the lack of walks with the upticks in power, and so instead of becoming a McCutchen-like all-around hitter, he’s succeeding with a line that looks like something straight out of an aggressive-slugger’s career.
For historical context, let’s go back 20 years, and look at under-25 hitters who have put up similar offensive seasons. To filter for similar lines, we’re going to look for players with a walk rate between 4%-8%, a strikeout rate between 10%-15%, and an ISO between .200 and .300. These are the guys who have had similar offense seasons at a young age.
| Name | Season | PA | BB% | K% | ISO | BABIP | AVG | OBP | SLG | wOBA | wRC+ |
| Vladimir Guerrero | 1998 | 677 | 6% | 14% | 0.265 | 0.331 | 0.324 | 0.371 | 0.589 | 0.403 | 145 |
| Hanley Ramirez | 2007 | 706 | 7% | 14% | 0.230 | 0.353 | 0.332 | 0.386 | 0.562 | 0.405 | 144 |
| Mookie Betts | 2016 | 534 | 6% | 13% | 0.246 | 0.317 | 0.313 | 0.354 | 0.560 | 0.384 | 138 |
| Vernon Wells | 2003 | 735 | 6% | 11% | 0.233 | 0.318 | 0.317 | 0.359 | 0.550 | 0.385 | 133 |
| Chad Tracy | 2005 | 553 | 6% | 14% | 0.245 | 0.317 | 0.308 | 0.359 | 0.553 | 0.385 | 130 |
| Jose Vidro | 2000 | 663 | 7% | 10% | 0.210 | 0.339 | 0.330 | 0.379 | 0.540 | 0.391 | 129 |
| Nomar Garciaparra | 1997 | 734 | 5% | 13% | 0.228 | 0.315 | 0.306 | 0.342 | 0.534 | 0.374 | 122 |
| Brad Fullmer | 2000 | 524 | 6% | 13% | 0.263 | 0.284 | 0.295 | 0.340 | 0.558 | 0.376 | 118 |
| Jody Gerut | 2003 | 525 | 7% | 13% | 0.215 | 0.287 | 0.279 | 0.336 | 0.494 | 0.354 | 117 |
| Paul Konerko | 1999 | 564 | 8% | 12% | 0.216 | 0.300 | 0.294 | 0.352 | 0.511 | 0.371 | 117 |
Vladimir Guerrero! There’s a guy I wouldn’t have ever expected to compare Betts to, as from a raw skills standpoint, they really couldn’t be much more different. But his age-23 season is actually quite similar to Betts’ age-23 season, even though the physique and approach to hitting are polar opposites. Hanley Ramirez makes a bit more sense, as he also came up as an athletic middle infielder who turned out to hit quite well, but still featured an all-around game early in his career. Nomar Garciaparra continues the Boston connection, but like Guerrero and Ramirez, he was known as a guy who swung at everything and made up for his approach with remarkable plate coverage.
The funny thing is that Betts is getting results like those guys, but he hasn’t transformed into a free-swinger. He’s offered at 41% of the pitches he’s been thrown this year, well below the league’s 47% average, and while he’s expanded the zone a little bit compared to where he was in his rookie season, his 26% O-Swing is still a good bit under the 30% average of the rest of the league. Betts is, by any measure you want to use except for walk rate, still a selective hitter at the plate.
But as I showed back in June, Betts is still getting pitched like a slap hitter. I’ll borrow an image from that post a couple of months ago about the need for the league to adjust to Betts’ new-found power.
That graphic showed that Betts, despite a .225 ISO over the last calendar year, had the fifth-highest Zone% of any qualified hitter in baseball. If we updated the graphic for last calendar year from now, Betts would have the fourth-highest Zone% in baseball despite a .240 ISO over the last 365 days. This remains incomprehensible; Betts is slugging like a cleanup hitter but seeing strikes like he’s Ben Revere. The league continues to not adjust to Betts’ development, and he continues to punish them for it.
Eventually, we have to expect rational behavior to kick in, and for pitchers to stop throwing Betts middle-middle and middle-in fastballs that he can turn on. At some point, the scouting report on him has to change, and when they start pitching him more carefully, the walks should come back, and the power will probably come back down a bit. After some more adjustments, Betts may indeed settle in as an Andrew McCutchen type of hitter.
But right now, with how he’s being pitched? He’s more like Guerrero, Ramirez, or Garciaparra. Or peak-level Robinson Cano. His 2016 season looks like something that would fit in perfectly with Adrian Beltre’s career. A low-walk, high-power superstar? This is not the Mookie Betts any of us were expecting.
Dave is the Managing Editor of FanGraphs.
I remember prior to the season, BBREF had listed Grady Sizemore has Mookie’s #1 comp for his age 22 season. If forced to choose I would have bet the under that he didn’t turn into what Sizemore was in his prime, but it looks like that’s what he’s become.
It may not be the Mookie Betts that anybody was expecting, but I think it’s the one we all want to see.
Ah, depends on where the Yankees are in the standings.
For the comps is it worth looking for a similar age 23 season plus similar total career to that point?
Through age 22, +/- 20% of MBs PA, min 3.0 fWAR/600PA, +/- 10 points of MBs wRC+, less than 10% walk rate, debut 1969 onward. Got one catcher in there… dump him.
Now drop anyone without a very good age 23 season. The 130 or greaters* with their fWAR ages 24-27:
19.7 Hanley Ramirez
15.6 Grady Sizemore
5.5 Ellis Valentine
* none between 103 and 130 anyways, so the number doesn’t matter too much in this case 🙂
Only reason the comp doesn’t seem congruent is because different players come up and develop different strengths at different times. And the comp players you posted all had missed between 50-100 games during that time.
It becomes subjective to only look at “age 23 season” since some players come up a little earlier and struggle before breaking out, and others hone their skills more in the minors and may not come up at that magic age. Age 24-27, although the assumed peak of a players’ talent, won’t correlate to the timing of development, so looking at the 23-age comp in itself gives way to more avenues by which Betts can go.
It would be better to standardize comps based on a jump fWar season from seasons’ past (within reason of age) and then look over a future outlook of 3-4 years.
Long story short, Betts has seemed to improve much quicker (in his weaknesses, vs. expectation of power from Sizemore/Ramirez) than his comps and has shown to adjust to the long and short game. His speed is more dangerous than Sizemore and Ramirez in their heydey, so it seems even if his floor becomes a Jean Segura for some reason, he seems to have more avenues of success long-term, barring injury as the comps are full of guys that were good but hardly expecting to play 150 games/season after their 25-age years.
“And the comp players you posted all had missed between 50-100 games during that time.”
OK…? The article’s comp list included Vlad Guerrero who had less than 400 PA coming in; Konerko at 247 PA, Garciaparra at under 100 PA and Gerut with 0 PA.
What I was suggesting was that maybe there is some value in looking beyond players with a similar young year to Betts’ 2016 and that perhaps there are some comps might be more relevant if their career leading up to that season was also similar.
I’ll certainly agree that some flexibility on the target year age is worthwhile and also adding in a speed element to the comp makes sense– I look forward to seeing what you come up with.
First off, great article. I was hoping to get a good Mookie update given how well he’s doing.
Second, your comment about his Swing% and his O-Swing% got me thinking about something that has bugged me a little bit for a while. If I’m looking at a player page, say Giancarlo Stanton, and see his Swing% is 46.3, I can’t really see how that compares to the rest of the league unless I look at the overall leaderboard for this year. I think it could help provide a better context if, when we clicked on the column title, it could give some sort of average for this year and maybe over all history to account for numbers changing over eras. I know this is just a small problem and I really don’t want to distract from the great article you wrote; but it’s just something I’ve been thinking about for a while with such a dense amount of information in each page.
On every player page, in most of the sections, there’s a little button that says “Averages”. if you click on it, it will expand the boxes to include the league average mark for each metric.
awesome. you guys think of everything.
Oh my goodness thank you so much I never even saw that. This is incredibly helpful thank you!
nice to be reminded that we weren’t crazy to think Verno was pretty dang good.
In addition to being a great hitter, Betts is also 6th in MLB in Baserunning Runs above average (6.5) and 4th in MLB in Defensive Runs Saved (17).
This guy is unbelievable and will challenge Trout for MVP for years to come.
This is why I love O-swing as a stat. It’s not really Mookie’s fault he isn’t walking. If we keep the comparisons to just hitting I think the current version of Justin Turner is pretty similar. Both are low O-swing high contact guys that have shown power. Betts makes a bit more contact and hits more pop ups and Turner hits more line drives but the results are close. The impressive thing is Betts is pretty young and very well rounded. Very likely to reach 30 HRs and 20 SBs while hitting .300 this season.
This is truly bizarre that he keeps being pitched this way. Is it a macho thing? Like they don’t want to pitch around the lil guy?
Maybe my expectations for Mookie Betts are too high, but I found that list of comparators to be pretty underwhelming.
It’s the low walk rate parameter that really eliminates most of the better comparables.
Not sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing though.
Dave addressed the walk rate. It’s hard to walk a lot when you’re hitting the crap out of everything in the zone and still being pitched very aggressively. That won’t continue, but he’s already shown the ability to adjust in this area twice before.
Yeah, might want to dial it down a bit, if only for your own well being.
well, there is only one MVP award on that list, so it might be right to think the list underwhelming if you think Betts’ll be a perennial MVP candidate.
I would pump the brakes on ‘perennial MVP candidate.’ However, I do think he’ll be better than the guys on that list, if only because his game is more well-rounded with speed and defense. There’s some great careers on that list, though.
But the whole point of the article is that he’s smashing dingers because he’s getting a steady diet of meatballs. This won’t last forever, and we’ll see how he settles in when the league pitches him appropriately.
recency bias!
Its underwhelming because Mookie is a better baserunner and defender than just about all those players. Those comps were simply based on hitting at their ages.
The all around player comps that the article mentions were Beltre and Cano, who are both pretty good player.
For instance, Mookie should already have racked up 15 WAR through his age 23 seasons. Baring any crazy injury or crazy decline, its not hard to imagine him raking up 40+ WAR
Wells, was only worth 25 WAR over his career. Konerko, 23. Tracy 7 WAR.
Even if you only consider hitting, I think it’s an underwhelming group of comparators. By career wRC+, the median comparator is Brad Fullmer at 108 wRC+. If Mookie Betts were to hit 108 wRC+ over the rest of his career, I would consider that a mild disappointment.
Fair enough. However, the article does mention Robie Cano and Adrian Beltre as potential comps for Betts.
Mookie Betts is better than Andrew McCutchen. It’s Trout and Mookie’s world, and everyone else lives in it
Er, no. Trout’s another tier above Mookie, who shares the same world as guys like Machado and Corey Seager.
Uhhhhhh… Yeah no. I don’t think you realize just how good Trout is.
Betts is amazing, and he definitely belongs in the conversation with the best players in the majors, but Trout is unreal. Seager could be a peer for Trout, and MAYBE Machado could as well (but I’m very skeptical). Donaldson was in the conversation last year, but I’m skeptical he can sustain it both because last year was so insane and because he’s quite a bit older. Outside of those, Correa and Bryant seem on the brink (they’re not Troutian yet), and… that’s basically it (maybe I’m just too down on Harper, but that’s me).
Betts is very firmly in the second tier of superstars: amazing, but not generational. Trout’s name will be spoken 100 years from now when baseball historians argue about the single greatest player of all time. Betts isn’t that good.
The only question Trout still has to answer is whether he’s Alex Rodriguez (hopefully without the PEDs) or Babe Ruth. Even if it’s “only” the former, an ARod without scandal is instantly inner-circle HoF; and if it’s the latter… The next ten years will be very interesting.
Well said kbn. I’m probably one of the most Mookie-biased guys out there, and I’m really believing it wasn’t crazy to say his ceiling was to be the next Joe Morgan. That would make him about a 9 WAR per season player at his peak, which would make me positively giddy.
Mike Trout’s already working on his fourth 9 WAR season (yawn). We’ve already conditioned ourselves to think of his 8 WAR season as a down year. And he’s just two years older than Mookie. Let that sink in for a bit.
Why can’t a 9.5 WAR per season Mike Trout and 9 WAR per season Mookie Betts share a world?
Why don’t you come back when Mookie Betts actually has a 9 WAR season?
Betts currently has a career-high 5.7 WAR, on track for an 8 WAR season if he maintains this pace.
Mike Trout has not had less than 8 WAR in any season (other than the 2011 cup of coffee).
Oh, I realize how good Trout is. Trust me, I do. I don’t think you realize how good Mookie is. Mookie is a better defender right now and still has tons of room to grow in the outfield. Mookie is a better baserunner right now and his body will age better (speed wise) than Trout’s. Mookie can still lower that k rate and improve that walk rate and improve that BABIP whereas Trout has seemingly maxed out those skills. Can you imagine a Mookie Betts with a sub 10% k rate (attainable), a 10% bb rate, his current power, and a 350 babip (like he put up regularly in the minors)? Basically, I think Mookie can be current level Altuve with superior baserunning and defense. That is right up there with Trout. If it isn’t quite Trout, it’s close, and my contention that it’s Trout’s and Mookie’s world isn’t far off.
By the numbers and by the eye test, Trout is both a better defender (particularly his arm) and the better base runner (by far!) than Mookie. Believe me, I know how good Betts is. He’s amazing and I love watching him play. But Trout is Trout.
I get that you’re fanboy’ing really hard right now, but nearly everything in this post is unsubstantiated. I don’t really even know where to begin.
I would question your assertion that Betts is a better base runner. Trout has more SB, less CS, and Fangraphs has him worth a run more on the basepaths.
You also say that Trout has maxed out his walk rate and strikeout rate, yet he’s currently posting a career high BB% and career low K%. It seems like the exact opposite of what you said.
Betts has a low walk rate because he is aggressive at the plate. Betts has a low strikeout rate because he is aggressive at the plate. If he began taking pitches the way Trout does, both rates would likely go up. He’s not going to raise his BB rate 4% while simultaneously lowering his K rate to under 10%.
Minor league BABIP doesn’t just carry over. At several minor league stops Trout posted a BABIP of well over .400. It’s not the same.
You’re getting so far ahead of yourself. I would say just enjoy the ride. He’s not Mike Trout.
Better than 2016 Cutch, yes, but that’s not saying much.
Que? Betts has yet to match McCutchen’s home run peak or HR/FB% peak. Moreover, Betts’ average distance this season of 222 feet ties for just 164th best in the majors (even in a down year McCutchen is 49th best at 235 ft). Betts’ average home run distance of 388 feet is tied for 312th in the majors (McCutchen is 208th at 397 ft), and his maximum home run distance of 428 feet ranks 208th (McCutchen is 138th at 439 ft).
ah sweet fenway.
Fenway’s park factor for right-handed HRs is slightly positive, but nothing crazy. In 2016 Betts has hit 15 HR at Fenway and 11 on the road. For his career he’s hit 25 at home and 24 on the road. With as many sharp line drives as Betts hits, it’s not inconceivable that Fenway has cost him as many HRs as it’s gifted.
Eh… I think Damaso is probably right on this one. Betts leverages the monster probably even more heavily than the other RH bats in their lineup. I’d be interested in seeing a home/away comparison on Betts’ ISO once he’s been around long enough for such stats to stabilize.
Mookie’s career home ISO is .223.
Mookie’s career away ISO is .187.
Home runs distance isnt exactly the greatest way to compare power. A 350 ft home runs counts the same as a 450 ft hr, you know.
Betts is rocking a .246 ISO and is on pace for 36hrs and 91 XBH. Betts currently leads the majors in XBH’s with 65.
In comparison, Mccuthcens single season best ISO was .228 and the most home runs he’s ever hit was 31.
Betts, at age 23, is hitting for more power than Mcutchen (age 29) ever did in the majors.
Actually, that’s exactly how you calculate power. In his scouting series, Kiley McDaniel described “power” as “how far he can hit the ball.” Because ISO is simply measuring the number of extra bases gained per hit, it is positively influenced by speed and base-running, therefore it is an inferior measure of pure “power.”
And yet they do not demonstrate the same level of power, correct?
No. Someday he may surpass McCutchen in “power,” who knows, but he definitely has not even equaled McCutchen in that department thus far.
It seems you are confusing raw power and in game power. How far you can hit a ball is pretty useless unless it translates to the game.
So sure, if Betts and Mccutchen were in the home run derby, you may side with Mccuthen, but in terms of translating that power into actual games, Betts has done a better job, and thus has HIT for more power.
Betts’ ISO and slugging % right now is higher than any single mark Mccuthcen has put up. Betts is one pace for more home runs and XBH than Mccuthen has ever hit.
Thus, Betts has hit for more power than Muccuthcen in his prime.
*sigh* No, “raw power” refers to how far a batter is able to hit the ball in a non-competitive environment whereas “game power” refers to how far a batter is able to hit the ball in a competitive environment.
Again, “how far” a player can hit a baseball and his season power numbers are not equal.
The articles intent was not to suggest Betts could hit a ball farther than Mccuthen, it was simply saying Betts should hit for more power this season (higher ISO, XBH’s ect) than Mccuthcen has in his prime.
What he’s saying is that those stats are more a reflection of where Mookie plays than how much “power” has, which is true.
Batted ball distance is how you measure power, not ISO. ISO is positively influenced by speed and base-running, which have nothing to do with “power.” Please stop arguing about this.
Raw power is very different from game power. In 1996, the Mets drafted Rob Stratton, who had incredible strength and raw power. But…he just couldn’t hit breaking balls, so his game power was virtually non-existent – and his raw power was irrelevant.
I am with Brock244 on this one. An insane number of Mookie’s homers have been low trajectory liners that, while absolutely crushed, didn’t necessarily go very far. Alternatively, we could measure how fast a ball left the ballpark, and by that measure Mookie would be killing it. Also why do you equate raw power with only homerun distance? By your metric doubles and triples don’t factor into power at all…..that’s far worse than allowing speed to slightly influence one’s conception of power.
Mookie has more power than Cutch
I didn’t equate it with only home run distance. I cited Kiley’s definition of power as “how far he can hit the ball,” and the very first evidence I presented was Betts’ average batted ball distance: “Betts’ average distance this season of 222 feet ties for just 164th best in the majors (even in a down year McCutchen is 49th best at 235 ft).” I have consistently stated that “Batted ball distance is how you measure power,” not just home run distance, so please stop deliberately misrepresenting my argument.
The data conclusively proves that he has less power than Andrew McCutchen at this point in time. He may develop more power at some point, who knows, but the suggestion that he has more now has been proven false.
Yeah Dave was being uncharacteristically imprecise. Pittsburgh plays to an 88 park factor for RH HR’s, while Boston is 104. Pretty substantial difference to just tot up the dongs
I don’t know about HR distance, but I do know what my eyes tell me… that Mookie has the fastest hands and cleans out an inside fastball better than anyone I’ve seen since Manny Ramirez and Gary Sheffield.
His bat-speed is amazing. That’s also a skill that gets WRECKED by random injuries and age curves. Unfortunately, the Garciaparra comp is a great example of what can happen. Ramirez had other skills to fall back on as his batspeed declined (also, you know, steroids). Garciaparra’s bat speed was hindered after his injury, and he basically fell off a cliff once his main skill set was gone.
That’s not a guaranteed outcome for Betts, but let’s be careful about fetishizing hitters who get by on pure bat speed and plate coverage. It’s the equivalent of gawking over a starter who throws 100 mph at age 25 with sloppy command and weak secondaries. Said starter is going to implode in their 30s as their velocity drops without developing other skills, however dominant they may seem now.
I understand that we’re supposed to be analytic around here and that’s all well and good. And this article is informative and interesting and all that. But the story for Mookie Betts right now is very simple: dude is fun as all get out. He’s a freaking delight to watch play baseball. That should be noted immediately in every conversation about the dude, because it’s undeniably true.
I’ve known all year that this was a fluke from Betts. He’s not nearly as good as he looks this year. I’ve been saying it to every baseball fan I talk to, and I will stand by it until I’m proved right over the next few years. But it was just intuition, along with a strong suspicion that he’ll spend a lot of time on the DL, even at a young age. I didn’t really know why until I read this article, and now I do:
“Betts is slugging like a cleanup hitter but seeing strikes like he’s Ben Revere. The league continues to not adjust to Betts’ development, and he continues to punish them for it.”
He’s not this good. He will never be this good again. He’s having a lucky year, and all the home runs that barely make it over the Green Monster prove it — they would be flyouts to the warning track in most other stadiums.
After 2016, a Matt Carpenter comparison will be the BEST scenario for Betts.
” all the home runs that barely make it over the Green Monster prove it — they would be flyouts to the warning track in most other stadiums.”
Lol. Most of Mookie’s Fenway homers appear to still be rising as they clear the monster. Bogaerts is the one who hits warning track fly outs that land in the first row.
Jordioteque, circa 2040, at Mookie Betts’ HOF induction: “His career was a fluke! He was not nearly as good as his career looks, and I’ve been telling every baseball fan I talk to! I don’t understand why they all say, ‘Give it a rest, already.’’
yours truly,
Buck Showalter
Let me tell you something you don’t know. I coached Mookie when he was 11&12 years old and I can tell you this is no fluke. You have no idea of what you speak. After coaching hundreds of kids for over 20 years, he was a once in a lifetime athlete. He was the best quarterback in TN that never played HS football because his mother would not allow it. Johnny Football had nothing on him. He won 2 championships for me and was years ahead of his teammates. He was an all star HS basketball player. He was an all star bowler with a pro average. He was an all star baseball player. We used to joke if he took up golf, Tiger Woods would be done. If you underestimate him like the idiots that passed on him and let me have him just because of his size, you are just about as stupid as they were. His greatest strength is he rarely makes the same mistake twice and he has no equal being a class act.
According to ESPN’s Home Run Tracker,
1. 6 of Mookie’s HRs would have only been HRs in 0 or 1 other ballparks
2. Mookie is 2nd in the league in “Just Enough” HRs with 14
3. Mookie is 1st in the league in “Lucky Homers” with 5
Trout is second in lucky homers with four. Mookie is tied with Joc Pederson, Bryce Harper, and Miguel Sano for no doubters with six. Mookie has one more no doubter than Josh Donaldson and only one less than Mike Trout.
Mookie has a 35% hard hit rate and a ridiculously high average exit velocity. Mookie hit two more homers tonight and now has 28. He leads the majors in extra base hits. He is a monster
And how many of his line drives that slammed the monster would have landed in the tenth row at Camden? Stupid comparison since everyone playing at Fenway is hitting against the monster and who gives a damn about “Lucky” homers. Isn’t that like being a little bit pregnant? It’s nice to hit one clean out of the park but the scoreboard still shows one run per home run
And now needs some NEW new comparisons.
I was making an argument today that Mookie Betts has gotten quite lucky this season with some of his HR’s. I.e he has hit tons of “just enough” home runs, and has 5 “lucky” home runs that wouldn’t of been HR’s unless they were wind aided. He says to me, “Well how many balls off the wall has he hit that would be home runs in other ballparks. I thought that was a stupid question and wanted to prove that wasn’t the case but couldn’t figure out how. Anyone know how to figure that out?
Yoooo…the Mookster smashed two more tonight!!! What were all you haters saying???????
Exactly….both of those would have been slammed off the wall. If he played for Baltimore, he would have 40
Betts season doesn’t surprise me, at all. He is an inch shorter and ten pounds lighter than Willie Mays, is extremely athletic, unusually intelligent, and his package comes with the personality to put it all together. I don’t know that he’ll ever be better than his age 23 season, but he can sustain this. Lest we forget, this is a guy who can play a premium center field and should be an all star second baseman right now. He is unique, so comparisons are tough. He is the first to agree that he is not a home run hitter, but for Betts hitting is all about selection and he is good at that and getting better.
Most position players peak in their late 20s. Consider that for a second. The age curves say Betts is going to get quite a bit better over the next few years, hitting free agency at age 27 (barring extension), with two or three more prime years left. Just consider that bidding war.
The Dodgers will dither too much, offer too little and lose out, and Betts will join Harper on the Yankees