Rays Call up Richie Shaffer

With a 52-54 record and a meager 10% chance of making the playoffs, there likely won’t be much reason to pay attention to the Rays over the next two months. Simply put, it’s unlikely they’ll be playing too many more meaningful games from here on out. However, the Rays just got a bit more interesting today. They called up former first round pick Richard Shaffer from Triple-A Durham, who’s been one of the best hitters in the minor leagues this season.

Shaffer’s hit the crap out of the ball this year. The 24-year-old slugger opened the year in Double-A, where he hit .262/.362/.470 in 175 trips to the plate. The Rays promoted Shaffer to Triple-A in May, and he made it immediately clear that he was one of the best hitters at that level too. His .261/.353/.592 performance yielded a 168 wRC+, which is the second highest mark of any hitter with at least 200 plate appearances in the International League this season, trailing only Jerry Sands.

Shaffer’s 2015 performance has been undeniably excellent, but he hasn’t always enjoyed that same level of success. In 2013 and 2014, he posted wRC+s of 99 and 112, respectively. Since Shaffer was a bat-first prospect, that performance pushed him to the fringes of the prospect radar. At first glance, it might appear as though Shaffer’s 2015 breakout came out of nowhere, and that it’s only a matter of time before the unfeeling hand of regression pushes him back towards mediocrity. But there’s reason to believe that Shaffer’s improvements are for real, and that he very well might be the hitter his 162 wRC+ in Triple-A suggests he is.

As I noted in April, both Shaffer himself and personnel from the Rays organization noted that he revamped his offensive approach towards the end of last season. Both seemed to think the adjustments made him a much better hitter. Kiley McDaniel had the chance to see Shaffer in person multiple times this past April, and confirmed that he seemed much more relaxed and comfortable at the plate. He observed that Shaffer was no longer guessing on pitches, and was doing a better job of capitalizing on pitchers’ mistakes.

These improvements also showed up in the data, as his offensive performance took a huge leap forward in last season’s waning days. Over his final 17 games, he hit .357/.486/.758 with six homers. Looking at a time series of Shaffer’s wOBA from last year, the trend is immediately obvious.

OK, so there’s a good amount of evidence that Shaffer’s turned a corner this year. It’s probably safe to say he’s a much better prospect today than he was, say, 18 months ago. But he was barely even a prospect at all 18 months ago. Where does that put him now?

According to KATOH, he’s still not a particularly exciting prospect. Running Shaffer’s numbers from Double-A and Triple-A this year through the KATOH machine yields a forecast of 2.2 WAR through age-28, which is only a modest improvement from his preseason forecast of 1.9 WAR. For what it’s worth, however, things look markedly better if one zeroes in on what he’s done since his promotion to Triple-A. Including only these plate appearances yields a forecast of 3.9 WAR, which would have put him 103rd on KATOH’s preseason list.

KATOH’s pessimism towards Shaffer is largely due to his strikeout numbers. Although he’s been excellent overall, he’s also whiffed in 28% of his trips to the plate. His 12% walk rate and .276 Isolated Power are both very encouraging, but a strikeout rate pushing 30% is very troubling coming from a 24-year-old.

Let’s see what’s become of hitters who performed similarly to Shaffer at the Triple-A level. Using league-adjusted, regressed stats, along with age, I calculated the Mahalanobis Distance between Shaffer’s performance and every Triple-A season since 1990 in which a batter recorded at least 400 plate appearances. Below, you’ll find a list of historical players whose performances were nearest and dearest to Shaffer’s, ranked from most to least similar.

Rank	Mah Dist	Name	PA thru 28	WAR thru 28
1	1.94	J.R. Phillips	505	0.0
2	1.97	Brooks Conrad	19	0.0
3	2.00	J.J. Davis	117	0.0
4	2.62	Jay Canizaro	648	0.0
5	2.66	Jon Nunnally	1,049	5.4
6	2.82	Butch Huskey	2,277	1.4
7	3.02	Wladimir Balentien	559	0.0
8	3.02	Ernesto Mejia	0	0.0
9	3.09	Michael Coleman	70	0.0
10	3.10	Darren Reed	167	0.0
11	3.14	Michael Ryan	285	0.0
12	3.21	Chin-Feng Chen	25	0.0
13	3.22	Mike Simms	333	1.0
14	3.23	Sean Rodriguez	1,594	6.2
15	3.32	Mauro Gomez	111	0.0
16	3.36	Jim Vatcher	122	0.2
17	3.43	J.P. Arencibia	1,614	0.0
18	3.43	Jeromy Burnitz	1,297	7.3
19	3.49	Jared Hoying*	0	0.0
20	3.52	Izzy Alcantara	89	0.0

*Batters who have yet to play their age-28 season.

The comps share KATOH’s pessimism on Shaffer. This list is littered with Quad-A sluggers who never quite made enough contact to hack it in the majors. Jon Nunnally and Butch Huskey are the only players on the top 10 who hit enough to be better than replacement level.

As was the case with many of the hitters listed above, there’s an awful lot of swing-and-miss in Shaffer’s swing, which doesn’t bode particularly well for his transition to the majors. Research shows that Triple-A hitters who frequently swing and miss on pitches in the zone often struggle with the transition to the majors. It should be of no little concern that Shaffer placed near the bottom of his league by that metric at both Double-A and Triple-A this year.

Furthermore, some scouts are concerned about Shaffer’s approach at the plate, according to Kiley, which may prevent him from fully realizing his offensive potential in the majors. This might make it difficult for him to stick as big league regular, since he’s already below-average at third. Given these concerns, Kiley said he wouldn’t be surprised if Shaffer hit some home runs in his first time around the league, but then struggled when he faced teams for the second time.

The data agree that Shaffer’s not particularly good at the hot corner. According to Baseball Prospectus’s minor league FRAA, he’s been 14 runs below average on defense between this year and last, with the majority of that coming at third base. He’s also dabbled at first this year, and has reportedly taken some reps in right field, so he might see time at those positions as well. But since those positions are at the defensive spectrum, he’ll absolutely need to hit to stick as an everyday player.

Shaffer certainly has his warts, both offensively and defensively. But considering what he’s done over the past 12 months, I’d be surprised if he couldn’t at least resemble a league average hitter right away. A player like that would surely come in handy for the Rays, both this year and for years to come, even if it’s only in a part-time role. It remains to be see what position he’ll play, and how well he’ll be able to play it. But if he hits anything like he did in Triple-A, the Rays will surely find a way to get his bat into the lineup.