Archive for Daniel Murphy

You could be forgiven, heading into last season, for thinking that Daniel Murphy would fail to carry over the magic of his 2015 playoff performance into the 2016 campaign. Many teams seem to have had similar suspicions: a free agent, Murphy received just $37.5 million over three years to sign with Washington. The Nationals were immediately rewarded: Murphy recorded nearly six wins for the club, basically providing a full return on Washington’s investment in just the first year of the contract.

Despite the wild success of Murphy’s 2016 campaign, it’s possible you had your doubts going into the current season, as well. Murphy was entering his age-32 season. His success last season was built in part on a very high BABIP. He doesn’t walk a ton. The projections were pegging him for just short of three wins this year. There was plenty of reason to expect some regression.

Early in the 2017 season, however, Daniel Murphy’s play is dispelling whatever doubts remained about the legitimacy of last year’s breakout.

After just eight games, Murphy already has 17 hits, seven for extra bases. He’s gotten at least one hit in every game, gotten at least two hits in six of eight games — including a three-hit game and last night’s four-hit game. With two doubles and a homer yesterday, Murphy is hitting .472/.486/.778 with a wRC+ of 230. It’s easy to say that it’s only eight games, but if Murphy gets another 550 plate appearances on the season and hits “only” his projected 118 wRC+ over the course of it, he’ll still record a 125 wRC+ overall. Over his last 200 games dating back to August 1, 2015, Murphy has a 153 wRC+ and that doesn’t even include another 86 postseason plate appearances where that number was close to 200. Murphy has been a really good hitter for quite some time, and it doesn’t look like he’s slowing down.

If you recall, Murphy did this exact same thing at the beginning of last season, hitting .480/.581/.880 with a 277 wRC+ after eight games. There were still skeptics at that point, and there were still skeptics a month later when Dave Cameron asked everyone to buy into Daniel Murphy. Over the winter, Jeff Sullivan looked at Murphy’s unique skillset, which includes a whole lot of power and a whole lot of contact. Sullivan noted that, in recent history, only Victor Martinez and Nomar Garciaparra have had seasons like Murphy’s 2016. Going further back into the past we find Hall of Famers like George Brett and Tris Speaker.

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Over the last week, we’ve been looking at sophomore players in the Major Leagues. Today’s post is looking at the National League East division, which was fairly barren in terms of rookies in 2008 although the Braves organization had its fair share of newbies.

In the past few days, we have looked at the: AL Central, AL West, AL East and NL Central.

Perhaps buoyed by the mass of ever-present media, fielder Daniel Murphy entered 2009 with quite a bit of hype after just 188 at-bats during the ’08 season. Last year, he hit .313/.397/.473 with rates of 12.1 BB% and 21.4 K%. Murphy hit just two homers (.160 ISO) and did not successfully steal a base in two attempts. Perhaps the biggest negative with the left-handed hitter is his lack of position. Originally an infielder, Murphy’s penchant for errors led to a move to the outfield, where he spent all of 2008 while in the Majors. This season, he’s split his time between left field and first base. His 2009 line of .250/.324/.362 is below average for both positions, as is his ISO at .112.

Martin Prado bounced between the Majors and triple-A during both the 2006 and 2007 seasons. He spent the majority of the 2008 season with Atlanta and had an above-average offensive season for a utility player by hitting .320/.377/.461 with 18 doubles and three steals in 228 at-bats. His rates were also pretty good at 8.4 BB% and 12.7 K%. This season, the infielder is hitting .277/.344/.445 with 11 doubles and no steals in 119 at-bats. Both his plate rates have improved by a percent or two. The downside, much like with Murphy above, is that Prado has been used mostly at a position that traditionally produces power (third base and first base). If he spent more time at second base – or shortstop – he would have greater value to the Braves, assuming he can play at least average defense at those positions.

Desperate for some outfield help in 2008, the Braves organization ran through a number of outfielders with “fourth outfielder” labels hovering over them and not one of the three players has done much to dispute that impending title. Josh Anderson, Gregor Blanco and Brandon Jones have all seen their playing time with the Braves decrease, even though the club still needs outfield depth. In fact, Anderson was traded out of the organization to Detroit earlier this year. Blanco showed the ability to get on base last season but he did it with almost no power. The 25-year-old outfielder hit .251/.366/.309 with 19 extra base hits and 13 steals in 430 at-bats. This season, he’s spent the majority of the year in triple-A. Jones hit .267/.312/.397 with one homer and a single steal in 116 at-bats. His rates of 5.7 BB% and 24.1 K% suggested more work needed to be done. Like Blanco, Jones has spent most of 2009 in triple-A.

Stolen from the Tigers in a trade after the 2007 season, right-hander Jair Jurrjens has been a very good pitcher for the Braves. Jurrjens posted a 3.68 ERA (3.59 FIP) in 2008 with 188 hits allowed in 188.1 innings of work. He also had a walk rate of 3.35 BB/9 and a strikeout rate of 6.64 K/9. His ground-ball rate was 51.2%. This season, Jurrjens has allowed 81 hits in 87.1 innings of work, along with an ERA of 2.89 (3.52 FIP). His rates are very similar, although his ground-ball percentage has dropped to just 39.5%.

Reliever Manny Acosta allowed 48 hits in 53.0 IP but posted disappointing rates of 4.42 BB/9 and 5.26 K/9. He’s pitching in just nine MLB games in 2009 with eight hits allowed in 11.2 innings. He’s also shown similar rates, which is disappointing considering his fastball averages out at 93 mph.

Emilio Bonifacio had a very nice first month of the 2009 season, but that has been sandwiched by about six months worth of below-average play. Based on his offensive skill set, the 24-year-old infielder is best suited to play second base, but he’s spent the majority of the 2009 season at third base, where he has hit .241/.288/.292, which is well-below-average for a third base (and even for a second baseman). He’s also stolen just 12 bases in 17 attempts and has a walk rate of 6.5 BB%. Last year, Bonifacio hit .243/.296/.337 with seven steals in 11 attempts. Sadly, he’s not even a stellar defensive player.

John Baker, 28, toiled in the minors for seven seasons before earning his shot in 2008 and he hit .299/.392/.447 with five homers in 197 at-bats. The catcher also showed OK patience at the plate with a walk rate of 13.2 BB%. This season, Baker has struggled to hit for average with a line of .245/.335/.411 and six homers in 163 at-bats. His ground-ball rate is probably a little high at 56.3% for a plodding catcher.

The ground-ball pitcher that is Chris Volstad had a very nice debut season in 2008. The right-hander quieted the critics who said he was not ready by posting a 2.88 ERA (3.82 FIP) with 76 hits in 84.1 innings of work. He posted a walk rate of 3.84 BB/9 and a strikeout rate of 5.55 K/9 but allowed just three homers (0.32 HR/9). It’s the missing quality sinker that has hurt Volstad in 2009. He’s given up 88 hits in 89.1 innings, including 14 long balls (1.41 HR/9).

Southpaw John Lannan, 24, doesn’t get a lot of love even though he keeps putting up the results – and for a bad team. He had a 3.91 ERA (4.79 FIP) while allowing 172 hits in 182 innings in 2008. The left-hander also had rates of 3.56 BB/9 and 5.79, so he puts the ball in play a lot. In 2009, Lannan has a 3.38 ERA (5.09 FIP) with 82 hits allowed in 85.1 innings. His walk rate is very similar, but the strikeout has dropped to 4.43 BB/9.

Collin Balester, 23, has to be pretty disappointed. The right-hander made 15 starts in 2008 and allowed 92 hits in 80 innings of work. He also posted rates of 3.15 BB/9 and 5.63 K/9. Like Lannan, Balester also struggled with home runs and he allowed 12 homers (1.35 HR/9). This season, he’s made all 14 of his starts in triple-A, where he has a 4.00 ERA.

Steven Shell and Charlie Manning both pitched a good chunk of innings for the club in 2008, but neither player has seen much MLB playing time in 2008. The better of the two pitchers, Shell is a former Angels prospect, posted a 2.16 ERA in exactly 50 innings. He also had a 7.38 K/9 rate. In 2009, though, the right-hander fell apart. He appeared in four games for the Nationals before moving on to the Seattle organization, where he has a 7.90 ERA in 12 games. Manning appeared in 57 games in 2008 with an ERA of 5.17. He has yet to pitch in the Majors in ’09.

The Philadelphia Phillies organization did not distribute significant playing time to any rookies in 2008.

The New York Mets organization received key offensive contributions from two rookies in 2008, which helped the club finish second in the National League East division. Neither Daniel Murphy nor Nick Evans was considered amongst the club’s top prospects. Murphy checked in on Baseball America’s Top 30 Mets prospect list at No. 15 and Evans sat at No. 20 (This list was compiled prior to the Johan Santana trade, which cost the organization four of its top seven prospects).

Last season, Murphy appeared in 45 games for the Mets and hit .313/.397/.473 with an ISO of .160 in 131 at-bats. The 23-year-old left-handed batter posted a reasonable walk rate of 12.1 BB% and a strikeout rate that was on the high side for his skill set at 21.4 K%. Murphy, a Florida native, was originally selected out of Jacksonville University in the 13th round of the 2006 draft and played mostly at the hot corner in the minor leagues. His power, though, is below average for the position. Murphy spent his MLB debut in left field for the Mets.

Despite his solid build (6’3” 210 lbs), his bat does not profile well in a corner outfield spot, either, with a career minor league line of .290/.352/.444. The Mets organization realized this and sent Murphy to the Arizona Fall League (AFL), after the 2008 season, to learn second base. Defensively, he had some hiccups (four errors in 15 games) but Murphy also showed enough promise to give incumbent second baseman Luis Castillo reason to be worried about playing time in 2009. Offensively in the AFL, Murphy hit .397/.487/.619 in 63 at-bats.

Evans also has a chance to play regularly in 2009, despite modest debut numbers last season. Only Carlos Beltran and, perhaps, Ryan Church are assured of 500-plus plate appearances in 2009, if healthy. Evans, a right-handed hitter, was a surprised call-up in 2008 and hit .257/.303/.404 with an ISO of .147 in 109 at-bats (50 games). The 22-year-old Arizona native was originally drafted in the fifth round out of high school in 2004 and spent the first half of 2008 in Double-A.

Evans has raw power, but he is still learning how to tap into it. He also does not walk much (8.1 BB% in Double-A, 6.0 BB% in the Majors). The big problem with Evans, offensively, is that fact that he hit just .135/.150/.189 against right-handed pitching, which is downright awful. He killed southpaws, though, with a line of .319/.380/.514. Evans is going to have a hard time playing everyday if he cannot improve that – and it’s something that haunted him in the minors too, although not as dramatically.

Defensively, Evans spent the majority of his time in the minors at first base (284 games out of 313). However, all but three of his appearances in the Majors came in left field. Despite his inexperience, he displayed average range and did not make an error. Evans has a higher upside than fellow sophomore Murphy, but the latter is more Major-League ready.

Murphy certainly appears ready to play everyday at second base for the Mets, and could be one of the biggest surprises of 2009. Evans, though, could use some more time in the minors to work on his approach at the plate (as well as against right-handed pitching) and log some more innings in the outfield. He may be pressed into regular duty, though, if players like Cory Sullivan, Jeremy Reed, and Bobby Kielty underwhelm in spring training.