Archive for Jimmy Rollins

One of the more confounding parts of baseball, and surely if you’re a baseball player, is the disappearance of what appeared to be an entirely reliable skill set for extended periods of time. Some of it can be explained away by statistical measures while others are attempted to be explained away by a narrative. But frequently, it’s hard to unearth a tidy explanation. And that’s simultaneously frustrating and rather fascinating.

I was scanning the leader board recently, looking at strikeout and walk rates for hitters and those who have seen notable changes this year. For curiosity’s sake, here’s what caught my eye after a cursory glance:

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My followers and I had some fun on Twitter the other night, trying to compare actors to baseball players. Josh Hamilton to Robert Downey, Jr was a solid comparison. Robert DeNiro drew plenty of Cal Ripken, Jr, or Ken Griffey, Jr responses. Clint Eastwood was a toughy, as someone who was great in one area for an extended period of time, switched positions, and was equally great, if not better, in that area. 

Robin Yount fit that description, as he began his Hall of Fame career as a shortstop, before switching to center field.

Yount won two MVP awards in his career, recorded 3,142 hits, and finished with a .344 wOBA and 66.1 wins above replacement. He made just three all star teams in his 20-year career from 1974-1993. From 1980-83, Yount’s 25.9 WAR ranked behind only Rickey Henderson, Mike Schmidt, and Andre Dawson. He was the second best infielder in the game, and was named an all star in 1980, 1982, and 1983, only missing out in 1981, in part due to the labor strike.

He didn’t even make the all star team in 1989 when he won his second MVP award at 33 years old. The idea of a player winning a coveted end of season award while not being considered good enough in the first half to make a roster supposedly comprising the best players in each league piqued my interest.

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Earlier in the week, we focused on the top two spots in the Phillies order. Specifically, the revelation that using Jimmy Rollins in the leadoff spot over Placido Polanco would only cost the team about 1.18 baserunners over the course of a season. The commenters pointed out, rightly, that this analysis ignored the slugging aspect of the two batters’ repertoires. Questions were also raised about the lefty-lefty tandem at the heart of the order. So, let’s dive right in and try to get this right by the numbers: A little moron, the Phillies’ batting order.

Remembering back to the LOOGY wonder that was Javier Lopez in the playoffs last year, you might over-rate the “problem” of batting lefties Chase Utley and Ryan Howard back-to-back. Lopez only pitched 4 1/3 innings, but his four strikeouts were memorable, and it seemed that he shut the duo down. But this wasn’t really a year-long problem. Yes, Howard has a nasty platoon split (.424 wOBA vs righties, .324 vs lefties), but Utley doesn’t. His work versus righties (.382 wOBA) is basically indistinguishable from his work against southpaws (.390 wOBA). Opposing managers can bring out their LOOGY for both guys at their own peril.

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Judging from this ESPNinsider piece by Buster Olney, it’s about time for a yearly piece of rosterbation when it comes to the Phillies’ lineup. With such a veteran lineup, the question really boils down to the top two spots. The three veterans that could fill those two roles are all above-average, strong players, but that doesn’t mean that the team can’t get it wrong. In fact, it’s possible they’ve been getting it wrong for a while now.

Much of this discussion revolves around the decline of Jimmy Rollins, but not all. He’s been a negative with the bat the last two years, and his sub-par wOBAs came in about half a season last year. The rule of recency might make us over-rate how far his athleticism has fallen, but if we focus on his career rates, we see that he’s always been below average when it comes to getting on base (.328 career OBP, average is about .330 most years; 7.4% career walk rate, average is about 8.5% most years).

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First off, given some of the howling on twitter, it’s time for the obligatory strike zone plot. Let’s get it out of the way, thanks to Brooks Baseball.

It’s pretty ugly, but consistent enough. It was four or five inches too wide, or a half a foot if you count both sides. But there are plenty of triangles and squares out there beyond the box, so let’s not blame it all on umpire Wally Bell.

For all the talk of how similar Madison Bumgarner and Joe Blanton were going into the game, it’s somewhat prescient that they both failed to get out of the fifth inning and that they both left having given up three earned runs. On the other hand, the journey was not necessarily so similar. Bumgarner does use his left hand, and he did strike out six and allow only one run to score while he was on the bump, while Blanton struck out three and was directly responsible for all of his runs. It wasn’t all bad for Blanton – all of his balls in play were counted as groundballs – but it since the starters played to a standstill on the scoreboard, the advantage goes to the hometown pitcher.

Phillies fans can’t even blame the randomness of coming through in high leverage moments in this one – there were eight moments with a leverage index over one last night. The Phillies batters came through in two of them, and the Giants batters came through in two of them. It may seem that the Giants were more ‘clutch,’ but that would probably just be because they came up last. To the home-fielders went the spoils.

At this point, some of the blame must rest squarely on the Phillies’ stars. In this game, Chase Utley put up a -10.8% in win probability by going one for five and not coming through in some key moments. That comes on the heels of a -12% in game three (0-for-4), +3.8% in game two (0-for-3 with two walks), and a -1.8% in game one (1-for-3 with a walk). It’s obviously just a poor four-game stretch for a great secondbaseman, but it’s also bad timing for that stretch. The same could be said for Jimmy Rollins (.267, 1 extra base hit) and Jayson Werth (.250, 1 extra base hit).

The larger pattern is one of struggles for all of the left-handers on the team. Chase Utley, Ryan Howard, the recently benched Raul Ibanez, and young Domonic Brown are a combined 7-for-39 with 7 walks and 3 extra-base hits, and most of that is Howard’s production. Maybe it’s not a surprise given the left arms of Jonathan Sanchez and Madison Bumgarner, but Javier Lopez looms as a large acquisition for the Giants in this series. He has three big holds and gave up his first run Wednesday night. His lefty sidearm release has been hard on the lefty batters, and that makes sense given the difference in release points vis-a-vis a regular right-hander.

All this said, it was a great game. The WPA graph does a good job showing the rollercoaster that was Wednesday night. Fans of baseball were satisfied, if not fans of Phillie baseball.

Well, as improbable as it was, this game did not turn out exactly like Carson Cistulli drew it up. Roy Oswalt did not strike out fifteen batters and hold the Reds scoreless, and Scott Rolen did not hit a home run off of Jose Contreras. And instead of two homers, Chase Utley hit no homers.

The funny thing? The Phillies still won and Bronson Arroyo actually pitched as decently as was predicted. What if Sports had Arroyo going seven innings with a strikeout, a walk and three runs allowed on five hits, and he actually allowed two (unearned) runs in five and a third innings with two strikeouts, three walks and four hits allowed. I mean, that’s not bad for literally trying to predict the future down to the hit batsman. Despite the awesome leg kick, and kicking tunes, Arroyo’s stuff was not of the shut-down variety (two swinging strikes all game). He gamed through it, gritting and grission-ing his team to a lead.

Arroyo may not have been as good as the typical game story may suggest, but the task at hand is to think about this from the Phillies’ angle. And really, was Oswalt’s night deserving of so much better? I mean, yes he had better ‘stuff’ and more swinging strikes (nine of them!) and was right around the zone all night (only one walk, and no pitches that were a foot-plus out of the zone like Arroyo had), but he also grooved a few many straight down Broadway. Those home runs to Brandon Phillips and Jay Bruce happened, we can’t xFIP them away despite Oswalt having a decent groundball-to-flyball ratio (6-to-7).

Though Jimmy Rollins was oh-for-the-series, and ‘failed’ once again in a key position (one down, tying runs on base in the 7th inning, the third-highest leverage index moment of the game), his soft flyball to Jay Bruce (a +18.9 Right Fielder this year according to UZR) was muffed about a billion times, and suddenly Rollins looks like a hero to Oswalt’s zero. Seriously, Bruce missed a play he should have had 95+ times out of a 100 (or, rather, 256 in 259 times), then screwed up the throw, the relay was punted, and Rollins stands on second with the crowd roaring. Rollins gets a .352 WPA for the play, Oswalt a -.152 for his five innings, three run effort. Sometimes WPA doesn’t tell the whole story.

The Reds, the better fielding team going in, fell apart and made a division-series-record four errors in a game they should or could have won. Or: The Phillies put the ball in play against a Reds’ staff that only struck out four in nine innings – putting pressure on the defense, which lead to five unearned runs and a win. Two ways to tell the story once again, but as happy as the Phils may be, they have to know that a good amount of luck helped them along their way on Friday night.

In another universe, in another iteration of this game, Oswalt pitched a second-straight no-hitter and the Phillies beat up on Arroyo. Same result, I guess. Phillies up 2-0 and a step away from the NLCS.

With first basemen in the books and our look at keystone cornermen last night, our attention will now turn to shortstop, a position once populated with mega-stars such as Cal Ripken, Alex Rodriguez, and Nomar Garciaparra. Now, we have the new breed of shortstops, all of whom play in the NL East, with last names beginning with same letter: Hanley Ramirez, Jimmy Rollins, and Jose Reyes. Rollins took home the NL MVP award last season, in a much-debated race. Ramirez is probably the most underrated player in the game of baseball right now. And Reyes is one of the most exciting and talented players in the game.

Offensively, Hanley Ramirez is in a league of his own, with a 4.24 WPA/LI, just about two wins better than closest competitor JJ Hardy of the Brewers. Hardy checks in with 2.27, just ahead of Reyes and his 2.20. Jimmy Rollins places fourth, over a full win less than Reyes, at 1.02, with Christian Guzman slightly behind at 0.96. Rollins did have a disappointing season in 2008, in which he saw his power output diminish. He also missed some time early in the year due to injury, which is uncharacteristic of his career. His value extended beyond just the regular forms of evaluated offense this year, however.

On the basepaths, Bill James’ baserunning score placed him fifth in the entire major leagues with a +46. This metric adds one point for each steal while subtracting two for each time caught stealing, and factors in how often a player was able to get from first to third, second to home, first to home, and avoid double plays. No other shortstop ranked in the top ten. Looking solely at the stolen base portion, Jose Reyes finished sixth, but he could not capitalize enough on the base advancement factors to earn a spot in the top ten.

Additionally, Rollins led all shortstops with a +23 in the field, making him this year’s best fielding shortstop. Yunel Escobar of the Braves finished slightly behind Jimmy, at +21, with JJ Hardy and Cesar Izturis tied for third place at +19. Jack Wilson rounded out the top five with a +16. All of this does not push Rollins into the same area as Ramirez, by any stretch, but serves as an important reminder of why more factors other than offense need to be taken into account when evaluating a season.

Yunel is a pretty neat example of a role reversal. Last year, in half a season with the Braves, he was well above average with the stick, but scored a 0 in the +- fielding system, making him the epitome of a league average shortstop. This year, his WPA/LI deemed him a league average hitter, yet he was the second best fielding shortstop. Oh, how things change.

On the opposite of the effectiveness spectrum, Bobby Crosby’s -2.56 WPA/LI was by far the worst in baseball for shortstops, a full win worse than Yuniesky Betancourt. In the field, Crosby was a -13, with Betancourt a -19, so it is not as if Crosby played gold glove caliber defense. He had a dreadful season. Orlando Cabrera (-1.43), Edgar Renteria (-1.40), and Miguel Tejada (-1.27) round out the bottom five.

Stephen Drew led the pack with 44 doubles, with Jose Reyes topping everyone with his 19 triples. Hanley Ramirez led with 33 home runs, 92 walks, and a .940 OPS. Albert Pujols should win the MVP award this year in the National League, but based on how long the Marlins stayed in the race, Hanley Ramirez should not go unnoticed at all. His fielding has improved as well, with a +3 this year compared to a -37 in 2007. Yuniesky struck out the least, just 42 times. Rollins swung the least often, offering on just 39.7% of the pitches thrown his way. Despite that, he made contact on 90.8% of those swings, a rate topped only by Ryan Theriot and Marco Scutaro, who also found themselves at the top in percentage of pitches seen in the strike zone.

We also cannot forget Troy Tulowitzki, who had an injury-plagued sophomore campaign after proving himself as quite capable offensively and a wizard with the glove in 2007. Or even Rafael Furcal, who had a scorchingly hot April before going into hibernation only to return just in time for the division series. With Troy, Jose, Hanley, and perhaps Yunel on the rise, with veterans like Furcal, Rollins and Guzman still remaining valuable, this position might lack the star power of the A-Rod days, but it is still very talented.

While I firmly believe the comments made by Jimmy Rollins towards Philadelphia fans was a non-story, and, well, true, the fact is that he is having a very poor followup to his 2007 MVP campaign. Granted, some will argue that he should not have won the award in the first place, but he did, and his performance with the bat this year has been anything but award-worthy. Now, in the field, he has been a +8 shortstop this year to go along with his +7 last year and +12 in 2006. The issue, however, is that the perceived effectiveness of a player is generally born out of his offensive performance and production in timely situations.

In other words, WPA is a pretty good indicator of the MVP award, because voters aren’t going to stop and think about what would have happened if every plate appearance just counted as one (WPA/LI). They look at overall numbers, the clutchiness, and more like-factors. With that in mind, and with Rollins’ offensive struggles this year, I took a look at the MVP winners over the last twenty years (1988-2007), along with their WPAs in both the award year and the next year. The ultimate goal being to see if anyone else has had such a drastic perceived drop in effectiveness.

  Year          NAME             WPA1   WPA2   WPA-Drop
  1988      Kirk Gibson          5.00    0.87    -4.13
  1989      Kevin Mitchell       6.91    2.86    -4.05
  1990      Barry Bonds          5.63    7.99     2.36
  1991      Terry Pendleton      3.57    4.81     1.24
  1992      Barry Bonds          5.92    7.79     1.87
  1993      Barry Bonds          7.79    4.82    -2.97
  1994      Jeff Bagwell         5.79    4.70    -1.09
  1995      Barry Larkin         3.96    3.54    -0.42
  1996      Ken Caminiti         6.10    4.38    -1.72
  1997      Larry Walker         6.65    2.63    -4.02
  1998      Sammy Sosa           6.09    4.11    -1.98
  1999      Chipper Jones        6.36    2.16    -4.20
  2000      Jeff Kent            4.85    1.21    -3.64
  2001      Barry Bonds         11.63   10.57    -1.06
  2002      Barry Bonds         10.57    8.36    -2.21
  2003      Barry Bonds          8.36   12.63     4.27
  2004      Barry Bonds         12.63    0.26   -12.37
  2005      Albert Pujols        4.15    9.57     5.42
  2006      Ryan Howard          8.10    3.11    -4.99
  2007      Jimmy Rollins        2.69    0.33    -2.36

Now, Gibson in 1989 and Bonds in 2005 were both injured and missed significant time, so their second year WPA numbers should be disregarded. Other than that, though, Rollins is not alone in his perceived dropoff. In fact, his dropoff from last year to right now is actually less than some others on this list. What also needs to be taken into account is how his WPA in the MVP year is the lowest of anyone in the last twenty years—so there is much less to drop off from—but he has not been the worst in terms of WPA differential between the award year and the year after. His .747 OPS is disappointing, but he has been solid in the field, and despite the criticism pointed towards him with the hustle or lack of puncuality, the situation could be much worse.