The Padres Need a First Base Upgrade
In 2020, the San Diego Padres finally had their breakout season, going 37-23 in the pandemic-shortened sprint, good enough for the third-best record in baseball. A lot of players were responsible for getting them to where they ended up, but one of the best bits of news for the team was that Eric Hosmer was one of them. After signing a long-term contract prior to the 2018 season, Hosmer hit .259/.316/.412 in his first two seasons with the Friars, for a wRC+ of 93 and -0.5 combined WAR that placed him near the bottom of the ranks of baseball’s first baseman. But in 2020, with the highest average launch angle and lowest grounder percentage of his career, he hit .287/.333/.517, giving some hope that would turn things around.
If the first three months of 2021 are any indication, those hopes have mostly evaporated, ninth inning, game-tying home runs aside. Hosmer’s still hitting the ball very hard, but he’s largely back to his old, pre-2020 habits, hitting an inordinate number of pitches straight into the dirt, knocking out more ants than opposing pitchers. Since 2015, Statcast has kept track of what they call the “Sweet Spot” or pitches hit with a launch angle between eight and 32 degrees. Only twice has Hosmer been over 30%: in 2020 and his equally excellent 2017 season. For 2021, that mark has dropped to his lowest number yet, 22.3%. As a result, even with a better average exit velocity than last year, he’s missing 150 points of slugging percentage:
When the Padres weren’t competing, any real damage done to the team by Hosmer’s lack of punch was a financial question rather than one that had a significant impact on the team’s baseball fate. In 2021, with the Padres contending, that’s a different story. The Giants have crashed the predicted Dodgers-Padres NL West race, turning a duel into a mêlée, and San Diego first base is one of the weakest positions among any of the three rosters:
| Team | Position | RoS WAR vs. AVG |
|---|---|---|
| Padres | 1B | -0.72 |
| Giants | SS | -0.47 |
| Giants | RP | -0.47 |
| Padres | RF | -0.45 |
| Giants | 3B | -0.42 |
| Giants | 2B | -0.39 |
| Giants | CF | -0.36 |
| Giants | LF | -0.20 |
| Dodgers | LF | 0.00 |
| Padres | C | 0.06 |
| Dodgers | 2B | 0.11 |
| Giants | RF | 0.15 |
| Giants | 1B | 0.18 |
| Padres | 2B | 0.31 |
| Dodgers | 3B | 0.48 |
| Padres | LF | 0.50 |
| Giants | SP | 0.57 |
| Dodgers | 1B | 0.58 |
| Dodgers | RP | 0.83 |
| Giants | C | 0.86 |
| Padres | 3B | 0.88 |
| Padres | CF | 0.94 |
| Dodgers | C | 0.96 |
| Dodgers | SS | 1.03 |
| Padres | RP | 1.03 |
| Padres | SS | 1.53 |
| Dodgers | CF | 1.64 |
| Dodgers | RF | 1.95 |
| Padres | SP | 2.47 |
| Dodgers | SP | 3.07 |
In other words, starting Hosmer nearly cancels out the positive effect of being able to start Manny Machado every night. Wil Myers is a problem as well, but first base is currently the team’s biggest issue and one that is projected to persist for the rest of the year.
ZiPS was never optimistic about Hosmer, but at the start of his San Diego tenure, it projected him to be a two-win player for the first half of the deal. Instead, thanks to Hosmer’s 2021, he’s once again back down to replacement level. With the chances that 2020 reflected a meaningful comeback fading, so too have his projections for the rest of the contract:
| Year | BA | OBP | SLG | AB | R | H | 2B | 3B | HR | RBI | BB | SO | SB | OPS+ | DR | WAR |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022 | .251 | .307 | .397 | 506 | 57 | 127 | 21 | 1 | 17 | 90 | 40 | 118 | 6 | 90 | 0 | 0.4 |
| 2023 | .248 | .302 | .388 | 484 | 53 | 120 | 21 | 1 | 15 | 84 | 37 | 110 | 5 | 86 | -1 | 0.1 |
| 2024 | .245 | .296 | .376 | 457 | 48 | 112 | 19 | 1 | 13 | 76 | 33 | 100 | 4 | 82 | -1 | -0.3 |
| 2025 | .241 | .289 | .360 | 428 | 43 | 103 | 16 | 1 | 11 | 67 | 29 | 87 | 4 | 76 | -1 | -0.7 |
If the projections hold true, Hosmer would be smart to not exercise his opt-out clause after the 2022 season, leaving a final eight-year total of -0.1 WAR for $144 million. I actually had to tell ZiPS to assume that Hosmer wouldn’t be benched; the model for predicting playing time in a player’s final years was determined to stop playing him after 2022.
Ignoring the long-term first base problems, simply getting an extra win would be a real boost in a tight pennant race. Coincidentally, that’s about what adding Trey Mancini from the Orioles would give to the Padres, bringing a bit of real-world applicability to a theoretical solution. Let’s re-roll the divisional races both with the current rosters and with the Padres adding an extra win.
| Team | W | L | GB | Pct | Div% | WC% | Playoff% | WS Win% |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Los Angeles Dodgers | 96 | 66 | — | .593 | 63.8% | 33.4% | 97.2% | 12.8% |
| San Diego Padres | 92 | 70 | 4 | .568 | 22.8% | 64.2% | 87.1% | 6.9% |
| San Francisco Giants | 91 | 71 | 5 | .562 | 13.4% | 63.0% | 76.4% | 5.0% |
| Colorado Rockies | 66 | 96 | 30 | .407 | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
| Arizona Diamondbacks | 59 | 103 | 37 | .364 | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
ZiPS isn’t completely sold on the Giants, though it’s gotten to the point where it sees them as a roughly .500 team (a .508 team, to be exact), a significant step up from its preseason prognostications. But even if they’re a .508 team, they’re a .508 team with a six-game advantage over the Padres as we approach the halfway mark. A .500 team in their position will likely remain relevant come August and September.
| Team | W | L | GB | Pct | Div% | WC% | Playoff% | WS Win% |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Los Angeles Dodgers | 96 | 66 | — | .593 | 57.7% | 39.4% | 97.1% | 12.2% |
| San Diego Padres | 93 | 69 | 3 | .574 | 30.8% | 61.5% | 92.3% | 8.3% |
| San Francisco Giants | 90 | 72 | 6 | .556 | 11.5% | 63.5% | 74.9% | 4.8% |
| Colorado Rockies | 66 | 96 | 30 | .407 | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
| Arizona Diamondbacks | 59 | 103 | 37 | .364 | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
It’s not a massive change, but by this estimate, one additional win is the difference between the Padres spending October playing baseball and playing golf about 8% of the time — that can’t be pooh-poohed easily. Eight percentage points would be a larger improvement than 29 of the 30 teams were projected to make last year as a result of trade deadline moves.
For the San Diego Padres, first base is a short-, medium-, and long-term problem, and problems that go unaddressed have a bad way of coming back to bite at the wrong time. The Padres need to deal with their weakness at first as effectively as they’ve added starting pitching talent over the last year. Moving on from Hosmer isn’t easy, but crushing the dreams of your division rivals ought to be a good motivation.
Dan Szymborski is a senior writer for FanGraphs and the developer of the ZiPS projection system. He was a writer for ESPN.com from 2010-2018, a regular guest on a number of radio shows and podcasts, and a voting BBWAA member. He also maintains a terrible Twitter account at @DSzymborski.
They’re stuck aren’t they? haha. I wonder if the easiest solution would be to simply platoon him. Sitting him against lefties would make a big difference I think. Over his career he has a .349 wOBA vs RHP and a .291 wOBA vs LHP. He’s also shown the ability to get the ball in the air a little better vs righties. 1.98 GB/FB vs RHP to 2.48 vs LHP. Sure he’s an expensive platoon player, but alas haha.
Yeah, it looks like they’re going to need any improvement they can get. Platooning him makes sense right now, although he won’t be happy about it, and who knows what it might do for morale or whatnot. But, they need to do something, and is a logical solution. But then, that likely creates a need for a platoon partner (not that it should be too difficult to find at the deadline). Their bench is pretty light right now. I’m sure they’ll be pretty active in the next month or so making moves.
Expanding a bit and this probably doesn’t fix enough, but moving Myers to 1B against LHP and some better defensive OF on those days is probably an easy internal start to solve.
Myers has clearly been playing hurt for most the year and Hosmer has significantly better expected results profile
His splits have been pretty stark for a while. The obvious plan would have been to sit him against lefties and play Nola at first, since a Caratini / Nola combo is far better against lefties than an Nola (accidentally put Allen in here, whoops) / Hosmer combo, but with Austin Allen being hurt that’s not an option at the moment.
The other option before the season started would have been to move Cronenworth or Myers to first and let Kim or Profar take 2nd / OF, but Kim and Profar have both been bad enough that it’s not ideal either. So they could try and trade for a guy to platoon with Hosmer at first and option Kim to the minors to see if you can straighten him out. If that were the case, it would probably be best if they were a fringy catcher-type like Mejia (whoops) or Gary Sanchez (who looked like he was done in NY earlier this year and now not so much).
EDIT: Accidentally threw Austin Allen’s name in here once, whoops.
also, Austin Allen plays for the Oakland A’s, so it will be hard for the Padres to use him very much either at catcher or first
Thanks, edited.
EDIT: Ha, I missed it. Ridiculous.
Kim’s glove is good enough to keep him in a utility role, he has like a 9 drs
As I recall, this signing was widely panned at the time in these very pages because, well, duh. There was some thought that it might have the advantage of making San Diego a viable destination for other free agents, but I don’t think that it affected Machado’s decision significantly (although who know?).
As a Padres fan, I dreaded the signing and was hopeful that Cameron (former FG writer) joining the FO would derail it, but to no avail. This argument (need to “prove” to FA’s that SD is “serious”) frustrates me to no end. FTJ and a good farm (at the time) were enough. I think Myers and Hosmer, the other “big” signings for the Padres before Machado are drag on the Padres, not a lift. Vaguely hopeful for Myers being useful but until Hosmer stops having miniscule (at times negative) launch angle, he is close to useless.
From what I remember, the Hosmer trade was panned from day one just because he was getting superstar money and wasn’t a superstar. It came out later that the signing was predicated on Hosmer’s leadership and clubhouse intangibles, which sounded very silly at the time but who knows?
Hosmer has a 123 wRC+ against lefties this year and a 82 wRC+ against righties so his platoon splits have reversed this year
Hosmer sucks and the padres should look to dump him in the offseason by eating most of his contract. That being said this article is disingenuous as it ignores how unlucky he’s been. He’s actually had a very strong xWOBA this month, it’s like 360+. And his overall xWOBA is 337, which is still bad for a 1Bman but make his war numbers very misleading.
Agreed. He’s hardly been amazing, but has been unlucky with babip. In addition, Baseball Savant’s defensive OAA has him above average defensively, as opposed to DRS and UZR showing him below average.
Isn’t all of that a function of hitting too many ground balls?
doesn’t xwOBA take exit velo AND launch angle into account?
xWOBA takes that all into account
BABIP isn’t all random. 70% of his contact this year is grounders and popups, I don’t think .280 BABIP is bad luck.
While his GB rate and IFFB are both high, they do not total 70% of all batted balls. IFFB is the rate of fly-balls that are pop-ups (https://library.fangraphs.com/pitching/batted-ball/), so 11.4% of 22.9%, or 2.6%, of batted balls have been popups.
To the idea that BABIP isn’t all random, I agree. I said he has been unlucky, and was responding to matt’s comment about his xwOBA, which is currently 39 points higher than his actual wOBA. xwOBA is not fully accurate or fully predictive, but is typically more indicative of what a player has done than his wOBA.
Explain to me how a slow dude who pounds ground balls into the shift has been unlucky.
For the people replying it’s misleading cause he grounds into the shift all the time. His xWOBA/wOBA has lined up very consistently over his career. Is this suddenly the first year he’s been shifted?
I get what you’re saying, and he does make a lot of hard contact, but sometimes the simplest possible answer is THE answer.
Do you think it’s realistic for a plodding, left-handed, groundball hitter to sustain a .360 wOBA for a significant length of time?
the fact that his xwOBA is higher than his wOBA is also insignificant, the entire league is doing that due to the new ball throwing off all the readings this year
Curious – is the projection based upon the assumption that Hosmer either leaves with the trade, gets cut, or doesn’t have a single AB after acquiring Mancini? Because none of those options seem particularly likely, and that’s going to blunt the salutary effect of getting an upgrade.
It’s shaping out to be an interesting trade deadline for the 1B market, as the Padres and Brewers *should* be heavy into the 1B market, and arguably the Rays and Indians as well. Because of this, as a Twins fan I’m pushing for them to consider moving Sano. He’s under pretty cheap control for a couple more years, and becoming increasingly redundant in MN, and he’s even a bit versatile since he can hold his own at 3B. Should have value in this market.
The Rays, Clevelands, and Brewers are not going to be terribly interested in taking on Sano’s salary, much less trading any prospect away, for a guy who is currently below replacement. They’re going to be looking at guys like Asdrubal Cabrera and Garrett Cooper. The Padres might take him as a salary dump because AJ Preller does things like that but I can’t say I’d recommend it.
Just those 3 teams? Hard to see anyone being interested in taking on Sano’s salary (what remains of this year + 9.25 million next year + 2.75 buyout for 2023) when he’s been replacement level the past 2 years and 3 of the past 4. Eddie Rosario, who historically has been a much better player, only got 8 million for his age 29 season. Which shows you should be able to get someone of Sano’s talent for a lot less than what his current contract pays him.
Well, those were the teams that were mentioned. The point is that the contract is underwater.
Yeah, that’s what I get for skimmimg the original comment!
Uh, have you noticed who is now getting the bulk of the ABs at 1B with Cleveland?
https://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=17278&position=1B/DH
It’s only two weeks but even zips projects him better than Hosmer to date and most other projections have him as playable, presumably with a platoon. (Francona loves platoons.)
Any trade they make will be an innings eating starter.
Probably with a rebuilding team looking for a near term infielder. They have those coming out of their ears.
Quietly Jonathan Schoop has been playing a lot of 1B in Detroit, has IF flexibility & is hitting well. I would think any of those teams would take him & the remainder of his $4.5M contract over Sano.
You gotta love the Giants having 8 of the top 13 position “problems”/upgrades needed among the three teams, including 1B, 2B, SS, 3B, LF, CF, RF and RP! LoL. And the other two positions — C and SP — do not crack the top 10 least problematic. And yet … there they are … with the best record in baseball … continuing to defy all the negative expectations every day.
It’s kind of what makes baseball great.
Where’s the problem with the Giants at SS?
Dave rails against Hosmer signing. Dave joins Pads front office staff. Padres breakthrough. Dave may lose his ever-loving mind if running Hosmer out there every day keeps Padres out of the post-season.
As a padre fan, Hosmer goes far beyond frustration. He walks around and carries himself like he’s truly worthy of the money they’re paying him. It’s like he’s got them all hypnotized that it’s 1983…
Do you expect Hosmer to walk around sheepishly, hanging his head in shame?
Yep….No but really, when you’re overpaid and sucking It’d just be nice if your attitude is, “I know I’ve been struggling and these are the things I’m working on to get better.” Not ‘WAR?? I have a gold glove and they’re paying me $144 million so I must be good…”
I agree. His public comments suggest he sees absolutely nothing wrong with his performance as a Padres. He points to his RBI totals. In modest defense, he does seem to consistently over-preform in RISP positions, but little solace as he is drag. I could care less what he says or how he carries himself if he just hit better.
I often wonder if Hosmer thinks he’s a good player. I’ll bet he looks at those 90+ RBI’s he accumulates every full season and thinks, Yup. “Barrels, dude…Barrels!”
He absolutely does. He’s the type of player that thinks WAR is a made-up stat for the eggheads.
This
Don’t tell Keith Hernandez this. He spent every second of last week’s Mets-Padres series gushing over Hosmer. I honestly don’t understand what the old-school types see in this guy
Does anyone actually believe that FanGraphs knows anything about baseball compared to Keith Hernandez? Hernandez is one of the most brilliant defensive 1st basemen ever to play the game, with an MVP, 11 Gold Gloves, 2 Silver Sluggers, 5 All-Stars, a career BA close to .300 and OBP close to .400. And the folks at FanGraphs? Oh, yeah. They do fake baseball math. 🙄
Just because Hernandez was a great player himself doesn’t necessarily mean he’s any good at analyzing the performances of other players.
Keith Hernandez was an excellent baseball player, that is a completely separate point from his ability to evaluate other baseball players. If that was the case every GM would simply be former MLB All-Stars like Dave Stewart
Forgot the /s
This must be a tough place for you Brad, what with all the eggheads and nerds around here with their tilty desks and big rulers…
“It’s called a T-square!”
As a Mets fan growing up Keith was my idol. The fact that he can watch Eric Hosmer and say anything positive about his baseball skills tells me he either doesn’t watch much ‘non-Met baseball’ or is clearly going senile…
Or it could be a bit of a “Jeter effect”. Hosmer makes enough eye-catching plays to get attention (above average in the “Good Plays Made” component of DRS), and on the balls he gets to, he does so cleanly (above average on the UZR “Error Runs Saved” component). Trouble is, he gets to far fewer balls than the average MLB first baseman (in Ryan Howard territory on DRS plays made, and in last place by a large margin in UZR Range Runs, all stats over Hosmer’s career 2011-now).
Barrels Dan, BARRELS!!!
Thank you for this reference, OGB. Screw Hosmer.
*grumble, grumble — how dare you talk to Eno that way — grumble, grumble*
Agree, I will always root against him for that. What a jerk.
Strange to hold a grudge because someone was mean to a wife beater.
Two key facts about Hosmer’s contract:
– His limited no-trade clause expired last year; however:
– Next year he will regain his no-trade rights as a 10-and-5 player.
With this in mind, the Padres need to dump him asap. Make the Rockies an offer they can’t refuse (say Hosmer + Myers + $51 million for C. J. Cron), and don’t look back.
The Rockies would definitely refuse that trade.
At first I agreed, but that’s a lot of money to pay someone to go away. If he opts in he’ll have $59M starting next offseason. He does have some value as a platoon bat, and $9M over four years, plus whatever he’d get paid this year…? I think the Rockies probably would give it a whirl and they wouldn’t be crazy to do it.
Maybe throwing in Wil Myers is a dealbreaker, though. That would be another $20M, plus whatever his buyout is.
I can’t say that this specific move makes sense since the Rockies have only 3-4 actual position prospects who could be up before Hosmer’s contract is and they’re all corner infielders. Also, I’m not sure the Padres would be thrilled moving Myers in the same deal where they’re giving away that much money.
But in theory, the Rockies are a pretty good place for overpaid and/or washed up big names to go. If the Cubs offered to pay for almost of Jason Heyward’s contract, I would think the Rockies would say “why not?”
The $51 million was tongue-in-cheek, but even the Rockies would probably need a lot of money going their way in a deal like this. Even for just Hosmer.
I don’t think the Rockies would take on over 30 million.
Who would take him unless the Padres sent somebody useful from their thinned farm. Maybe a ton of cash but Padres ownership has to be tired of this.
I am a Padres fan and I couldn’t believe that Hosmer was in the top 5 in the first ASG vote update. Also, the baseball youtuber, Mark Giraffe Neck, placed Hosmer in the “Good”category of all MLB first basemen just 3 weeks ago. That is the 3rd best tier out of 6.
That said, earlier this year, I was hopeful that Hosmer would continue his 2020 ways, but he has been really bad the last month, notwithstanding last night’s clutch home run.
YouTubers are idiots bro. No point watching 99% of them
He is in my “cerulean” category, which falls below puce and goldenrod but above burnt sienna and eggplant.
I do not have a YouTube channel, but did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night.
One positive thing about 2021 is that his K% is down considerably from where it was in 2018 and 2019. Since he still hits the ball hard, his batting average could rebound a bit. But he needs to hit more fly balls to approach his 2020 production.
The Padres really need to tell Hosmer he has to rework his swing to hit fewer ground balls (like he did last year) or he is going to start getting benched. Yes, it will likely piss him off and may not work; but what difference does it make? He’s already pretty worthless. If they end up releasing him so be it.
As a Padres fan, I thought Hosmer’s contract was an overpay from day one, but one that at least represented a positive sign about what ownership was willing to do to win. I didn’t think it would end up as the abject failure that it has. It’s time for the team to acknowledge they made a mistake and at the _very_ least platoon him.
The thing that is especially frustrating with Hosmer is last year demonstrates that he could be at least competent if he was willing to make the launch angle adjustments we all know he needs to make. But at the end of the day, he’s an anti-data kind of guy. See also: His treatment of Eno Sarris and his refusal to receive the COVID-19 vaccine while spreading misinformation about its impacts on fertility.
Do you have a link for the covid stuff?
https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/sports/padres/newsletter/2021-05-23/padres-best-record-streak-eric-hosmer-fernando-tatis-austin-nola-chain-padres-daily
The piece was slightly edited after several of us asked that Acee reflect that the fertility stuff isn’t true. I learned through this incident that Hosmer is engaged to a Fox Nation personality, fwiw.
2020 was weird. Myers, Machado and Hosmer all had big surges in ISO. Now all look on trends that seem very normal excluding 2020.
Definitely weird. And all sample sizes abound.
That said, 2020 Hosmer had an average LA of 8.7 — the highest of his career and meaningfully higher than his career average of 3.1. Machado (15.6 for 2020 v. 13.8 career average) and Myers (13.4 for 2020 v. 11.6 career average) did slightly better than usual than relatively close to average. It looked like Hosmer had made an adjustment but not one he’s been willing to stick with.
I don’t really believe that giving out a bad contract necessarily is necessarily a sign that ownership is going to other players to better contracts. I feel pretty confident that Machado signs with SD without Hosmer
100%. Machado went were the biggest guarantee was.
That was an awful abomination of a contract the moment it was announced. The Padres fleeced themselves but thanks to their good work elsewhere and his solid year last year they probably thought they could get through the worst of it ok.
Most ideas I’m seeing are to trade a premium prospect like CJ Abrams to the team that takes that awful contract. So it would be something like Abrams, Hosmer, and $X cash for Mancini.
I wonder which teams would be willing to eat most of that contract to get a prospect of Abrams’ quality out of the Padres… Baltimore maybe, KC maybe, Pittsburgh maybe, Twins maybe once they trade Cruz… Not a ton of options for a 1B/DH making that kind of money with that level of production… Anyone have some suggestions for other options?
I don’t see why the Padres would do this unless they don’t think Abrams is a top-tier prospect anymore. Some teams might balk at this because the owners have been crying poor but if I’m the Pirates or Royals or Baltimore or Twins or Orioles I do this immediately. If you see a future 70 hit tool on an up-the-middle player with 80 speed and average game power, how much would you pay to bring him in? That’s a far better prospect than Yoan Moncada was when he was signed out of Cuba. That player would project to be the Padres second best position player behind Tatis, and not by very much. That’s like what Cedric Mullins has been doing this year.
Of course, if you don’t buy that projection and don’t think he’s something like the 5th best prospect in baseball, then all bets are off.
Bro. You think If they sent CJ Abrams they would have to send cash? They aren’t moving Abrams.
I’m just reporting what I’m seeing on mlb trade values. If you want to swap Hosmer for Mancini it would cost you someone like Abrams or Gore. I personally would rather the Padres just suck it up and either platoon him or bench him if he gets worse instead of dumping him and losing a great prospect but that’s likely the cost of doing business per Dan’s post.
I don’t know who is giving you this idea, but I strongly suspect you should stop listening to them. Unless the Padres don’t like Abrams that much anymore, he’s not going anywhere.
For the Padres to move Abrams, it would have to be a big move for 2021 that also gives them something for the future. I guess if KC offered Santana and Merrifield for Hosmer, Myers, and Abrams (with no $ coming back from SD), you might argue that the payroll relief for SD is the benefit going forward (maybe use this to extend Grisham).
So unless the Padres have gone a little sour on Abrams, you’d have to really blow their socks off to get him.
I don’t think this site is always accurate with their values but I find it to be a good starting point in trade discussions. https://www.baseballtradevalues.com/trades/?team_filter=529&s_type=player&s=14374&s_term=C.J.%20Abrams
Yandy Diaz. Then get Wander to the show!
The problem with Hosmer is that unlike Chris Davis, he is not terrible enough where benching him is blindingly obvious to everybody.
While we may balk at the four Gold Gloves he accumulated, the idea of Hosmer as a clutch hitter is indeed borne out by data.
Hosmer has the 2nd highest Clutch stat since his debut (2011-2021)
and 14th highest Clutch stat during his tenure as a Padre.
It is unlikely to be pure luck at this point. (One possible explanation is that Hosmer gets shifted less with runners on base.)
Clutch stats and shifting! You gave me an idea about something to explore.
This might have been partly before you wrote here, but Jeff Sullivan was absolutely in love with the “clutch” stat and wrote about it a lot. And it drove some of us totally nuts. The best players tended to have bad “clutch” ratings and guys like Albert Pujols and the bad version of Dansby Swanson had good ones. It became pretty obvious that the denominator rendered the whole thing useless. But on top of that, someone suggested (and I think this made a lot of sense too) that much of “clutch” can be attributed to players who were shifted heavily without runners on base, and that they couldn’t do it as much with runners on base.
I’ll try and find some of those old articles and post links, although fangraphs has been blocking links to other parts of fangraphs lately so it might get held up in moderation.
EDIT: Also forgot about the fact that some batters are much more likely to get new pitchers to face them. So there’s a selection effect too.
IIRC, Giancarlo Stanton was terribly unclutch, and the most clutch guy was somebody weird like Daniel Descalso
https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/25900712/daniel-descalso-outhit-giancarlo-stanton-year
Heeeere we go…I forgot about the fact that some hitters get new relievers just to face them, too, so there’s selection bias.
Oh, and the one where the biggest discussion was, that was a Travis article. My goodness, I forgot about this.
https://blogs.fangraphs.com/aaron-judge-has-been-the-least-clutch-player-on-record/
The big problem with “clutch” is that it adjusts for only one part of game context, the leverage index. It doesn’t adjust for other things like the quality of the pitcher faced, as sadtrombone mentions.
I recall articles in the past few years on how poorly Kris Bryant and Aaron Judge did on their “clutch” stats. If you took a look at who pitches most often in high-leverage situations, it’s right-handed power pitchers. Who tends to have their worst splits against RH power pitchers….RH power hitters with high K rates! So there’s an inherent bias against RH batters relative to lefties, even without considering the impact of not shifting lefties with runners on.
It looks like the article didn’t get through moderation, but there was an article on Aaron Judge by Travis a while back that talked about how Aaron Judge was the least clutch player of all time in that year he was an MVP candidate. So I looked up the least clutch players of all time, just to see who else was on there. They ranged from good hitters (115 wRC+ types) to awesome, game breaking players (170 wRC+ types). It appears that how good you are in the lower leverage situations makes the whole measurement incoherent.
Let’s just take an example from this year. Let’s take a look at the least clutch players in 2019. Justin Turner was the worst. His wRC+ was 132. The second worst was JD Martinez. His wRC+ was 139. Third was Kyle Schwarber, at 121. Fourth was Jorge Soler, at 136. Notice a pattern? The three players with the highest wRC+’s that year were Trout, Yelich, and Bregman. Yelich’s was slightly above average, at 0.49. Trout and Bregman were both below -1.
At the top end you get a lot more diversity–it doesn’t appear you have to be bad in order to be clutch. But it becomes pretty clear that the “Clutch” stat is somewhere in between misleading and meaningless. I’m not sure which.
If you look at the career leaders in clutch, you’ll notice that most of the players have below-average power. Hosmer is 13th all-time, and the only guy in the top 15 with more power than him is Dave Parker. A big reason for this is that the benefit of power-hitting is often rendered moot in final-inning situations (which have leverage well above average).
So, if it’s tied in the bottom of the 9th with runners on 1st and 2nd, a Willie Bloomquist single and a Mike Trout homer will have the same impact on WPA. Same situation in the bottom of the 5th inning, the homer will improve WPA more than the single. This means that, even if Bloomquist’s batting line is exactly the same in every game situation, and Trout’s batting line is exactly the same in every game situation, Bloomquist will end up having a higher “clutch” than Trout.
How can that possibly be true? How can we still have a stat like that? My goodness. Let’s take a look. The top 5 in clutch are:
-Tony Gwynn
-Pete Rose
-Scott Fletcher
-Mark McLemore
-Ichiro Suzuki
The bottom 5 are:
-Sammy Sosa
-Mike Schmidt
-Lance Parrish
-Jim Thome
-Chet Lemon
(others in the Top 15 include Andre Dawson, Jermaine Dye, Giancarlo Stanton, Bonds, and A-Rod)
This is probably oversimplifying it, but you could re-imagine Clutch as a ratio of singles to home runs.
I think the initial intent of Clutch was reasonable, as an attempt to show how much of WPA came from good offense overall and how much came from good offense “in the clutch”. Over a large enough sample size, it probably catches some added value for guys whose “small ball” skills may add more to actual wins than the expectancy baked into the linear weights within WAR. I’ll actually do what tung_twista did and make an allowance for a guy like Hosmer that he’s added a bit more value than WAR would suggest because of his high Clutch over almost a decade in the majors.
That said, the Clutch stat is constructed in a way that makes it too sensitive to noisy data and too biased to other contexts besides situational leverage – rendering it ineffective for anything meaningful. I’d much rather see a stat the strips out the baserunning part of RE24, and compares that to the offensive runs above average based on linear weights/wOBA. You could call this stat “situational hitting”, and get a truly useful measure of hidden offensive value.
RE24 is a fantastic stat that for whatever reason flies totally under the radar.
If RH power pitchers are more common in high leverage situations and some hitters are particularly weak against them, then Clutch is not biased against them, it is measuring what it is intended to measure (players’ relative performance changes according to leverage).
Who cares if you are clutch if you are below average the rest of the time?
You couldn’t be more mistaken about Eric Hosmer. That’s precisely the sort of misanalysis we expect – and receive – from those like you who aren’t good enough to play baseball, so you take on the role of self-appointed “experts” who have no real understanding of the game and instead try using numbers to “prove” your embarrassingly incorrect positions.
Hosmer – along with Manny Machado – is part of the glue that helps keep an underperforming Padres team from falling entirely out of the NL West. His defense is second to none, yet your obsession with unsound practices such as steep launch angles and placing offense over defense keeps you from being able to understand any of that.
Baseball is won primarily with pitching and defense, with offense a distant third. In the case of the Padres, their biggest problems include Fernando Tatis’ inconsistent and erratic play (you don’t win with a shortstop as defensively unpredictable and unreliable as him); pitching (Mark Melancon’s spectacular, but much of the staff is performing well below expectations); and lack of position-player depth and consistency on both defense and offense.
Sorry to burst your bubble, but your baseball “expertise” is practically non-existent. Need further evidence? Your ridiculous “Rest of Season WAR for NL West Contenders” has the Giants’ Brandon Crawford 2nd-worst, Evan Longoria 4th-worst, Mike Yastrzemski 12th-worst, and Brandon Belt 13th-worst out of 30. You and all your pseudo baseball math wouldn’t know a player’s value to his team if it struck you with the force of a fastball smashing into Kevin Pillar’s unprotected nose. Those four Giants’ players are among MLB’s defensive elite, and – along with the incomparable Buster Posey and the team’s exceptional pitching – are the reasons the Giants presently have MLB’s best record. (Although, if it were up to you, the team should replace those four, as you have all of them ranked below-average thanks to your overemphasis on the artificial concoction referred to as “wins above replacement”, a stat equaled in its uselessness perhaps only by the wildly inaccurate “defensive runs saved” (DRS).)
Here’s a thought: Stick to basic math (or try your hand at another discipline) and stay far away from baseball. 😉
This is parody right?
U look at Erica Gospera, more grešiš takes ikada. This is kind of a deceptive analysis, we expect – and can people like you who are not good enough to play baseball, so you will take on the role of the self-proclaimed “experts” who do not have a real understanding. of the game and instead of trying to use numbers to “prove” ashamed, their location shortcomings.
Hosmer-along with Manny Machad-is part of glue to help the padres team get out of western Newfoundland completely. his room, no, but obsessed with bad practice like steep launch angle and husband attack on defense, not letting you figure it all out.
Baseball is mostly taken on the field and protected and the attack is on a distant Tuesday. In the case of Chaplain their biggest problems, including the inconsistent and erratic play of After Tatis (not winning with speed, unpredictability, and unreliable defense like he); pitch (impressive play by Marc Melanson, but most of the staff working below expectations), and the lack of depth and consistency of a player’s position in both defense and attack.
I’m sorry for popping bubbles, but you baseball “experience” is virtually nonexistent. Need more proof? In the fun “end of the season competing for NL West competitors,” Giants Brandon Crawford 2. It’s the worst thing, Evan, Elle 4. is the worst, Mike Yastrosemsky 12. is the worst, and Brandon Belt 13 .is the worst of the 30s. You and all pseudo-baseball math won’t know a person worth his team if he hits you with the end of the day of the force the batter hits in the unprotected nose of the spine. Kevin. Four giants who are in the defense of the elite and the same with the incomparable Buster Posey and a special team – there are reasons why the Giants are the best ball record. (Although if that’s you, the team replaced the four because they were below par, because you’re too much emphasis on the artificial mix called “winning over the world,” a figure by the vain of them, perhaps only extremely bad “defense run” (phd).)
Here’s the idea: use basic math (or try it out in a discipline) and away from baseball.
Must be Luke’s brother.
As a Padres fan that watches a lot of games and geeks out on the data, a lot of this is wrong. But the worst take is “Hosmer is a great defender” take. Defensive stats are complicated and I always a bit wary, but two things stand out watching Hosmer: he has a tiny range. He is nowhere near balls that are gloved by other defenders and he is not good a picking questionable throws. Consistently. And then he does really blatant mistakes as well.
Well, that’s certainly a take.
Um, it’s always been obvious that offense is significantly more important than defense for position players other than catchers. To think otherwise is insane! In fact, I believe that WAR still overrates defense compared to offensive (especially with its ridiculous DH defensive penalty).
Meanwhile, even basic math like OPS shows Hosmer to be a significantly below average hitter this year, and despite his Gold Gloves even his defense isn’t anywhere as great as you imply it to be.
Sometimes I wonder if players read Fangraphs, and if they have burner accounts. We found Eric Hosmer
Eric “brad scott” Hosmer
Pirates should send them Moran and Stallings for until Nola is back. Moran would be a 1 win swing so far. They should send Hosmer and cash back and include a luxury guy like Kim or a prospect like Hassell III
Moran has been worth literally 1 win his entire career
You even bother to look at his line this year?
Brad Scott says you should stick to ex-President business and far away from baseball
I think there were scouts at the Tiger’s game. They may be going after Cabrera for his clutchness
Pretty unreal that Zips pegs the second weakest link among those three teams as… Brandon Crawford, who Zips forecasts to finish with 3.8 WAR.