Last night, right as the Yankees were putting up a two spot on the White Sox in the first inning, friend of the author Mike Rogers made a great point:
Things I would like in baseball: the triple slash line presented with the 100=avg scale instead of raw numbers.
He continued:
Do we need to know a guys actual AVG/OBP/SLG, or are we more concerned with how those numbers relate to league averages?
Then, he took it a step farther:
Using positional offensive thresh holds, Miguel Cabrera is hitting 116/124/124. We been 16, 24, 24% better than the avg AL first baseman.
Mike makes some great points here and I agree with him. In any offensive climate, it’s more helpful to know how a player is performing against league average. In this climate, in which the American League’s collective on base percentage is .322 (!!), comparing players to league average is even more helpful. This is why numbers like OPS+ and (especially) wRC+ are incredibly helpful. What could be even more helpful is doing what Mike did with Miguel Cabrera, and that’s comparing the player to league average. So, that’s what I did for the 2011 Yankees, accurate through the start of last night’s game. First, I’ll post the players’ triple-slash lines with the league average for that position in parentheses. After that, I’ll post the “adjusted” numbers.
Raw Numbers:
C: Russell Martin: .225/.326/.366 (.235/.305/.376)
1B: Mark Teixeira: .249/.347/.510 (.271/.342/.451)
2B: Robinson Cano: .295/.342/.505 (.258/.319/.386)
3B: Alex Rodriguez: .295/.366/.485 (.238/.310/.375)
SS: Derek Jeter: .268/.330/.356 (.266/.322/.388)
LF: Brett Gardner: .278/.358/.399 (.251/.310/.382)
CF: Curtis Granderson: .269/.361/.564 (.262/.320/.408)
RF: Nick Swisher: .270/.379/.448 (.264/.336/.427)
DH: Jorge Posada: .235/.318/.383 (.263/.340/.416)
Team: .263/.343/.440 (.256/.322/.399)
Adjusted Numbers
(For the calculations, I set up a rough/simple proportion of: Player Number/Position average = X/100. As with all adjusted numbers we see, 100 would be average, anything higher is better than league average, lower is worse
C, Martin: 95/106/97
1B, Teixeira: 89/101/113
2B, Cano: 114/107/130
3B, Rodriguez: 123/118/129
SS, Jeter: 100/102/91
LF, Gardner: 110/114/104
CF, Granderson: 102/112/138
RF, Swisher: 102/112/104
DH, Posada: 89/93/92
Team: 102/106/110
So, this shows us just how well (or not so well in Posada’s case) the Yankees are hitting compared to their peers. Derek Jeter’s season, for example, looks a little better considering how he stacks up against your typical American League shortstop. Curtis Granderson and Alex Rodriguez are pretty much lapping their respective fields. This shows us just how poorly Jorge has done and how far Russell Martin has fallen from his torrid start in April (though his OBP is 6% better than the typical catcher).
Context is the most important thing we can have when we aim to analyze anything, be it a quotation or a set of data. The more context we have, the more accurate our analysis can be. While my adjustment is crude, it shows us simply how the Yankees are doing compared to their positional peers. And, guess what? They’re doing pretty well.
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7 Responses to Yankees hitters vs. position averages
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TIQ IQ
Great post, Matt. I think the most eye-opening stat is the fact that Tex is barely getting on-base above a league-average clip for first basemen. Per Fangraphs, there are six first basemen with better OBPs than Tex, and two of them are Casey Kotchman and Michael Cuddyer.
I know he’s been hitting better as late, but he has to be better than that.
Thanks, Larry. What caught my eye most was how relatively poorly third basemen and left fielders are collectively hitting.
Great post. Any ideas on a “scale”, such as 10% below is awful, 15% over is great, etc.?
Very interesting look at the line-up. How would the Bean Town CrapSox look when their line-up/team is adjusted?
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[...] with an IsoP of .131. Cano, as stated above, is hitting .304/.348/.522/.870. Using the positional averages, Cano is hititng 117/109/168/122. On the same scale, his IsoP is at 169. This is nothing new, Cano [...]
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