KChiefs1 |
04-21-2021 10:39 AM |
https://theathletic.com/2532954/2021...t-the-hitters/
Royals statistical breakdown: Which numbers matter this early, and what do they say about the hitters?
by
Alec Lewis
Quote:
Somehow, the Kansas City Royals are 9-7. That winning record might look surprising considering they’ve done it with notable hitters posting these types of numbers:
Jorge Soler: .559 OPS
Andrew Benintendi: .516 OPS
Hunter Dozier: .362 OPS
For reference, the major-league average OPS for 2019, the last full season, was .758, which shows just how much these three Royals have underperformed. Soler, Benintendi and Dozier were supposed to be among the Royals’ most productive hitters and key pieces for the team’s hopes in 2021.
Now, here comes the critical clarification: It’s very early. Soler had 679 plate appearances in 2019. This year, he’s had 62. This would be like judging Patrick Mahomes’ numbers after one quarter. You can’t read too much into that.
What you can do, though, is delve deeper into the detailed numbers and make some assessments — or at least begin to understand what’s closer to true and what is not. We’ll get into the nitty-gritty of each hitters’ specific statistics, but the premise is this: even small sample sizes can be revealing. At the risk of turning this into a calculus class, studies such as this terrific piece from 2016 found that certain statistics, such as strikeout rates and chase rates, start to stabilize at specific times, sometimes as early as now.
To explain things further, and to provide more context on some of the Royals’ most important hitters, we selected one meaningful statistic for each of them after these first few weeks.
Jorge Soler: 37.9
Here’s how this will go: We’ll lay out the number, explain what it means and why it matters.
Soler has a 37.9 strikeout rate. In total, he has 22 strikeouts in 62 plate appearances. This shouldn’t be mind-blowing. In 2015, when Soler was playing his first full season with the Chicago Cubs, he struck out 30 percent of the time in his 101 games. That ranked in the bottom 4 percent of Major League Baseball.
He improved the next year, striking out only 25 percent of the time. Then, after an uptick in 2017, he arrived in Kansas City and seemed to find some consistency. He struck out 26.8 percent of the time in 2018 and followed that in 2019 with the best overall season of his career, when he struck out 26.2 percent of the time. The trend seemed like a byproduct of Soler’s work with the Royals’ current special assignment hitting coach, Mike Tosar, throughout those offseasons. But in 2020, Soler struck out a career-high 34.5 percent of the time.
Because it was a short season, it seemed reasonable to write it off. That and, well, Soler played through an oblique injury for the majority of the season. He showed up to spring training this year healthy and appeared poised for a bounce back, especially in a contract year. Instead, he’s continued to strike out at an alarming rate. Studies have shown that the strikeout rate stabilizes around 60 plate appearances; Soler is at 62.
Concerning as it may be, it’s important to mention that Soler tends to be a slow starter. In 2017, Soler posted a .565 OPS in May. For now, let’s assess why this might be happening in 2021. It could be the way pitchers are attacking Soler as he’s seeing fewer pitches in the strike zone than ever (only 41 percent) and he’s been thrown more breaking balls than ever (40.6 percent). It could also be Soler shifting toward an all-or-nothing homer approach. He’s lifted 45.8 percent of the balls he’s hit this season. In 2019, when he broke the Royals’ home run record, that number was 27.7 percent. It’ll be interesting to watch these numbers as the season progresses.
In the meantime, Royals manager Mike Matheny said this on Tuesday: “(Soler) is close. Yesterday, he hit a moonshot. He was a fraction off of that landing up in some kind of water. He has a better foundation and timing. I’m expecting it to take off pretty soon.”
Andrew Benintendi: 89.4
Benintendi’s average exit velocity (the average speed at which the ball shoots out of the batter’s box) is 89.4 mph. That’s the highest average exit velocity he’s had in his big-league career.
According to studies, average exit velocity tends to provide an indicator after 40 batted balls in play. Benintendi is at 38, and while his overall numbers .204/.271/.259 have not been good, that should provide some semblance of optimism.
On the flip side, knowing what we’ve laid out with strikeout rate, Benintendi is at 27.1 percent over 63 plate appearances. That’s much higher than his 16 percent strikeout rate of 2018, and it might be a byproduct of slower bat speed. Benintendi is whiffing on a higher percentage of fastballs (24 percent) than he did in 2018 (17.8 percent). He’s also hitting the ball to the opposite field 39.5 percent of the time, which is almost double the percentage from some years past.
About a week ago, Benintendi was asked about his swing, which has gone through a whirlwind of changes over the years.
“There’s been a lot of times this year, almost every at-bat, where I’m fouling off a pitch I should be driving,” Benintendi said. “Then I’m down 0-2 or 1-2, and you have to battle.”
Why has that been the case?
“I feel like I’m so close,” he said. “It’s so frustrating. Even compared from now to spring training, I feel like it may not look different, but I’m a lot closer to where I want to be. Those pitches where I should be driving, it is frustrating. But sometimes you have to slow it down and say, ‘we still have 150 games left.’ It’s going to come eventually.”
Hunter Dozier: .200
This is Dozier’s on-base percentage. Unlike strikeout rates or average exit velocity, this is a statistic that requires a much larger sample before stabilizing. About 460 plate appearances, to be exact. Dozier has had 39.
It didn’t help that Dozier suffered a bruised right thumb in the first game of the season. He’d timed his swing up, but missing games messed up that timing. He’s been fighting that uphill battle ever since.
Two other notable numbers are his swing rate and chase rate. He’s swinging at 48.6 percent of pitches in 2021, which is up from the 44 percent clip of his combined 2019 and 2020 seasons. Swing rates typically become easy to pinpoint at the 50-plate appearance mark, so Dozier is fairly close. Similarly, Dozier is chasing 39 percent of pitches, up from 29.5 percent over the two previous seasons.
Still, he says he’s not worried about the overall numbers, nor should you be.
“I’ve just kept telling myself, ‘I have 600 more plate appearances. It’s a long season,’” Dozier said.
Carlos Santana: 46.4
Not since the beginning of Statcast in 2015 has Santana recorded a swing percentage above 41.4 percent. He has this year. In 63 plate appearances, Santana has swung at 46.4 percent of pitches faced.
As with Dozier, that swing percentage statistic becomes meaningful as early as 50 plate appearances into a season. What does swinging more mean for Santana? Well, his 17.5 strikeout percentage is the second-highest percentage of his career.
Alternatively, Santana has done some damage, especially of late. His 89.8 mph average exit velocity is higher than it was in 2020. He’s also barreling 9.5 percent of baseballs, close to his 9.6 percent number from 2019. This, among other factors, explains why the Royals recently moved Santana to the No. 2 spot. That, and the fact he has eight hits in his last 16 plate appearances.
Nicky Lopez: 92.2
Only four players in MLB have made contact on 92.2 percent or more of the pitches they have swung at. Lopez is one of them.
Among all of the positives in this Royals season, Lopez’s resurgence ranks up there. He posted a .378 OPS in spring training. The Royals optioned him. He then watched the video of his minor-league swings alongside Royals staffers. Lopez saw his old rhythm. And he saw that he wasn’t whiffing at 95 mph fastballs. He got the point: Get back to that guy.
So that’s what he and the Royals did. There were hours spent in the cage in Surprise, Ariz. There were many conversations. Lopez planned to test out the adjustments in a game on the back fields. But would-be starting shortstop Adalberto Mondesi suffered a strained right oblique, forcing Lopez to instead test out his adjustments against big-league pitching. And the adjustments have paid dividends.
Lopez has batted .302/.354/.372. Unlike 2020, when his contact percentage sunk to 80.7 percent, it has jumped back up. It’s a bit early for contact percentage to stabilize — that’s typically around 100 plate appearances — but through 48 plate appearances Lopez is off to a nice start.
And get this: He’s making contact on 97.8 percent of pitches in the strike zone.
Salvador Perez: .322
There is a baseball statistic designed to measure raw power, and that’s ISO. Perez is at .322, ranking 17th in MLB and ahead of sluggers such as Atlanta Braves first baseman Freddie Freeman (.304).
Before 2020, Perez had never posted an ISO above .227. Last year, he posted a .304 ISO. This year’s ISO shows how hot of a start Perez is off to. An ISO tends to stabilize around 160 at-bats. Perez’s 63 total at-bats mean he’s not even halfway there. But there’s reason to believe in an improvement.
In the 2019 offseason, Perez worked with Royals special assignment hitting coach Mike Tosar. They ironed out Perez’s stance, focusing on balance. They adjusted Perez’s head position, similar to a tweak Tosar made with Soler. Perez’s barrel percentage in 2020 was the highest of his career and it’s continued to go up in 2021. That, of course, translates to power and production, which the Royals will continue to need as long as their other middle-of-the-lineup bats are struggling.
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