2015 Pod Projections: Anthony Rendon
The Pod Projections are back! My projections are based on the methodology shared in my eBook Projecting X, and the process continues to evolve and improve.
This year, I have turned every hitting metric into a rate stat in my spreadsheet, which allows me to project counting stats like runs scored and batted in, along with stolen bases, much more easily. This means that I don’t directly project those numbers, but rather runs scored per times on base, stolen base attempts per times on base, stolen base success rate, etc. Typically in these Pod Projections posts, I explain my reasoning behind the statistics I manually project. However, you don’t really care about my runs per times on base projection. You just care about the runs scored projection itself! So I will stick with the same format as in years past.
The player earning the honor of the first 2015 Pod Projection is 2014 breakout star Anthony Rendon. His current NFBC ADP is 13th overall and he hasn’t been picked later than 24th. Obviously, fantasy owners believe that Rendon will perform at levels close to last season.
Plate Appearances: 650
He should remain in the two hole all season this time, which will lead to an inflated PA total. But projecting 683 plate appearances again isn’t wise, especially considering he isn’t batting leadoff, a slot that would typically receive the highest PA projection.
K%: 16.1%
Let’s see, compared to 2013, Rendon swung at more pitches outside the zone, posted a lower Contact% and higher SwStk%, but his K% fell from 17.5% to 15.2%. Something doesn’t add up. His minor league track record consists of many tiny samples, but they all support strikeout rates closer to his 2013 mark than his 2014. I split the difference, giving him credit for improvement, but expecting some regression.
GB%/LD%/FB%: 40.5% / 22% / 37.5%
This was essentially his career average over his 964 at-bats. Batted ball type distribution tends to remain fairly consistent from year to year, so for a young player, there’s little reason to project much of a change.
BABIP: .315
His xBABIP (the new and improved version available on FG+ now!) suggests some BABIP upside, as he hits a solid rate of liners, avoids the pop up, and possesses both power and speed. The .315 projection is higher than his career average and conveys my opinion that his increased mark in 2014 was a better representation of his true talent level.
HR/FB Ratio: 10%
Here’s where things get tricky. If you consult his xHR/FB rate (13.3%), you see a hitter with further home run upside. However, he has underperformed his xHR/FB rate during each season in the league, which suggests that the equation is missing something with Rendon or he has just been unlucky for two straight years.
Adding more fuel to the fire is that he ranked third in Just Enough % (JE%) from ESPN Home Run Tracker. A study I conducted several years ago showed us that hitters who posted the highest JE% in one year saw their HR/FB rate decline more than the rest of the player population. Since Rendon enjoyed a meaningful jump in HR/FB rate from 2013 to 2014, I figured some regression was in order, but felt that his power is probably much closer to his 2014 level than 2013.
RBI and Runs: 72 and 92
The RBI total is higher than the average two-hole hitter given Rendon’s power. But, it will be extremely difficult for him to replicate his 83 runs batted in total from last year without greatly elevating his game with men on base once again. It’s not something I would bet on happening.
His projected 92 runs scored total represents quite the falloff from his National League leading total of 111 last season. That was the result of him posting a ridiculous runs per times on base mark that would be impossible to repeat. You would only expect super speedsters like Billy Hamilton and Dee Gordon, hitting ahead of a powerful offense, to post a mark as high as Rendon did. The projection assumes some regression from that R/TOB, but acknowledges the strong Nationals offense, his above average speed and the automatic runs from his homers.
SB: 11
Almost a complete shot in the dark. Rendon went from attempting two steals (3.5 extrapolated over his 2014 PA total) to 20 from 2013 to 2014, after making just eight stolen base attempts throughout his short minor league career. Six triples and a 6.4 Spd score validate that he does indeed have some speed. And he was quite successful as well, swiping bases at a strong 85% clip.
But does he fall back into the mid-single digits, sustain his upper teen pace, or end up somewhere in between like I’m projecting? I have no real idea and neither do you! His ultimate fantasy value will really hinge on his stolen base output. Given how early he is being drafted, fantasy owners are banking on something close to a repeat in the steals department, which is risky.
Below is my final projected fantasy batting line, along with the other systems for comparison.
| System | AB | AVG | HR | RBI | R | SB | K% | BABIP |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pod | 582 | 0.283 | 18 | 72 | 92 | 11 | 16.1% | 0.310 |
| Steamer | 569 | 0.279 | 19 | 72 | 84 | 11 | 15.6% | 0.308 |
| ZiPS | 531 | 0.276 | 18 | 72 | 85 | 10 | 17.3% | 0.309 |
| Fans (36) | 598 | 0.291 | 21 | 87 | 103 | 14 | 15.2% | 0.317 |
Who woulda thunk that all the systems would project exactly 72 RBI?! We’re also all in agreement on his BABIP, stolen base and home run totals. The runs scored totals from Steamer and ZiPS appear a bit too conservative.
It’s no surprise that the Fans are most optimistic, though I’m curious if their level of optimism is greater for Rendon than other players. I know the Fans projections are optimistic in general, so I wonder if their Rendon projection indexed to the rest of the players they projected is more or less optimistic than the rest of us.
Based on my and the other systems’ projections, Rendon seems overvalued to me. He seemingly has to hit the Fans targets to break even for his owners, which is a tall order, but obviously not completely out of the realm of possibility.
Mike Podhorzer is the founder of ProjectingX IQ, an advanced fantasy baseball analytics platform that transforms projection data and in-season performance signals into actionable intelligence. He is the 2015 Fantasy Sports Writers Association Baseball Writer of the Year and three-time Tout Wars champion. He is the author of the eBook Projecting X 2.0: How to Forecast Baseball Player Performance, which teaches you how to project players yourself. Follow Mike on X@MikePodhorzer and contact him via email.
Glad this is getting started, but forgive me for discounting your thoughts on Rendon heavily based on last years’ projection. I believe he’ll be an MVP candidate.
Bearish
Anthony Rendon
My Rank: 20 | Consensus: 15
Real glad he showed up here. I don’t get it. He’s getting some sleeper love, and frankly it makes little sense to me. He’s slated to hit eighth, which is the worst possible spot to hit in if you’re a National Leaguer and he has seemingly little chance of moving up much given the names ahead of him. He has no speed and shouldn’t be expected to be a major positive contributor to your batting average.
So, you’re really hoping he enjoys a power breakout. Heck, he must do so to deliver any value whatsoever, since his runs scored and batted in totals are going to be underwhelming out of that eighth slot. His batted ball distance last year was just about league average, as was his xHR/FB rate. The good news is that suggests a nice spike from what he posted last year. The bad news is that even if he doubles his home run output, or gets into the high teens, that still makes him close to replacement level in mixed leagues.
Well I was right about his power and his stolen bases surprised everyone. Also remember my valuation assumed he’d hit 8th all year but he lucked out, benefiting from an injury to move up immediately.
I didn’t expect 17 steals but if you watched him run in 13′, it was clear he had some speed – I kind of assumed he was given an order to limit the running based on his injuries throughout the minors.
Basing a preseason valuation of someone based on where they’re expected to hit opening day is not a good idea. If a hitter produces, they will move up. By assuming he’d hit 8th all year, you were assuming he would not produce. No one keeps a 130 wRC+ in the 8 hole so calling it “lucked out” is a bit disingenuous.
Sorry d_i, but projecting a position in the batting order is an ESSENTIAL part of preseason projections. Sure there is going to be some fluctuation, but what you are proposing is akin to chaos. Rendon last year is like Wong this year in that regard. Both could probably be in the 2 hole, but the other batters in the lineup prevent that from happening to start the year. PA/G and R/RBI per PA are greatly effected by assumed batting order.
The problem is that it was silly to project him batting 8th. I know he hit 8th on Opening Day, but pretty much everyone who followed the team expected him to bat second, which is where he hit pretty much all year. You bought into Spring Training lineups too much, where Ian Desmond was batting second. That was never going to happen.
I agree PAs affect the valuation so I probably overstated that, but my main point stands, no one who performs hits at the bottom of the order long. If you think someone is going to hit 8/9 all year, you’re really saying you think they’re going to be bad.
Right now Betts and Rendon are like cult stocks on wall street. Irrational exuberance and very little skepticism. Great players but valuation of both are a tad pricey. More so for Betts. Need to see some growth to justify that P/E!
Very true. Based on the hype you would think that these two guys have Pujolsian talent. They don’t have any elite skills.
Everyone seems to have forgotten how injury-prone Rendon is as well.
I think the thing is, they do a little bit of everything well and don’t kill you in any category, an increasingly rare skill set in MLB.
How is Rendon injury-prone? He hurt his shoulder in college. That’s it, really.
He had a series of nasty ankle injuries, no? That people thought might be chronic? I did think that was why he didn’t run in the minors … hence a few more years of double-digit steals seems possible …
Everyone seems to have forgotten that he was the golden god of hitting in his two years at Rice. He never missed a single regular season game due to injury in his college career. There is a reason why he was the consensus #1 overall talent in the draft that year.
A couple of fluky ankle injuries didn’t even effect his speed and baserunning ability. There hasn’t been a hitter of his caliber since he was drafted in 2011 as evidenced by his 79 game minor league career. He’ll be a premium hitter well into the next decade …
Regarding his xHR/FB. He is interesting. His HR+FB distance is 290, which is really good, but his SDD is 56, which is pretty average. His FB rate is decent, though. I can see low 20’s HR, though yours, Steamer, and Zips aren’t much lower than that.
I like your Runs projection relative to Steamer and Zips. 92 is more realistic considering batting order than mid 80’s.
forget rendon..why don’t you show us how you got to Billy Hamilton in the second rd of labr? Would think that might show a bigger gap in your assumptions relative to the other systems.
Don’t worry, it’s coming. But my projection is the same as everyone else, you don’t realize how valuable 60 steals are in a 15 team league!
haha. I do. I was on ben revere island by myself last year. I dont think some of the valuation methods properly account for the value a specialist contributes. They’re often overly punitive on the things he cant do.
He might’ve made it back to you in rd 3 though…
@ d_i
I very clearly remember that post and I’m going to cut Pod a little slack here. It seems part of the projections were influenced by Rendon batting 8th and in 5×5 that can be a killer in 2 categories.
Personally, I was appreciative that Pod was “bearish.” It may have influenced some others in my league.
I wasn’t bearish based upon my own projection system customized to our points keeper (now dynasty) league. It allowed me to pick him up for almost nothing in auction with the idea that he was going to be a backup with the hope he’d replace my 2nd baseman in future seasons.
Needless to say, he wasn’t the backup for long and I’ve got him at a ridiculous salary.
In my projections for this season, I’m not predicting regression except maybe in K’s and I don’t care about RBI’s and runs ’cause they don’t drive our league. Extra base hits are much more important.
He’s only 24 and IMO has enough skills to be near the top at either 2nd or 3rd.
PS I wrote this before the reply and other comments appeared.
Who’s to day he doesn’t steal more bases? He had 8 steals in 89 games in his first half split and 9 in 64 in the second half. Doesn’t it seem odd to rely on the same data that never saw the 17 steals coming in the first place when making another prediction that he’s going to steal fewer. Imagine you had only his major league season to look at. Given his age and last years trend, how many steals would you predict for that player? I’m not saying he will steal more. I’m just saying you could make a case that he’s actually as likely to steal more than fewer.
Will -Rendon had a few bad ankle injuries as well.
He hasn’t been in hurt in a few years though.
but it may explain him running more than in the minors and his rookie year.
So the big question, Pod, where would you take him right now? Would you take him in the second round or just avoid him altogether?
At the office now so don’t have my values in front of me, but I think I had him somewhere in the 30s overall for the 15 team LABR mixed draft. So that’s where I would have taken him. I don’t avoid anyone…well except players projected or negative value with no hope of positive value upside.
Would you take Donaldson ahead of Rendon? If Rendon’s steals drop and he only swipes about 5 or 6 more than Donaldson and Josh pops 8-10 more homers and perhaps drives in and scores a few more combined, does the BA and position flexibilty outweigh that?
Will – I would say it depends on your league set up and categories. If OPS is included, I may lean toward Donaldson over Rendon. But for the sake of argument, I would say the eligibility at 2B carries quite a bit of weight. In my projection spreadsheet (accumulation and average of 3 different projection systems), 2B is going to be a gaping hole for the majority of teams in a 12-15 team league and only about half of the team’s in a 10 teamer will have an everyday, wire-to-wire 2nd baseman. That carries value in my book because I can find a valuable 1B, 3B, and OF later in the draft or on the waiver wire. But at 3rd base, there isn’t much differentiating guys like Donaldson, Rendon, Frazier, and Longoria and the drop off to guys like Seager, Carpenter, and Arenado isn’t so absurd that I would feel compelled to draft Donaldson when he has a floor of hitting .245 with a .775 OPS.
I had Rendon ranked 38th in the LABR draft and Donaldson 45th. Both are overvalued in my eyes, but it’s possible others are projecting better performance, rather than misvaluing them. It would seem that’s definitely the case with Donaldson given his ballpark move.