Archive for September, 2016

Adrian Beltre: Steady as a Rock

I’ve spent a lot of time this season profiling some of the league’s young stars at the hot corner. Kris Bryant and Jake Lamb have each represented points of emphasis, while the likes of Manny Machado, Justin Turner, and others have all had their moment in the sun in this here column at one point or another throughout the 2016 season. But there’s one that I have failed to give his due, which is a shame because he’s doing exactly what he’s done for the better part of his (potentially) Hall of Fame career. There may not be a finer example of consistency than that of Texas Rangers third sacker Adrian Beltre.

One of the league’s longest tenured veterans, despite not being among the game’s oldest when the season began, I’ve come admire Beltre above many others over the past few seasons, and it really is for a variety of reasons. His stoic presence with which he graces the field each day is not unlike my own, whether in the classroom or manning the infield on my own slow-pitch softball team (of course, that’s really where the similarities between the two of us really begin and end). I’m also a sucker for great defense, especially on the left side of the infield. Perhaps above all, though, there is something to be said for consistency, and there may not be a more upstanding example of a steady presence in recent years than that of Adrian Beltre.

I should preface this by noting that of course there are going to be declines and discrepancies in certain aspects due to factors such as age, health, BABIP, etc. The variation is going to exist, no matter how often the word consistent is going to be tossed around. Nonetheless, that consistency comes in a number of different regards. And given that the natural reaction is to neglect those down years in Seattle, we’ll start with 2010 as the basis for labeling him as such a constant presence at the plate.

Since re-establishing himself with Boston in 2010, Beltre has been the model performer at the third base position:

AVG OBP OPS ISO K% BB% wRC+
2010 .321 .365 .919 .233 12.8 6.2 140
2011 .296 .331 .892 .265 10.1 4.8 135
2012 .321 .359 .921 .240 12.5 5.5 142
2013 .315 .371 .880 .193 11.3 7.2 135
2014 .324 .388 .879 .168 12.1 9.3 143
2015 .287 .334 .788 .166 10.5 6.6 109
2016 .298 .356 .872 .219 10.4 7.7 127

If we were to take each specific category and slap it on a line graph, I’d venture to say that it’d be a pretty steady distribution as the disparity between figures exists, but isn’t terribly significant. His power has declined a bit as he’s aged, but he’s still extremely productive, as indicated by virtually everything else above. Obviously there are going to be some outliers over the course of seven seasons, something which is true of every player because baseball. That strikeout rate is especially impressive, though, just because of how little disparity actually exists over that time.

Raw numbers have a little bit more “give”, as far as their ability to fluctuate a little bit more and still allow us to declare a player consistent. Which is what makes the contact rate and contact type aspects of Beltre’s game so intriguing:

Contact% SwStr% LD% GB% FB% Soft% Med% Hard%
2010 82.8 8.8 19.1 40.5 40.5 18.3 41.6 40.1
2011 85.0 7.6 18.1 37.8 44.1 22.6 42.8 34.6
2012 83.2 8.5 21.1 39.0 39.9 11.5 52.7 35.8
2013 85.5 7.0 21.8 38.2 40.0 9.4 55.3 35.3
2014 84.6 7.3 22.1 42.3 35.6 14.0 52.7 33.3
2015 84.2 7.6 22.7 41.6 35.7 14.3 52.0 33.7
2016 85.2 7.2 17.4 41.8 40.8 16.6 48.5 34.9

We’ve seen players whose ability to not only make contact, but solid contact, fluctuates significantly from year to year. Obviously there are players out there who make hard contact at a significantly higher rate than Beltre as the percentages stand right now, but look at the Hard% since 2011. That’s very little variation. Which is kind of the theme here with Adrian Beltre: very little variation.

Beltre has never been keen on taking a free pass. His walk rate this season has him set in the bottom half of qualifying third basemen. Last year, he ranked 12th at the position (6.6%) and in 2013 (7.2%) he ranked 14th (2014 serves as the outlier here as he walked at a clip over 9 percent). But that hasn’t been a detractor from his success, as he’s maintained the high contact rates and low swinging strike rates as illustrated above. That’s not to say he’s a free swinger, as his Swing% on pitches outside the strike zone is just 33.o% for his career. The approach is there, even if he hasn’t exactly demonstrated a penchant for walking.

The production and contact at the plate are certainly one result of that consistent approach. And as far as his pitch selection is concerned, that’s yet another element of his game where he’s been entirely steady. That’s yet another aspect of his game which has not deviated from what we’ve come to expect:

Brooksbaseball-Chart (15)

The lone exception there is the offspeed in 2014 and 2015, but everything else has remained pretty steady. Beltre has posted a mean swing percentage of 53.02 against the hard stuff, with a median of 52.58. Against breaking pitches, he’s gone for a 44.23 average and a 43.22 median, with a 43.91 average against offspeed and a median of 43.75. Each category lends itself to a pretty even distribution and really helps to drive home the point of Beltre’s consistency as it relates to a number of different aspects.

It’s almost difficult for us to appreciate production this consistent. At some point, it becomes the norm and, thus, less impressive to us. Rational or not, that just seems to be the way we, as fans or media types, tend to react to overwhelmingly stable production. Such is the case with Adrian Beltre. So while we’re obviously going to pay plenty of attention to the guys making all the noise, Kris Bryant, Josh Donaldson, etc., it’s important to take a step back once in a while and admire as reliable of production as we have seen this decade at the hot corner over these last seven or so years.


The Unwritten Rules

I didn’t grow up a fan of baseball. I was born and raised in Washington DC; an area that was devoid of a professional team until after I moved away. However, just like many kids, I played it growing up, but because I didn’t watch much of it growing up, I didn’t know about many of baseball’s unwritten rules until later in life. Read the rest of this entry »


The Secret to Rebuilding Your Fantasy Team

I have owned Nick Williams in a very competitive Ottoneu league since mid-January.  Effective today, I am cutting bait on Nick Williams.

Actually, Nick Williams is really just a proxy for all those glossy prospects we fall in love with. Exiting the 2015 season, I was coming off a championship but knew I’d be staring headfirst at a very difficult rebuild.  So, entering the spring of 2016 I did exactly what I usually advise new fantasy owners to avoid: stock up on a bunch of prospects and let hope fill in the strategic gaps.

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The Daily Grind: DFS, Streaming, and More for September 14

Agenda

  1. Walker
  2. The Daily Grind Invitational and Leaderboard
  3. Daily DFS
  4. SaberSim Observations
  5. Tomorrow’s Targets
  6. Factor Grid

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(Belated) Bullpen Report: September 13, 2016

• Some strange things going on in San Francisco. Santiago Casilla lost his role as closer earlier and Hunter Strickland who recorded a save on the 11th proceeded to give up four runs last night. Steven Okert, a lefty in the Giants pen, relieved Strickland in the ninth but promptly blew the save after allowing a homer to Ryan Schimpf. Bruce Bochy confirmed that Strickland is still his closer but Derek Law is due back today making Strickland’s leash considerably tighter. Sergio Romo and Will Smith might just be considered righty and lefty specialists at this point but they could possibly see some more chances and I wouldn’t fully rule out Casilla either, depending on how he finishes the year.

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Field of Streams: Episode 238 – Floundered A Bit Lately

Episode 238 – Floundered A Bit Lately

The latest episode of “Field of Streams” is live!

In this episode, Dylan Higgins and Matthew Dewoskin discuss bad Guinness World Records at the ballpark, Dylan throwing an accidental curveball into the position order (and Matt hitting it), coming around on Orlando Arcia, Jeremy Hazelbaker finally delivering, Carlos Rodon being on fire in general, Dylan thinking about believing in Jake Thompson, and keeping an eye on Dan Vogelbach.

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Raining David Crosby: Reviewing Our Preseason Predictions

The subject line of an e-mail we got from a Yahoo Group one of us belongs to made our blood freeze. “It’s been raining David Crosby,” it said. Oh no, we thought; again? Closer inspection revealed merely a Youtube clip of pre-Byrds solo-folksinger Crosby performing “It’s Been Raining.” It’s completely harmless, especially if you don’t watch it or listen to it. It occurred to us, though, even as we heaved sighs of relief, that “Raining David Crosby” might be a good metonym for our disappointing-to-catastrophic 2016 Fantasy Baseball season.

Nonetheless, in the spirit of fearless scientific accountability, we must now review our 2016 predictions, “Bold” and otherwise. We’ll look at preseason predictions this week and in-season ones next week. We’ll concentrate, as always, on the outré and the cut-rate; we can’t really take credit for predicting, say, that the Cubs would win the NL Central, though they undoubtedly will, or that Trea Turner would be NL Rookie of the Year, though he arguably is. Read the rest of this entry »


Roto Riteup: September 14, 2016

A reminder: While “look good, feel good” is a nice axiom, you do not, in fact, have to look good to be good.

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Brad Johnson RotoGraphs Chat – 9/13/16

Here are the results of today’s chat!

4:00
Brad Johnson: Today’s chat is brought to you by Yasmany Tomas

4:00
Brad Johnson: 29 home runs, -0.1 WAR

4:01
Brad Johnson: aka switch-hitting Jermaine Dye

4:01
EB: Hey Brad. Hope all is well. I’m in contention in my AL-only league and it’s slim pickings on the waiver wire in terms of SP. I would greatly appreciate if you could please rank the following: C.Lewis, Tomlin, M. Perez, McHugh.

4:02
Brad Johnson: I don’t know their matchups offhand, and that’s really what matters. Stadium and opposing lineups.

4:02
Brad Johnson: Tomlin seems a little broken to me right now while the others are just blah but functioning

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The Change: A Guide to Peaceful, Easy Streaming

We did a little work on streaming last week, in an effort to find you some stolen bases. But stolen bases are just one of the few things we’re all trying to cobble together here in the final month. You might be in a head-to-head league, looking to add one counting stat or another in your playoffs, or in a roto league where you’re furiously fighting for a category. Either way, you need power, speed, relief stats or spot starts, and either way, the context is key.

This is the guide for those that find themselves in that situation but don’t have the time to get granular. All you have to do is look at the team your potential player is facing, and you’ll know enough to make a decent move. Hopefully it won’t let you down — you’re already standing on the ground.

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