A Duda Day in Queens in 2012?
Lucas Duda provides us ample opportunity to write a catchy headline with that fantastic last name and I simply could not resist. Anyway, he is set to open the 2012 season as the Mets opening day right fielder, qualifying in both the outfield and at first base. After posting a strong .368 wOBA over 347 plate appearances during his rookie season, will we be singing Oh Duda Day next year?
Duda will be 26 next year so he should not be confused for some young top prospect. However, that just means that he is closer to his prime right now. In 2010 at Triple-A, he was fantastic, posting a .424 wOBA, making decent contact, walking at an above average clip, and displaying massive power with a .295 ISO. He was even better during his short stint at the level in 2011, proving that he was ready to become a full-timer with the big league club.
After a slow start with the Mets, hitting just two homers over his first 136 at-bats this year, he then hit eight over his last 165 at-bats. For a power hitter, he made contact at a pretty good rate, took his walks and posted an ISO just below .200. And his .292 average was not even propped up by an inflated BABIP; his .326 mark was in line with his minor league history and supported by a 22.5% line drive rate.
With minimal speed, his fantasy prospects hinge on his power and RBI total, along with potentially contributing in batting average. Over 389 career at-bats, his HR/FB ratio actually looks relatively low at just 10.2%, which is right around the league average. There is some good news though, aside from the Mets moving their fences in. According to Hit Tracker Online, Duda’s 10 home runs this year went for an average standard distance of 412.2 feet. To put this in context, the average MLB distance was just 393.7 feet in 2011 and young masher Mike Stanton was just above Duda’s average at 414.9 feet. So now we know that when Duda gets a hold of one, it goes far.
That’s not the only bit of good news. The other is that he is a fly ball hitter, knocking nearly 44% of his balls in play in the air. Any increase in HR/FB ratio will have a greater effect on his home run total than if he was hitting fewer fly balls, obviously. So these two factors, combined with the good contact he makes and the fences being brought in at Citi Field, mean that he has a real shot at launching 25-30 bombs next year.
An increased HR/FB ratio will also help his batting average since some of these balls had previously been caught. That should help him maintain positive value in the batting average category and make him a pretty good three category contributor. With reports telling us that his headaches have disappeared after colliding with the wall in late September, Duda has a good chance to earn a profit for his fantasy owners next season.
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.
Put it down now: Duda breaks out in 2012 a la Mike Morse 2011.
Bold prediction: .290/.360/.500/25/75/75
You call that BOLD?! I think 75 RBIs is rather low since he’s expected to hit in the middle of the order. I think Duda is a good candidate to make my annual Bold Predictions column and I’m thinking 30 homers is a good target.
Good Point Mike, that wasn’t the BOLDEST prediction ever. If they get rid of Wright and he hits 3 I could definitley see more R/RBI in the forecast. He’s gonna be a steal in 4 and 5 OF leagues in the later rounds come draft time.
Wait, did he have headaches after he ran into a wall, which have since resolved? Or did he have headaches which disappeared immediately after he ran into a wall? (Please please please be the latter!)
To me, the Mets have a real problem in terms of what they can do with Duda and Davis on the same roster. Duda is NOT an everyday RF and whatever advantage he will give us offensively will be dwarfed by his defensive ineptitude.
Don’t get me wrong, I love the guy’s bat and think he could be an even better offensive producer than Davis, but we just don’t have anywhere to stick him at.
This is a player who hasn’t dominated at any minor league level, the way Davis did. I like to be optimistic too, but realistic first…..does anyone remember Victor Diaz, Craig Brazelle & Mike Jacobs? I like Duda, but these players seldom work out.
Those guys like Jacobs were strikeout machines who could be pitched to relatively easily. Duda has improved his strikepout rates throughout his pro career, while also getting better in the OBP and SLG departments.
Mark Rak – take a long(er) look at Duda’s AAA numbers. Very silly statement.
455 ABs there: .310/.398/.606, 54 BB/84 Ks, 31 2B, 27 HR
My favorite player on the mets was Beltran, Now I think I’m going to be a big Duda Fan. I like everything about this ballplayer including his shyness.
I’ve been wondering something about a player’s average home run distance. Does anyone else think that since Duda played in a big park last year that his average might be inflated relative to other hitters who play in smaller ballparks because, for example, balls he hits 380-390 feet or whatever don’t leave the park and are therefore not weighing down his average? If he hits a home run at Citi Field, chances are he killed it, and the average distance of all his home runs at Citi Field has to be pretty big since every home run he hits has to go farther to get out.
This is an excellent point, and one of the issues with only looking at distance figures like I did. If he had more than 10 homers, I would have also looked at the breakdown of Just Enough/Plenty/No Doubters, but 10 was too small a sample to mean much for that breakdown.
Overall, I think it’s pretty fair to say that a player takes 100 AB’s or so (or more) to get used to the MLB. Looking at what he did over the last 1/3 of the season is about what his impressive AAA minor league numbers amounted to. Call me a sucker, but I’m drinking the Duda Kool-Aid and loving him at $4 in my NL only Roto league.
0 HR’s vs left-handed pitching as a MLBer.
Duda will make the NL All-Star team at least once in his career. With Mets fences pulled in, he will be even more productive.