Last week, I listed and discussed the barrels per true fly ball (Brls/TFB) surgers versus 2019. I apparently totally forgot to review the decliners, instead moving on to average fly ball distance leaders and laggards. So let’s get back to Brls/TFB analysis and check out the biggest decliners.
On Monday, I listed and discussed the surprises among the 2020 average fly ball distance leaders. Today, let’s do the same for the laggards.
The 60-game season fostered a lot of unexpected stat lines. Of course, the standard six-month seasons deliver them, too, but obviously the smaller sample breeds more volatility so let’s take a look at four big risers and see if we want to buy in for 2021.
Alex Dickerson, OF SFG | .298/.371/.576, 10 HR, 27 RBI, 28 R, 0 SB in 170 PA
Let’s get this out of the way immediately. He did get 30% of his home runs in one beautiful night at Coors Field, but that alone didn’t sustain his line. In his final 66 PA after the 3-homer game, he hit .356/.424/.627 with 3 HR, 7 RBI, and 12 R. He did have a meager .694 OPS in the run up to that career night, but a .231 BABIP was doing some heavy lifting there as he was still pacing toward a useful 22 HR/76 RBI full season.
His massive platoon split tempers the fantasy upside. He has a .278/.348/.514 line with 24 HR, 81 RBI, 84 R, and 4 SB in 551 PA v. righties while posting just a .687 OPS in 102 PA v. lefties. This will likely keep him relegated to a platoon role with guys like Austin Slater and Darin Ruf 러프 filling in for Dickerson against lefties. As such, it makes Dickerson a deeper league option.
For obvious reasons, Statcast’s average fly ball distance correlates highly with HR/FB rate (0.64 in my calculations from 2015-2020). So let’s peruse this shortened season’s leaderboard and discuss any of the surprising names.
With fewer games for extreme performances to regress back toward player and league averages, it stands to reason that surger and decliner lists are going to be pretty lengthy and more surprising than normal. In addition, the degree in which the metric being analyzed surged or declined is likely to be much greater than in past, full seasons. So let’s remember that when reviewing 2020 numbers and put much less stock into the fact that a player doubled or tripled some rate from 2019, and instead simply consider that the player may have enjoyed skills growth that could potentially carry over into 2021. Today, let’s review the barrels per true fly ball (Brls/TFB) surgers. Many of these same names appeared on the leaders list posted on Tuesday, so I’ll try discussing only those not on that list.
Yesterday, I listed and discussed surprises among the barrels per true fly ball (Brls/TFB) leaders. Today, let’s flip to the laggards and discuss surprising names at the bottom. We’re going to have to include a much longer list of names to find surprises, compared to the leader list.
In just a 60 game season, all the numbers and rates I typically analyze and include as components in my various equations will look wackier than normal. The small the sample size, the greater the chance a rate settles in at the extreme end of expectations. This is why we’ll have to heavily regress this year’s numbers when developing 2021 projections. That said, it’s still worth reviewing 2020 rates, as skill changes obviously still did occur. So we’ll start with one of my favorite metrics, barrels per true fly ball (Brls/TFB). This is my own metric that is used as a component in my xHR/FB rate equation. It simply takes Statcast’s barrel and divides by Fangraphs’ fly balls minus infield fly balls.
10/22/20
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Catchers Discussed: J.T. Realmuto, Salvador Perez, Christian Vazquez, Gary Sánchez, Austin Nola, Sean Murphy, Daulton Varsho, James McCann, Mitch Garver, Max Stassi, Joey Bart, Danny Jansen, Tyler Stephenson, Omar Narváez
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Yesterday, I reviewed the hitters that enjoyed a fly ball rate surge early on in the season to see how they performed the rest of the way. Today, let’s review the decliners. Did they rebound back to their 2019 level or was the early season slump an indication of a season-long decreased FB%?
I love batted ball distribution changes (hitting more fly balls or ground balls), because they are usually under the hood and require a review of the hitter’s statistical profile to uncover. Typically, when we see a home run breakout, it’s usually because of the obvious — the hitter has raised his HR/FB rate. But that’s not always the case. Sometimes he’s hitting home runs on his flies at the same rate, but simply hitting more fly balls. That’ll get you to the same destination, but following a different route. So in early/mid August, I identified and discussed the hitters that had increased their fly ball rates the most versus 2019. At that point, the sample size was still small, of course, so I was curious how these hitters performed the rest of the way. Did they maintain their FB% spikes or did those marks fall back to their 2019 levels over the rest of the season? Let’s find out.
