Does It Matter If Healy Heals?

Real baseball starts next Thursday. Let’s wrap up the final full week of the offseason by checking in on an old sabermetric darling.

With Ryon Healy working his way back from injury and Dan Vogelbach killing it this spring, I’ve had my eye on the Mariners first base situation. Healy reportedly will be ready for Opening Day, but can he cling to the starting job?

Before we dive into Vogelbach’s bona fides, we need to knock Healy expectations down a peg. In 888 career plate appearances, he’s looked an awful lot like another first baseman. Behold.

These are… the same player? Definitely the same player. The “other guy” hits twice as many infield flies as Healy. That’s literally the only discernible difference between the two players – it’s reflected in the batting average and BABIP columns. They’re even both plodding first basemen with poor-to-average defense.

The “other guy” aka Local Man Ruins Everything aka Tommy Joseph was recently DFA’d by the Phillies. He was claimed – for free – by the Rangers. A couple days later, the same Rangers paid Philadelphia actual cash for Eliezer Alvarez. Who? I know you’re thinking it.

Joseph has more designations for assignment and/or a move to Asia in his future. Meanwhile Healy will supposedly start for a contending AL West club. Seattle traded a legitimately decent reliever to acquire him – a position they arguably needed more than another first baseman. Clearly, they like Healy. And, because they paid for him, they’re semi-pot committed.

Seattle also paid for Vogelbach. Specifically, back in mid-2016, they traded effective swingman Mike Montgomery. It’s a deal they have probably regretted over the last calendar year. Seattle wouldn’t have acquired Healy if Vogelbach had developed as expected. He’s been assigned the dreaded Quad-A label, although it’s still premature to rule out a major league future.

We may be reaching the inflection point for regret. As David Laurila writes, Vogelbach has decided to eschew his contact-oriented approach in favor of more fly ball power. Although he states this isn’t about joining the air ball revolution, it’s definitely about joining the air ball revolution. A pulled ground ball for Vogelbach isn’t as bad as a strikeout. It’s pretty close though. Air balls have a chance to become something. Like an out. Or a home run.

Spring Training numbers are exceptionally noisy. We know this. Pitchers aren’t necessarily trying to retire hitters. They’re working on things. And missing spots. However, in 57 plate appearances, Vogelbach is batting .383/.500/.830 with five home runs and six doubles (out of 18 hits total).

Sure, he won’t sustain a .394 BABIP, but that’s missing the point. He’s making frequent extra base contact. He’s accomplished this while recording 10 walks, one HBP, and nine strikeouts. There’s room for hope. Vogelbach may have increased his ability to make hard fly ball contact without substantially sacrificing his feel for contact.

They say hope springs eternal. Projection systems peg him for roughly a .240/.325/.400 batting line. That’s definitely second fiddle to Healy. What does the eternal hope line look like? Something along the lines of .270/.360/.490 with a 25 to 30 home run pace? That blows Healy right out of the water.

In reality, Vogelbach truthers should be rooting for a 50/50 platoon early in the season, eventually growing into a straight handedness platoon as he proves his value. He’s free in most leagues.