Projection Showdown: OOPSY vs Depth Charts wOBA Forecasts
About two weeks ago, Jordan Rosenblum introduced us to his new projection system, OOPSY, which is now available on every player page that has received a forecast. The system incorporates Baseball Savant data, along with Stuff+, which made me very curious to see which players it was more bullish and bearish on than the Depth Chart projections (which are now 100% matching Steamer, since ZiPS haven’t been published yet). So let’s review the names that fall into each of these groups.
I filtered for hitters with at least 400 projected PAs so the names are all fantasy relevant. I also included the Statcast Average Bat Speed metric, as there has been a lot of chatter between his post and comments on the impact it has on his forecasts. For context, the 2024 league average bat speed was 71.5 MPH.
Name | Avg Bat Speed (MPH) | OOPSY wOBA | Depth Charts wOBA | Diff |
---|---|---|---|---|
Aaron Judge | 77.2 | 0.447 | 0.407 | 0.040 |
Giancarlo Stanton | 81.3 | 0.358 | 0.331 | 0.027 |
Mike Trout | 75.7 | 0.383 | 0.356 | 0.026 |
Jo Adell | 76.7 | 0.332 | 0.310 | 0.022 |
Christopher Morel | 76.1 | 0.340 | 0.318 | 0.022 |
Brendan Rodgers | 71.7 | 0.320 | 0.299 | 0.021 |
Wowzers, this list is your who’s who of bashers! Well, except one name, we’ll get to him at the end. Aside from that last name, every one of these names appear at or near the top of the bat speed leaderboard.
It’s hard to believe, but Aaron Judge is coming off the best offensive season of his career after posting an absurd .476 wOBA. All the projection systems are forecasting meaningful regression, of course, but OOPSY is still projecting a mark that would represent the third highest wOBA of Judge’s career. The most glaring reason is the .358 ISO, versus just a .304 mark projected by the Depth Charts (DC). Like wOBA, that would represent the third highest of Judge’s career…at age 33. Clearly, his insane Statcast metrics break lots of forecasting systems, as extreme outliers tend to do.
The other large discrepancy driving the projected wOBA gap is BABIP, where OOPSY forecasts a .332 mark versus just a .308 mark from DC. It’s a pretty pessimistic view from DC as Judge sports a career .344 BABIP. I think it’s pretty clear here that DC is heavily weighing age-related decline here, while OOPSY is heavily weighing the insane Statcast metrics, which are more than offsetting age.
Thanks to his league leading bat speed, OOPSY is projecting Giancarlo Stanton to post his highest wOBA since 2021, despite heading into his age 35 season. Stanton certainly proved that his power remained elite last year, and I’m actually surprised both his HR/FB rate and ISO weren’t even higher given those crazy Statcast metrics. OOPSY is forecasting a nearly .030 higher ISO mark, along with a .025 higher BABIP. The ISO makes sense given the system’s use of bat speed, but it seems the bat speed usage is also resulting in higher BABIP marks as well. Stanton does own a career BABIP well above all the current projections, but he hasn’t been above the .281 mark he posted last season since 2021. As a slow, extreme fly baller who hits lots of pop-ups and a low rate of line drives, you would expect a below league average BABIP here.
Gosh, it’s been sad to see Mike Trout’s career being ravaged by injury, as he hasn’t even reached 500 PAs since 2019 (okay, he came one short in 2022). The projections here are likely a shot in the dark as his health will likely play a role in how close he could get back to a .400 wOBA, after slipping well below over the past two short seasons. He’ll be a crapshoot in leagues again this year, but perhaps he comes cheap enough to be worth the gamble on his health. As usual, the Angels lineup isn’t very impressive.
Finally, at age 25, Jo Adell was given an extended look, accruing 451 PAs. Unfortunately, he was a disappointment, posting a sub-.300 wOBA. Buried inside his line was some good news though — a much improved strikeout rate, supported by a reduced SwStk%, an elite maxEV and his first double digit Barrel%, and a willingness to steal bases, despite his poor success rate. In continuing the pattern here, OOPSY is forecasting both a higher ISO and higher BABIP. I think he likely deserved greater power output given his Statcast metrics and I certainly think he’s capably of posting the ISO OOPSY forecasts, though I wouldn’t actually project it. That said, I would lean toward his final ISO coming closer to the OOPSY mark than DC. As a fly ball hitter with a high rates of pop-ups, I think it’ll be tough to reach the .290 BABIP it’s projecting, though.
What on Earth happened to Christopher Morel last year?! While his walk rate increased and strikeout rate decreased, his BABIP collapsed thanks to a surge in pop-ups and drop in an already low LD%, while his power disappeared. OOPSY is projecting a nearly full rebound to his 2023 level, though with an ISO that falls a bit short. Morel clearly still has significantly more power than his output suggests last year, so a rebound should be a guarantee. The temporary move to George M. Steinbrenner Field should also help, as it’s expected to be friendlier to hitters than Tropicana.
Brendan Rodgers?! He clearly stands out on this list, as his bat speed is barely above the league average and he hasn’t even posted an ISO above the league average since 2021, despite playing home games in one of the most power friendly parks in baseball. Still, the gap here is driven by the same components we see with the other names. OOPSY projects his highest ISO since that 2021 season, along with a higher BABIP, though that is right in line with his career average and well below last year. The DC BABIP forecast would actually represent a career low, which is odd. It’s strange that Rodgers has the HardHit% and maxEV to deliver above average power, but his Barrel% has typically been stuck in the mid-single digits, aside from his small sample double digit mark in 2023. I think we always expected more power from him, but that just hasn’t materialized. He’s still just 28, so we can’t rule out a major breakout at some point.
Name | Avg Bat Speed (MPH) | OOPSY wOBA | Depth Charts wOBA | Diff |
---|---|---|---|---|
Hyeseong Kim 김혜성 | 0.275 | 0.306 | -0.030 | |
Justin Turner | 65.1 | 0.295 | 0.320 | -0.025 |
Deyvison De Los Santos | 0.288 | 0.311 | -0.024 | |
Jose Iglesias | 69.7 | 0.279 | 0.302 | -0.023 |
Tirso Ornelas | 0.277 | 0.300 | -0.023 | |
Brooks Lee | 69.3 | 0.286 | 0.309 | -0.023 |
Gee golly, this is a very different list of names than the bullish group! Heck, three of the six don’t have avg bat speed marks because they haven’t played in MLB yet. The three that have all come in below 70 MPH.
The largest discrepancy here is for Hyeseong Kim, who signed with the Dodgers out of Korea. He didn’t show a whole lot of power in Korea, peaking at just a .132 ISO, but OOPSY is still forecasting a .122 mark, expecting him to mostly carry over his level of power. That’s a bullish point for OOPSY, yet Kim is on the Bearish list?! That’s because of the massive discrepancy in strikeout rate and BABIP! The DC is forecasting just a 16.2% strikeout rate, whereas OOPSY is at 26%. Kim hasn’t posted a strikeout rate above 17% since back in 2019, so I’m going to lean toward DC being closer here. On the BABIP side, Kim has been a monster, posting marks of at least .350 over the past four seasons. I think the .324 mark projected by DC might be optimistic, but I have to imagine it ends up closer than OOPSY’s super bearish .278 mark. Whichever proves closer, Kim appears to be a low power guy who could contribute in steals and potentially batting average, depending on where his BABIP lands.
Justin Turner is currently a free agent, but is still being projected for over 500 PAs. OOPSY’s projection suggests that he might be a weak signing, as his ISO plunges even further and BABIP craters. His Statcast metrics do suggest his power is gone, but a strong batted ball profile also suggests he could still get on base at an above average clip.
I’m guessing that with 70/70 Raw Power, Deyvison De Los Santos’ bat speed will be impressive and as soon as OOPSY accounts for that data, his projection is going to shoot up. De Los Santos put on a power show in 2024, despite a sub-30% fly ball rate, which isn’t what you expect from a guy with his power skills. OOPSY is forecasting an ISO well below that of DC, along with a meaningfully higher strikeout rate. I actually agree with the higher strikeout rate, as De Los Santos swings and misses a ton, but because he also walks infrequently, he eventually puts the ball in play after swinging at nearly everything. I’m sure MLB pitchers will take more advantage of the free-swinging ways. In terms of power, I’m definitely siding with DC here, but it would be cool to see more fly balls.
Jose Iglesias is another free agent, and only recorded 291 PAs last year. I’m not sure why he’s projected for over 450 by the systems, but he clearly overperformed drastically last year, thanks to a .382 BABIP. All the systems know that, but it appears OOPSY is far more pessimistic on his ISO and BABIP. He’s not exactly a fantasy option even if he does hit the more optimistic DC projection.
As the Padres roster stands now, we’re projecting Tirso Ornelas to serve as the team’s starting left fielder on the strong side of a platoon. The rookie was last ranked as the organization’s seventh best prospect and has been solid offensively in the minors since 2023. That year, his power blossomed and his maxEV has been above 110 MPH, with a HardHit% hovering around 40%. I think OOPSY’s ISO forecast is far too harsh, and even DC’s is a bit pessimistic, so I definitely lean toward the latter. With a touch of speed and solid plate discipline, there’s some deep league value potential here.
I was quite bearish on Brooks Lee last year when he was being hyped leading up to his recall. The problem was that while he posted a strong .239 ISO and 22.9% HR/FB rate in the minors, it came with just a 108.1 max EV and 31.8% HardHit%. Those marks are unimpressive and in no way matched with the power numbers he was posting. So I simply didn’t believe the power output would translate. Obviously, the sample size was tiny, but I was right so far, as his ISO plunged to just .099 with a 5.4% HR/FB rate, as his Statcast metrics remained unimpressive. None of the projection systems are forecasting anything close to his minor league power numbers, though, so even though I’m not impressed by the power, I think I still would learn closer to DC’s higher .148 ISO, as opposed to OOPSY’ lower .129 mark. I do like Lee’s low strikeout rate, but without a whole lot of power or much speed, I don’t see him as a post-hype fantasy target.
Mike Podhorzer 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.
Thanks for the comparison! It seems like you mostly ended up siding with the higher projection for players on both lists. Think there’s any pattern there or is that just how this shook out in a small sample?
Ha, I don’t think I gave my opinion on which side for every projection, but not sure if it’s any pattern or small sample. Perhaps we are generally more optimistic on forecasts and assume everyone will perform like they always have been, without any age-related decline or regression to the mean.