Archive for Adrian Beltre

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:

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:

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:

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.

As we approach the end of the first month of the 2016 Major League season, there’s obviously plenty to dissect. From a third base perspective, we’ll unpack a lot of that when we get to the first set of real, actual, less-leaning-upon-conjecture rankings in the coming days. But nothing says we can’t look at some things just a touch early.

For the most part, the top guys have been the top guys. If there was a “Stock Right Where It Was Expected to Be” category, these guys would fit the bill. Manny Machado leads the category, while Nolan Arenado and Josh Donaldson aren’t too far behind. Kris Bryant is right in the mix as well, keeping all of the top tier players from those initial rankings in that upper tier, just perhaps with some reordering. Beyond that top tier, though, there’s certainly going to be some shakeup. Some guys have emerged, some guys have fallen off the map almost completely, and some guys are just there. Looking at some of these stocks will give us a better idea of what the next set of rankings could look like.

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As I so often do, I ran some numbers through the z-score method yesterday. I ran each player’s 2015 numbers through as well as the Steamer rest-of-season projections and compared the results. Given the cumulative nature of fantasy production, I looked at each player’s production, actual and projected, on a per plate appearance basis to get an idea about who the projection system thinks is going to bounce back in the second half. Read the rest of this entry »

The infield is definitely the strength of the current roster the Rangers have assembled. We have them projected for 32.2 WAR, and their main infielders, counting projected platoons at catcher and second base, account for 14.9 in projected WAR. That’s about 46% for those of you without a calculator handy. But despite being such a strength, the positions on the right side of the infield are wild cards. Read the rest of this entry »

It’s official. 100% of my value is bothering @jeffwzimmerman to run data and then use that data for said content. I did just that this morning for updated shift data. I believe the last time he posted related content on RotoGraphs was here back in May looking at: Early Hitter Shift Data.

It was because of this post and his balls in play (groundball and pop-up rates) that led me to believe Albert Pujols was going to drop off/continue his downward trend. I guess I pushed out the fact that he was the best hitter of his generation. While the .375 BABIP (from the above link) against shifts did not last, he’s at a very respectable .284. Between this and additional discipline (best contact rate since 2008 and hacking less at stuff outside of the zone), he is able to hover around a .280 BA, which remains elite in conjunction with 30HR, 90R and 100+RBI.

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I don’t really like tiers, but it probably has something to do with the neatness of placing a player in a designated strata. I’ve never used tiers in fantasy baseball drafts because I think it tends to blind you to the nuances of each player and the specific needs your team might have. But now that the season has started, you should be all drafted up and it’s time to brand your cattle.

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The left side of the Texas infield will look the same as it has the last three seasons, but the right side will be completely different with Ian Kinsler being shipped to Detroit for Prince Fielder. Jurickson Profar will slide into Kinsler’s spot. The real baseball implications of the deal are complicated on Texas’ end, but it was definitely a good thing for fantasy owners in that we have three guys who are fantasy options instead of two.

But is Profar a good option? In 324 plate appearances last year, Profar had just a .291 wOBA and 75 wRC+. From a roto perspective he hit just .234 with six home runs and two steals. Profar’s best skills in the minors were his plate discipline and ability to make contact. Of the two, his contact translated better as his contact rate was basically what it was in the minors. And he didn’t just make contact, he made good contact with a 23.4% line drive rate.

His plate discipline, however, didn’t translate immediately. Of course, he’ll never be able to replicate the single digit O-Swing percentages he posted in AA and AAA the last two years. But we can expect his strikeout and walk rates to improve because Jeff Zimmerman has showed us that K% peaks around age 25 and BB% peaks around 27 while ISO and BABIP tend to peak immediately. That’s a long-winded way of saying that an adjustment period was to be expected. Profar’s going to get better quickly, probably a lot better. Read the rest of this entry »

“May Day” is actually an appropriate call for third base because, holy hell, it has been one trial after the last tribulation. Third base has been so tough to staff on some of you, the consideration of just going without has been more attractive than what’s available on the waiver wire. As far as putting this cast of misfits into tiers, I ought to just have Tier One and then “The Rest” as punishment to everyone outside of Detroit. There have been some pleasant surprises of course, so let’s get to it.

A quick note about this particular batch of tiers. In the past, I’ve always liked to temper the rapid movement up or down rankings in May, suggesting that the tiers should represent something akin to a “if the draft were held today…” line of thinking. But given the dearth of production from some players and the rampant injuries, I’d like to think these tiers are a happy median between on-field performance and what we should expect going forward. The stats after each player are the Steamer rest-of-season projections.

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When we do this thing where we categorize players into tidy little compartments it tends to bring out the monsters in many of you. Had I given more attention to some of my cultural anthropology or experimental psychology courses, perhaps I’d have an explanation as to why. But nonetheless intrepid reader, I’ll attempt to put forth my best tiered assessment of the available third basemen to you on draft day.

As you no doubt know, the tiers shift. They move like like an Omar Vizquel with Arthur Rhodes on the mound. But I know that many of you like to aim for top three tier material at as many positions as possible, so perhaps this will help you assuming you haven’t already put together your squads. If you already have and your guy is in tier five, well, condolences.

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Looking at the recent ridiculously early mock draft from a stony selection of the Rotographs raconteurs, I was A) quite pleased that I didn’t participate and subject myself to the scrutiny of the learned readers here and B) struck by the fact that third base continues to give me the heebee jeebees.

Third base has generally been my beat over the last twelve months for Rotographs and the implications of the 2012 season haven’t helped me rest well when thinking about the hot corner. While this year might welcome Chase Headley to the fantasy super-duper we also saw the departure of Jose Bautista due to eligibility, Kevin Youkilis due to Kevin Youkilis, Alex Rodriguez to the girl in the fourth row, and Michael Young to relevance.

And this gives me pause.

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