Archive for Carlos Gomez

My wife was late last week.  Not late for dinner late, but late late.  To subdue the paranoia, it was a quick trip to the drug store and back home for her to pee on the stick.  We sit and wait.  Can’t be, can she?  Apologies to my Catholic readers, but she’s on the pill.  We couldn’t possibly be part of that unlucky 2% could we?  We look and see a plus sign.  That can’t be good.  It’s not.  I hand her another one.  This time it looks negative but there’s some coloration that still makes us nervous.  Rather than reach for the nearest coat hanger, I make her a doctor’s appointment and luck out with an 8am opening the next day.  She goes in, the doctor confirms a false positive and the bullet gets dodged.  Phew! Read the rest of this entry »

When we checked the center field position and created tiered rankings, there were a few players that were suggested as possible values at the position.

Carlos Gomez and Cameron Maybin could provide some nice speed – at the cost of risking your batting average. Since the rankings were for rotisserie baseball, that risk pushed those players off of the rankings.

But what if we were talking about head-to-head baseball, where punting a category is a strategy many deep leaguers employ? In such a format, you are competing in ten categories every week and can easily ‘punt’ a category if it provides an advantage elsewhere. Imagine the value you could get out of eschewing batting average – your lineup could employ Jimmy Rollins, Mark Reynolds, Adam Dunn, and Jayson Werth, all without the problems that lineup would normally entail.

With that strategy in mind, is Chris Young a viable option in 2010? If Bill James is to be believed, Youngs’ power and speed could return and answer that question affirmatively. The fans have yet to chime in (but should take this chance to give their input).

After famously being demoted to the minor leagues last year, Young returned to a post-All-Star-break line that could help batting-average-punters (.236/.343/.444) – at least in the power department. He didn’t steal a base. We can be forgiven for feeling confused.

Looking at his plate discipline stats may just muddy the waters. Every statistic is going in a different direction. His strikeout rate has gotten steadily worse (24.8% in 2007 to 30.7% last year), but he’s reaching less often (22.9% in 2007 to 18.0% last year). Perhaps it’s all about his contact rate, which is definitely getting worse (79.7% in 2006 to 73.9% last year), but there are plenty of players that succeed with a 75-ish% contact rate (Evan Longoria and Adrian Gonzalez most prominently), and with his still-strong walk rate (9.1% career, 12% in 2009), he has his good qualities.

There’s also something interesting going on with Young’s take rate. As RJ pointed out, Young takes a lot of pitches in the zone, and a good portion of those pitches could have been called balls last year. But again, Victor Martinez and Chris Coghlan both also took about 40% of the pitches they saw in the zone, and they had pretty good years last year.

It may just be that a player that both takes a lot of pitches in the zone and doesn’t make contact is going to have a hard time in major league baseball. Let’s set the bar at Young’s career levels of swinging in the zone (around 60%) and contact rate (around 76%). How many other players in the last two years have had good seasons with those rates?

Last year, the list was short: Mike Cameron, Jason Bay and Brandon Inge all had passable years sporting percentages close to Young’s numbers (but none took as many pitches in the zone, with Cameron swinging the least at 63.7%). In 2008, it was Jason Bay and Mike Cameron again (but Bay made contact on 77.1% of his pitches, and Cameron swung at more pitches than Young.)

It looks like we have a (rather obvious) comp in Mike Cameron then. Except that if you compare Cameron’s career numbers in the two categories (63.9% Z-swing%, 75.4% contact rate), you’ll notice he doesn’t take as many pitches in the zone. He also plays solid center field defense (+5.7 UZR/150 in CF, career).

And you have your two things to work on for Chris Young the Outfielder. In order to be Mike Cameron, he needs to swing at more pitches in the zone and play better defense. Then he’ll always have a place on the field. The good news is that Young swung at more pitches in the zone last year than he did the previous two years. The bad news is that his defense needs to take a serious step forward this year (-4.9 UZR/150 in CF, career). The good news means that he may be ownable in the right league next year. The bad news means that he won’t be ownable in any keeper leagues going forward if the defense doesn’t improve.

Many fantasy leagues break the outfielders up by their respective positions, a quirk that creates a premium outfield position. Consider that, in many formats, the 12th-ranked center fielder going into the season was Chris Young, whose projections were comparable to the 12th-ranked second baseman going into the season (Rickie Weeks).

Defense then becomes a non-fantasy entity that can mean a lot to the fantasy fortunes of the center fielder. Play good defense, and you’ll buy yourself more time to figure out the batting part of the deal. Or at least, that seems to be what’s keeping Carlos Gomez playing in Minnesota. Let’s take a look at two young center fielders, how they are faring, and how defense factors into the decision.

Dexter Fowler – For a 23-year-old getting his first extended burn at the major league level, Fowler is acquitting himself reasonably well. His .264/.354/.405 slash line has a little bit of something for everyone. Walking 12.7% of the time assures that he can take advantage of his prodigious speed (6.5 speed score). He’s stolen 13 bases at a 72% success rate, and he’s hit three homers and 17 doubles in 273 plate appearances.

But it’s not all gravy on this train. He’s striking out 25% of the time after hovering around 20% for the large part of his minor league career. Subsequently, ZiPS RoS has him hitting .271 the rest of the season and continuing his current pace to finish with seven home runs and 25 stolen bases. Until his K-rate falls a little, that’s about the best that can be expected from this young man.

Because his offense is currently adequate, and his team is suddenly playing well, defense may not factor into his playing time too strongly. However, his team is not a strong contender in a crowded division, and things could change quickly. Pack an extended burn of strikeouts into a team-wide slump and a decision by management to focus on next year, and suddenly Fowler’s sub-par defense could become an ‘issue.’

His current 2.1 Range Factor in center field puts him in the Shane Victorino (2.3 RF) – Vernon Wells (2.3 RF) section of center field defenders. That’s the section where the offense helps the poor defense stay on the field. Is Fowler’s bat enough to offset the 5.3 runs he’s giving back on defense? Not if the major league team decides to think about his long-term future and sends him back to the minors to work on his D. That might also allow the team to showcase someone like Ryan Spilborghs for a trade.

Fernando Martinez – While his minor league team had already decided to play him at the corners, his major league team has a major league hole in center field and looks to be plugging it with their highest-ranked prospect. A look at the defense says that this is a short-term solution at best.

If major league defensive stats are still in their infancy, then minor league ones are much worse off. We can see that Martinez had a Range Factor of 2.31 in center field in the minor leagues, and that Carlos Beltran, an elite defender, had a career Range Factor of 2.7 in center field in the major leagues. Using the cruder Range Factor suggests that Martinez, like Fowler, could use some time honing his defense.

The problem in Martinez’ case, though, is that his offense won’t keep him in the position much longer. While his secondary offensive statistics are a little up and down like Fowler’s, Martinez has much more down in his numbers.

The good news is that he’s not striking out a ton (14.5%), and he’s shown improvement in that area over the last two years. His walk rate (6.8%) is in line with his minor league numbers, too.

But he’s not making good contact. He’s reaching outside the zone too much (26.5%) and not squaring the ball well (11.9% line drives). His 55.9% ground-ball percentage is positively Delmon Young-esque. Given that he’s only 20 years old, it’s a lot to ask of him to spell Beltran.

Since the team is in contention, look for Omar Minaya to target a center field platoon partner for Jeremy Reed. Relatively cheap acquisitions like Scott Hairston and Jason Michaels could take the bat out of Reed’s hands against lefties, while also letting young F-Mart work out some more kinks in the minor leagues. Those cheaper veteran outfielders would also still have value once all the injured veterans return.

The Minnesota Twins are not known for their outfield. The team’s big league outfielder core sports a combined OPS under .800 that puts the group in the bottom tier of major league outfields. With such a flawed group, the way the teams uses their assets will be very important, so let’s take a look at how each is being used and how they should be used.

Denard Span – Span has elbowed his way into a solid position on this team by being pretty good at everything. His solid approach at the plate (12.3% walk rate, 16.5% strikeout rate) has continued, and his 15.9% reach percentage is 12th in the league and close to elite status. He’s much better against lefties (.914 OPS) than righties (.768 OPS), but beggars can’t be choosers.

Unfortunately for the Twins and Span, his defense is not elite. Span’s UZR at center field this year is 30 runs under average, and he really should only be used on the corners according to the numbers. In 2008, he was 43 runs in the negative in center field. Yeah, he’s getting better with the glove, but Span is a corner outfielder that hits like a center fielder. In this group, though, he probably should be an everyday starter.

Delmon Young – Here’s another Twinkie outfielder that hits like a center fielder, and the last time he played center field (2007 in Tampa Bay), he cost his team almost 45 runs per 150 games according to his UZR rating. Young is not the answer in CF, either.

The rest of his Young’s game does not emulate Span’s. Young has improved his reach rate from 50.3% in his debut to 34.4% this year, but the new number is still on par with such ‘disciplined’ luminaries as Jeff Francoeur and Jose Lopez. With a line drive number that has decreased every year in the majors, and a strike out rate over 30% this year, both the short-term and long-term views of Young’s career have plenty of warts. Moving to Minnesota has also been famously terrible for his power, and his fly ball rates have continued to drop this year. An almost-decent fly ball rate of 32.6% in Tampa has turned into a terrible 24% rate this year.

The only thing worth pointing to in Young’s resume is that his decent speed has led to a career BABIP of .345 that seems steady at this point. With a nice BABIP like that, he should be able to maintain good batting averages, and ZiPS agrees by projecting him to hit .285 from here on out. Since he offers so little everywhere else, fantasy owners should be rooting for a trade, or looking for a trade partner in their league. Some people still like Young.

Michael Cuddyer – With a career slugging percentage of .446, Cuddyer is the slugger in this outfield. He’s having a good year and seems to be recovered from his myriad health issues from last year.

Earlier in his career he struck out a little too much but he’s now settled into a sub-20% level. He reaches a bit (25.1% career), and right now he’s making contact with 66% of the balls he swings at outside the zone. With a career contact rate at 53.6%, this number may point to some coming whiffs. Another negative is that Cuddyer is in the middle of a three-year decline in fly balls. He’ll need to loft the ball a little more in order to keep getting the ball out of the yard – his 18.6% HR/FB rate is an unsustainable career high, in other words.

All of this said, something in between his 2006 and 2007 levels of production are almost certainly on the way, meaning he’ll end up with a batting average around .280 and a decent home run total. That’s another every day starter for you, and a solid starter in leagues any deeper than standard mixed leagues.

Carlos Gomez – The reason for this article has been Gomez’ ‘improving’ play recently. So far in May, he’s gone .250/.327/.354, which counts as a solid jump up from his .195/.250/.293 slash line in April. He’s done so by improving his walk rate to 8.2% and his reach rate from 36.8% to a more decent 25.2% level so far this year.

The question might still be, though, if a center fielder putting up even his improved walk rate can succeed if striking out 22.5% of the time and not showing any power. Sure, his defense in center field is the best of the bunch (15.6 UZR/150 career), but he’s currently a negative on offense. Right now, his best value would be as a defensive replacement in center field, but he’s young and the team will continue to run him out there and cost the more valuable Cuddyer, Young and Span at-bats for no real good reason. If that changes, though, Cuddyer and Span should get a nudge up in your rankings.