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| Oh, I'll get to you in a second Francoeur. You just stop swinging at terrible pitches. |
A quick thought on the Royals. Since I’m stone bored right now and attempting to avoid any type of real work, I’ve been reading through old blog posts from the many terrific Royals blog sites. Among my favorites is a blog called Rany on the Royals from a great baseball writer named Rany Jazayrli, whose opinion I greatly respect.
Clicking through old posts, I came across his thoughts on the Royals’ extension of Jeff Francoeur, a signing he felt, was a little to generous, and it probably was. But another claim from the post stuck out more in my mind, a claim that with the Francoeur extension and a potential trade of Melky Cabrera (which has now happened) the Royals lineup would become too righty dominated and struggle with tough, right-handed pitching.
I’ve had a long-standing beef about righty-lefty matchups and managers who quickly pull pitchers because they happen to be right or left handed, and this claim did two things to me. 1) Made me panic that perhaps the Royals are too right handed and will struggle with tough right handed pitching. 2) Made me wonder if the Royals right-handed hitters struggle with right-handed pitching.
This is the crux of my argument against knee-jerk reactions to righty-lefty matchups. If a right-hander hits right-handers just fine, or if a right-handed pitcher gets left handed hitters out, what the hell does it matter? Too often, I’ve seen managers move through pitchers like Kim Kardashian moves through husbands just to get that perfect, angelic “matchup.” Playing the numbers I get. Playing the matchup is a touch overrated because they’re not always the same (Nor does playing matchups and numbers account for a player who is really feeling it on the mound or at the plate, but that’s a whole other argument).
For the Royals, it doesn’t look like they’ll have much of a problem. I see Rany’s skepticism with their right-handed heavy lineup, and on the surface the numbers seem to back him up.
Career v. Righties Career v. Lefties Career v. All
J. Giavotella .243/.261/.360 .262/.311/.429 .247/.273/.376
B. Butler .290/.346/.433 .318/.395/.526 .297/.360/.458
S. Perez .291/.309/.402 .484/.543/.742 .331/.361/.473
L. Cain .319/.362/.437 .260/.296/.320 .302/.343/.402
A. Escobar .247/.284/.347 .266/.295/.281 .252/.294/.339
J. Francoeur .260/.300/.410 .299/.346/.493 .270/.313/.433
AVG .275/.310/.398 .315/.364/.465 .283/.324/.414
*Note that one of these right-handed hitters, Cain, appears to hit better off of right-handed pitching. That’s a fairly small sample size of 49 games and 181 plate appearances, but that’s all we have to go on. This makes the Cabrera trade seem even more worth it, as Cabrera’s value as a switch hitter is a touch negated by Cain’s ability to hit right-handers.
At first glance, these numbers look like a pretty big split between righties and lefties. However, make Perez’s stats against lefties a more realistic .300/.330/.480, which seems much more likely than his big debut, and the numbers versus lefties drop a significantly (.284/.329/.422). Of course, to be fair, we might need to up Giavotella’s line a touch as well, since most are predicting better things at the plate for him in the future as well. Call his line a more realistic .300/.330/.450, and the averages all escalate a little (.291/.332/.425).
If I’m going to cheat and adjust the numbers against lefties for Giavotella and Perez, I should do the same against righties. Let’s assume Perez won’t drop much, maybe just to .280/.300/.390, which is, I think a pretty safe estimate. Giavotella may never crush right handed pitching, but lets say he makes it up to .270/.290/.390. That brings the adjusted numbers against righties to .278/.314/.401 (I know, it’s a lot of guess work, but feel free to make your own guesses too).
So, adjusted for small sample sizes and predicted improvement of Perez and Giavotella respectively, the split looks like this for the Royals right-handed hitters over their careers (I know. Some of those careers have been very short).
Vs. Lefties (.291/.332/.425) Vs. Righties (.278/.314/.401)
That difference seems pretty significant, and to a small degree, it is significant. But not as significant as some make it out to be, and certainly not significant enough to consider trading Cabrera and keeping Francoeur a bad idea. As I’ve noted already, Cain, Cabrera’s replacement, isn’t a part of the difference in the split. He’s essentially a left-handed hitter in terms of his effectiveness against right-handers so far, and predictably, it’s Franeour’s huge career split that is pushing the difference into dangerous territory.
Now, to see why I don’t see the Royals as too right handed, let’s take a look at 2011. In 2011, the Royals split looked like this: .277/.328/.420 v. R and .269/.331/.402 v. L. That’s virtually a wash, a little higher BA and SLG against righties and a little better OBP against lefties. Nothing that pops out. Gordon and Hosmer make up a large portion of that balance against righties, but they’ll be in the lineup when the Royals face right-handed pitchers so … HALLELUJAH! If you’re looking for a significant reason why the Royals were able to keep the split even in 2011, and the reason why I think they’ll be able to keep it even moving forward, look no further than Francoeur.
Part of the reason the numbers are closer for 2011 was because Francoeur’s split wasn’t nearly as lopsided as his career split. He went .279/.318/.445 against righties and .302/.363/.570 against lefties. He still struck out a ton against righties (19.7%), but his walk rate was up (5.1%) and he had a .327 BABIP (Batting Average on Balls in Play). While some are quick to call BABIP a matter of “luck,” I believe that Francoeur’s rise has to do with his increased plate discipline under Kevin Seitzer. In 2011, Francoeur swung at a career low 71.9% of pitches inside the strike zone, had a solid 19.9% Line Drive rate on batted balls, and had a 10.3% HR/FB rate, his highest since 2006. To me, that says that Francoeur is offering at pitcher’s pitches less and squaring the ball up more. For those who prefer the eye test, it certainly looked like Francoeur showed better plate discipline and squared the ball up well in his first year as a Royal.
Is the difference in the split significant in some way? Of course. That’s why it is important to have a guy like Brayan Pena around to pinch-hit for Escobar or Giavotella if they’re struggling against righties (frankly I might pinch-hit Pena for Escobar against a lefty if I really needed a hit). But if Francoeur can keep his split fairly even and Cain can maintain his history against righties, it looks like the balance will exist enough to keep the Royals from needing another left-handed bat or regretting the Cabrera trade. Their left-handed hitting is so potentially strong that it should also help carry the righties if they’re struggling. In the end though, the difference won’t be so substantial to be season altering.
I hope.
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