Early Season Surprises
by Bill Baer on April 11th, 2011Posted in MLB, Philadelphia Phillies, Sabermetrics | Print | 11 Comments »
Just because the samples are small and the season is young doesn’t mean we can’t be surprised by what we’ve seen so far. The 7-2 start by the Phillies is just about what everyone expected, but the Phillies took an unexpected road to get there.
With many expecting the veteran shortstop to continue on the downward spiral, Rollins has started 2011 with a bang. No, he has not hit a home run nor driven in a run hitting out of the #3 spot in the lineup, but he is hitting more balls on the ground and he is continuing to draw walks, a trend that started during his injury-plagued campaign last year. Rollins’ walk rate is at 9.8 percent, just a hair behind last year’s 10.2%, and he has hit only five fly balls — just 16 percent of his total batted balls. He has also stolen three bases in as many attempts, and looked quite nimble in doing so.
We all knew Bastardo had stuff, but we have yet to see it on display at the Major League level. In the Minors, Bastardo struck out hitters with reckless abandon, but his control was always in question. In four and two-thirds innings so far this year, he has struck out nine hitters (17.4 K/9) and has yet to allow a run, or even walk a batter. If he continues to pitch well, he could hop over J.C. Romero on Charlie Manuel’s bullpen depth chart.
Valdez filled in admirably for the Phillies’ infielders as they seemed to drop like flies last year. He was about replacement level with the bat, but played above-average defense up the middle. Filling in exclusively for Chase Utley in 2011, Valdez has a hot bat through nine games. He’s hitting .333 with three doubles and five RBI hitting out of the #8 spot. While I and many others are skeptical of his ability to maintain his level of production going forward, it is nice to see yet another scrap heap pick-up panning out quite well for the Phillies.
The Bench
Phillies’ substitutes are hitting .462 so far. That’s 12-for-26, which includes one home run and seven RBI (to be fair, most of that was Carlos Ruiz‘s grand slam). John Mayberry has been the most successful bench bat so far, notching four hits in seven at-bats, including a walk-off RBI single on Opening Day against the Houston Astros. The bench was believed to be a big weakness for the Phillies, partially a result of injuries to Utley and Domonic Brown, but the pine-riding crew has looked quite capable through nine games.
If I told you that Baez had pitched five innings without yielding a single run, you would call me a liar. But that’s been the case in 2011, despite allowing a hit in each of his five outings. Charlie Manuel has been using him mostly in low leverage situations: with an 8-3 lead against the Astros on April 2, a 7-1 lead against the New York Mets on the 5th, a 10-0 lead against the Mets on the 7th, and a 10-2 lead against the Atlanta Braves on the 9th. I am most skeptical about Baez’s success going forward, and it appears that even Manuel knows that when you play with fire, you get burned. He is using Baez such that when he gets burnt, it is in as low-leverage a situation as possible.
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11 Responses to “Early Season Surprises”
By Sean Cunningham on Apr 11, 2011
I’m happy with Jimmy’s progress, but would like it if he got all those extra base hits with men on base every once in awhile! Bastardo has just been awesome (the entire ‘pen has, to be honest) and the bench continues to surprise me every day.
Valdez, I think, will probably regress to his normal batting ways, but I still value his defense and will take his hitting as a luxury for now.
By Kyle on Apr 11, 2011
If you had told me Baez would pitch five innings without allowing a run, I would have assumed he was pitching for Lehigh Valley.
By Justin on Apr 11, 2011
Also I think it should be noted that Contreras is doing a great job in the closing duties, and pretty much may have taken the job from Lidge in my opinion…
By Justin on Apr 11, 2011
Also I think Francisco should be on this list.. that is all.
By Bill Baer on Apr 11, 2011
Ha, I totally meant to write about Ben Francisco, but it slipped my mind. Maybe a longer post about him is in order.
By Css228 on Apr 11, 2011
How about Hamels managing to cut the staff ERA almost in half in one start… Doesn’t say much about our first two runs through the rotation (Roys excepted) but damn he pitched a good game yesterday
By Michael on Apr 11, 2011
Bastardo has already surpassed his fWAR from last year, I think. I feel like his success is all the more reason that the Phils should give Mathieson a fair shot in the bigs.
By MplsPhilsFan on Apr 11, 2011
Michael, my sense is that Stutes has passed Mathieson on a list for potential call ups. Not sure why, unless they view him as too much of an injry risk. Best scenario for Mathieson is to be traded to another franchise.
I do think with Bastardo, Stutes, possibly Herndon and Zagurski, the Phils have the possibility of having a quality and cost controlled bullpen for some time
By Dan on Apr 11, 2011
@MplsPhilsFan,
Throw De Fratus in there as well. Plus Worley as the long man (I still like him much better than Kendrick). Really, I think we should be giving Madson his money, and maybe Contreras a little, too. But I think the rest could be filled out in-house with low cost.
By awh on Apr 11, 2011
I am one who is not surprised by Ben Francisco. While I don’t expect him to keep up the level of performance [.300+] at the plate this season, I expected him to be productive.
His track record suggested such.
However, I wm surprised by the poor defensive play. I expected a little better.
By COAL HAMLETS on Apr 11, 2011
Ben Francisco is solid with the bat, but that’s not a real revelation. The real question is what his production will be like over a full season this year. Does a 280 .AVG with 20+ HR, and 5-10 Steals sound reasonable?
His defense on the other hand has always looked rather suspect to these eyes, but I don’t think he’s a complete butcher either. Does he look worse than he actually is?