7/6/18 Reds (Mahle) @ CLUBES (Montgomery) 1:20 CST NBC Sports Chicago/MLBN

[Sammy Sofa]

RIP ct

 

[Tim]

I hate off days.

[Sammys Boombox]

Can we just play the Tigers again today?

[woodchip2153]

[tweet]

[/tweet]

[squally1313]

Stop having Almora lead off against righties.

[Derwood]

Stop having Almora lead off against righties.

 

Why? Until his BABIP regresses to the mean, keep him out there.

[squally1313]

Stop having Almora lead off against righties.

 

Why? Until his BABIP regresses to the mean, keep him out there.

 

...what?

[Derwood]

Stop having Almora lead off against righties.

 

Why? Until his BABIP regresses to the mean, keep him out there.

 

...what?

 

He's batting .330/.370/.455 against righties this year. The numbers are elevated by a high BABIP, but he's not exactly struggling against right handers.

[squally1313]

But that's now how regression works. Every piece of evidence shows he's going to start performing worse against RHPs. You don't get to carry over your past unsustainable BABIP.

 

Zobrist has a 302/412/463 slash against RHPs with a 323 BABIP

Schwarbar is 249/371/553 with a 260 BABIP

 

Tyler Mahle has a wOBA allowed of 407 to LHB, 266 to RHB.

 

I get that lineup order ultimately doesn't matter, but there's really no way to justify this.

[squally1313]

Still no KB activation, so that might be a Thing to worry about.

 

However,

 

[Derwood]

But that's now how regression works. Every piece of evidence shows he's going to start performing worse against RHPs. You don't get to carry over your past unsustainable BABIP.

 

But you're beholden to your past performance against righties?

 

 

I get that lineup order ultimately doesn't matter, but there's really no way to justify this.

 

Because drunky Joe

[squally1313]

But that's now how regression works. Every piece of evidence shows he's going to start performing worse against RHPs. You don't get to carry over your past unsustainable BABIP.

 

But you're beholden to your past performance against righties?

 

Yes? He's gone from being borderline unplayable against RHPs (711 OPS in 2017) to being someone you can feel comfortable starting out there, which is good. He's still a negative baserunner, and his defensive value is up for debate, but with Zobrist having to play more infield with KB out, there's plenty of ABs for Almora amongst the four outfielders.

 

But we have better hitters, including LHBs, against a pitcher who is significantly worse against LHBs. It's one of those things that almost definitely won't have an impact on the result today, but causes concern as to the thought process going forward.

[Bertz]

Almora leading off is not ideal but it's fine, and I don't think it says anything negative about Joe's thought process.

 

- Short of doing something actively harmful like leading off with the pitcher, the lineup doesn't matter as long as everyone is comfortable

- Much like BABIP, L/R splits generally regress to a player's overall mean

- They clearly want Almora to grow into the leadoff role, and are willing to pay a small price now for a larger potential reward later

- It could be just as much about not wanting Willson or Addison at the top of the order as it is about having Almora at 1.

[sneakypower]

[Almora's] defensive value is up for debate

http://gifimage.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/confusion-gif-19.gif

[Cubswin11]

Stop having Almora lead off against righties.

 

Why? Until his BABIP regresses to the mean, keep him out there.

You know when I play blackjack and double down and win I just keep doubling down every hand after until I bust

[sneakypower]

Stop having Almora lead off against righties.

 

Why? Until his BABIP regresses to the mean, keep him out there.

You know when I play blackjack and double down and win I just keep doubling down every hand after until I bust

very true if he goes 0-4 today then we forfeit the season

[squally1313]

[Almora's] defensive value is up for debate

http://gifimage.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/confusion-gif-19.gif

 

https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=cf&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=y&type=8&season=2018&month=0&season1=2018&ind=0&team=0&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0&sort=20,d

 

It all comes down to his routes/recognition vs his very real lack of speed. His arm is fine, nothing special. He makes a lot of catches that show up on the highlight reel, but it's very possible that someone like Heyward (or even Happ) makes those catches look a little bit easier.

[mul21]

Stop having Almora lead off against righties.

 

Why? Until his BABIP regresses to the mean, keep him out there.

You know when I play blackjack and double down and win I just keep doubling down every hand after until I bust

 

Oooh, false equivalencies. I like those!

[Ding Dong Johnson]

[Almora's] defensive value is up for debate

http://gifimage.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/confusion-gif-19.gif

 

https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=cf&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=y&type=8&season=2018&month=0&season1=2018&ind=0&team=0&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0&sort=20,d

 

It all comes down to his routes/recognition vs his very real lack of speed. His arm is fine, nothing special. He makes a lot of catches that show up on the highlight reel, but it's very possible that someone like Heyward (or even Happ) makes those catches look a little bit easier.

lol, Happ's defense is not good

[squally1313]

 

Why? Until his BABIP regresses to the mean, keep him out there.

You know when I play blackjack and double down and win I just keep doubling down every hand after until I bust

 

Oooh, false equivalencies. I like those!

 

You flip a coin 30 times, and it comes up heads 20 times and tails 10 times. For the next flip, someone offers you -150 for heads. Do you take it?

[Derwood]

What the eff does that have to do with anything?

[squally1313]

Because no one in their right minds would take anything less than even odds, because they know that the past results aren't likely to continue in the same manner.

 

Almora is leading the majors in BABIP against all pitchers, and against RHPs. He's not fast, and he doesn't have a batted ball profile that would lend himself to having a high BABIP, much less the highest in baseball. He's 138th in hard hit % against RHP, 65th in line drive %. Everything about that screams that so far this year, his groundballs (39th in groundball %) have managed to find holes. Unless you think Almora, contrary to almost every other hitter in history, has learned how to place his groundballs (and just learned that skill this year), this is a long way of saying he, with a high degree of certainty, will not continue to have the results he's had so far.

 

We have really good hitters who hit RHPs (especially shitty RHPs) really well. They should be getting more PAs than Almora.

[sneakypower]

https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=cf&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=y&type=8&season=2018&month=0&season1=2018&ind=0&team=0&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0&sort=20,d

 

It all comes down to his routes/recognition vs his very real lack of speed. His arm is fine, nothing special. He makes a lot of catches that show up on the highlight reel, but it's very possible that someone like Heyward (or even Happ) makes those catches look a little bit easier.

UZR is the outlier, DRS & statcast rate him as great this year which matches the eye test

 

UZR is too black box for me to opine real well why he's just +1 in their system but the others paint the picture he's been decent on balls in his zone and has made quite a bit more plays in the gaps than the average CF, so i'm not sure that his top-end speed holds him back or is lacking; if anything he's not super quick or bursty

 

i feel confident stating he's a very good fielder though

[sneakypower]

It all comes down to his routes/recognition vs his very real lack of speed. His arm is fine, nothing special. He makes a lot of catches that show up on the highlight reel, but it's very possible that someone like Heyward (or even Happ) makes those catches look a little bit easier.

one more minor point: Almora has slightly better sprint speed than Happ

[squally1313]

https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=cf&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=y&type=8&season=2018&month=0&season1=2018&ind=0&team=0&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0&sort=20,d

 

It all comes down to his routes/recognition vs his very real lack of speed. His arm is fine, nothing special. He makes a lot of catches that show up on the highlight reel, but it's very possible that someone like Heyward (or even Happ) makes those catches look a little bit easier.

UZR is the outlier, DRS & statcast rate him as great this year which matches the eye test

 

UZR is too black box for me to opine real well why he's just +1 in their system but the others paint the picture he's been decent on balls in his zone and has made quite a bit more plays in the gaps than the average CF, so i'm not sure that his top-end speed holds him back or is lacking; if anything he's not super quick or bursty

 

i feel confident stating he's a very good fielder though

 

Yeah, I probably settle on above average. It's a combination of his skill set (namely route running and recognizing the path of the ball off the bat) and the Cubs ability to get the most out of their defense (see Dexter Fowler's defensive number here vs everywhere else). I just think there's a little bit of a Jim Edmonds effect going on. Happ was a bad example, but I see some of those running/sliding catches and while they get the job done, you look at the top 4 defensive CFers on Fangraphs (Cain, Leonys Martin, Delino DeShields, Billy Hamilton) and probably conclude those catches would look a little easier for them.